Norm Geras of normblog, one of the most thoughtful and decent (in the non-sneering sense) people in the blogosphere, has revealed that he is in hospital being treated for the spread of prostate cancer.
I was first diagnosed with early prostate cancer at the beginning of 2003, not long before starting normblog. Though my initial treatment failed to cure the condition, I have remained asymptomatic and in good health for 10 years under the first-rate care of Christie Hospital in Manchester and the treatments recommended and implemented there. But this decade of good fortune ran out for me at the end of February this year when I learned that the cancer had now spread and, simultaneously, I started to suffer the effects of that.
As someone who for years has appreciated Norm’s wisdom and good sense, who had the privilege of meeting him when he visited Washington several years ago, who was the subject of one of his blogger profiles, who is a fellow Emmylou Harris fan, and who was treated for early-stage prostate cancer almost three years ago (with apparent success up to now), my thoughts are with Norm and his family.
The good news is that Norm hopes to be out of the hospital soon, and that he continues to blog as often as he can– as in this excellent post about why the victory over fascism in World War II was (even with its dark side) a great achievement that, despite a recent Guardian editorial, should not be “put to rest.”
Update: amie reports that Norm has returned home from the hospital.