Lisa's World

Friday 27 February 2015

RIP Leonard Nimoy.

“The miracle is this—the more we share, the more we have.” ~ Leonard Nimoy

Leonard Nimoy, who enchanted generations of audiences with his depiction of Star Trek’s human-alien philosopher and first officer Mr Spock, has died at his home in Los Angeles. He was 83.

The actor died on Friday morning of end-stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in Bel-Air, his wife, Susan Bay Nimoy, told the New York Times. He had been hospitalised at UCLA medical center with breathing difficulties days earlier.

Nimoy’s last tweet, sent on Monday, suggested he knew the end was near: “A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP.”

“Live long and prosper” was the Vulcan salutation which he made famous as Spock, and which he and fans carried into real life. Tributes to the actor, director, photographer, writer, poet, musician and teacher agreed he had indeed done so.

“I loved him like a brother,” William Shatner, who starred alongside him as Captain Kirk, wrote on Facebook. “We will all miss his humor, his talent, and his capacity to love.”

George Takei, who played Sulu, said the world had lost a great man. “And I lost a great friend. We return you now to the stars, Leonard. You taught us to ‘Live Long And Prosper,’ and you indeed did, friend. I shall miss you in so many, many ways.”

Nimoy announced last year that he was battling chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and attributed it to smoking, even though he gave up the habit long ago. With typical humour he tweeted last week: “I quit smoking 30 yrs ago. Not soon enough. I have COPD. Grandpa says, quit now!! LLAP.”

He enjoyed an enduring and eclectic career in the arts and in film behind the camera but it was as the pointy-eared, relentlessly logical sidekick to William Shatner’s Captain Kirk that Nimoy will be best remembered.

Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek, called Spock its “conscience”, a quizzical, alien and yet also humane moral sense which pervaded the original NBC series as well as subsequent big-screen outings, most recently in the rebooted films directed by JJ Abrams.

The actor, born in Boston to Ukrainian immigrants and Orthodox Jews, embraced the figure of the lone alien on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise, exploring the universe with more emotional, fully human characters.

His first autobiography, I Am Not Spock, published in 1977, said that as the Vulcan he found the best of both worlds, gaining public approval while still being able to play an other-worldly character. He published another biography, I Am Spock, in 1995.

“To this day, I sense Vulcan speech patterns, Vulcan social attitudes and even Vulcan patterns of logic and emotional suppression in my behavior,” Nimoy noted. It was not a complaint. “Given the choice, if I had to be someone else, I would be Spock.”

http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2015/feb/27/leonard-nimoy-mr-spock-star-trek-dies-ages-83