Life, Death & Superman

There is something deeply ironic in reading about Superman's death on the day I celebrate my birth-day.

Christopher Reeve was one of my all time 'heroes'. The character he played was always larger than life - in the comics I used to read and the movies I used to watch. And when the comic series which chartered the death of Superman was launched, I bought a copy quite almost immediately. On the final pages in which he valiantly fought Doomsday and eventually died, my heart wrenched and somehow, I cried. That was many years back.

The 'real' Superman has now passed on. There is something unreal about the reality of his death. In my mind, I could never square with how Superman could 'die'. He was supposedly invicible, a man of steel. But now he's dead just as how he died in the comic (and was later resurrected!). The reality and the fiction uncannily overlap. I feel a tinge of grief at the loss not just of Superman but Reeve. For Reeve, reality and fiction did become one. His struggle with his condition was in itself an act of heroism, a real superhero - and one that I deeply respected. He - Superman that is - was a childhood hero who grew up with me. And oddly, I learnt many values from him - the sense of justice, the will to persevere, and the feeling of always not being quite like everyone else. But like all comic superheroes, Superman and Reeve will be immortalised in the memory of those who've grown up with him and have come to love all he stood for.