Our Self-Written Obituaries – Stuart Freedman, Indian Coffee House
The 63rd death.
[Text by Stuart Freedman; photo © E.Corbin]
The English photographer Stuart Freedman died today in Delhi, appropriately in beautiful light at dusk in his favourite seat, on the balcony of his beloved Indian Coffee House, so reminiscent of the cafes of his London (misspent) youth. Apparently at the last, in his mind, he flew over the buildings with the Kites – soaring through the languid, polluted air above a city that was both Delhi and London and all the hundreds and hundreds of cities that he’d visited in a career that spanned more than half a century.
Mr Freedman grew up in a grim, grey tower block in Hackney, East London, in the 1970s and spent the rest of his life looking for beautiful things to photograph and write about to reassure himself he’d never have to go back there. He found in Delhi and later in a bolt-hole in the English countryside, places where he could escape with his long-suffering partner, Kim. He leaves a gigantic library of books, papers, unedited images, a greyhound that misses him terribly and a fervent hope that his beloved Tottenham Hotspur might one day win the league.
Our Self-Written Obituaries invites people to write their obituary in 200 words. The idea is to share with the world how you will like to be remembered after you are gone. (May you live a long life, of course!) Please mail me your self-obit at mayankaustensoofi@gmail.com.
Kites! Unique and beautiful.