IN MEMORY OF MARION VON ADLERSTEIN

I faltered over writing this farewell to Marion von Adlerstein – both of us formerly of this magazine. Not only is it odd to say goodbye to a friend with whom you share a name, I have found myself in what I suspect must be a widely shared time warp I’ll call ‘grief disbelief’.

For how many others must there be all over the world, who, separated by closed borders and quarantine, denied by the global pandemic the necessary rituals with which we deal with death, feel the same? In the past, we rushed for planes in response to teary late-night phone calls. We packed black. We arranged for flowers.