Christopher Hitchens Explained

Christopher Hitchens
Birth Name:	Christopher Eric Hitchens
Birth Date:	13 April 1949
Birth Place:	Portsmouth, Hampshire, England
Death Place:	Houston, Texas, US
Children:	3
Era:	Contemporary
Education:	Balliol College, Oxford (BA)
Notable Ideas:	Hitchens's razor
Signature:	Christopher Hitchens signature.svg
Module:	Embed: yes Party: Labour (1965–1967) International Socialists (1967–1971)

Christopher Eric Hitchens (13 April 1949 – 15 December 2011) was a British and American author, journalist, and educator.^{[1] [2]} Author of 18 books on faith, culture, politics and literature, he was born and educated in Britain, graduating in the 1970s from Oxford with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics. In the early 1980s, he emigrated to the United States and wrote for The Nation and Vanity Fair. Known as "one of the 'four horsemen'" (along with Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett) of New Atheism, he gained prominence as a columnist and speaker. His epistemological razor, which states that "what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence", is still of mark in philosophy and law.^{[3] [4]}

Hitchens's political views evolved greatly throughout his life.^[5] Originally describing himself as a democratic socialist, he was a member of various socialist organisations in his early life, including the Trotskyist International Socialists.^[6] He was critical of aspects of American foreign policy, including its involvement in Vietnam, Chile and East Timor. However, he also supported the United States in the Kosovo War. Hitchens emphasised the centrality of the American Revolution and Constitution to his political philosophy.^[7] Hitchens held complex views on abortion; being ethically opposed to it in most instances, and believing that a fetus was entitled to personhood, while holding ambiguous, changing views on its legality.^[8] He supported gun rights and supported same-sex marriage, while opposing the war on drugs.^{[9] [10]} Beginning in the 1990s, and particularly after 9/11, his politics were widely viewed as drifting to the right, but Hitchens objected to being called conservative.^{[5] [11] [12]} During the 2000s, he argued for the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, endorsed the re-election campaign of US President George W. Bush in 2004, and viewed Islamism as the principal threat to the Western world.^{[13] [14]}

Hitchens described himself as an anti-theist and saw all religions as false, harmful, and authoritarian.^[15] He endorsed free expression, scientific scepticism, and separation of church and state, arguing science and philosophy are superior to religion as an ethical code of conduct for human civilisation.^[16] Hitchens notably wrote critical biographies of Catholic nun Mother Teresa in The Missionary Position, President Bill Clinton in No One Left To Lie To, and American diplomat Henry Kissinger in The Trial of Henry Kissinger. Hitchens died from complications related to oesophageal cancer in December 2011, at the age of 62.

Life and career

Early life and education

Hitchens was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, the elder of two boys; his brother, Peter, became a socially conservative journalist. Their parents, Commander Eric Ernest Hitchens (1909–1987) and Yvonne Jean Hitchens (née Hickman; 1921–1973), met in Scotland when serving in the Royal Navy during World War II. His mother had been a Wren, a member of the Women's Royal Naval Service.^[17] She was of Jewish origin (Christopher and his brother were 1/32 ethnically Jewish^[18]), something Hitchens discovered when he was 38; he came to identify as a Jew.^{[19] [20] [21]}

Hitchens often referred to Eric simply as 'the commander'. Eric was deployed on, which took part in the sinking of the in the Battle of the North Cape on 26 December 1943. He paid tribute to his father's contribution to the war: "Sending a Nazi convoy raider to the bottom is a better day's work than any I have ever done." Eric's naval career required the family to move from base to base throughout Britain and its colonies, including to Malta, where Peter Hitchens was born in Sliema in 1951.^[22] Eric later worked as a bookkeeper for boatbuilders, speedboat-manufacturers, and a prep school.^{[23] [24]}

Hitchens attended two independent schools—Mount House School, Tavistock, Devon, from the age of eight, and the Leys School in Cambridge. Hitchens went up to Balliol College, Oxford in 1967 where he read Philosophy, Politics and Economics and was tutored by Steven Lukes and Anthony Kenny. He graduated in 1970 with a third-class degree.^[25] In his adolescence, he was "bowled over" by Richard Llewellyn's How Green Was My Valley, Arthur Koestler's Darkness at Noon, Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment, R. H. Tawney's critique on Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, and the works of George Orwell.^[17] In 1968, he took part in the TV quiz show University Challenge.^{[26] [27]}

In the 1960s Hitchens joined the political left, drawn by disagreement over the Vietnam War, nuclear weapons, racism and oligarchy, including that of "the unaccountable corporation".^[28] He expressed affinity with the politically charged countercultural and protest movements of the 1960s and 1970s. He avoided the recreational drug use of the time, saying "in my cohort we were slightly anti-hedonistic ... it made it very much easier for police provocation to occur, because the planting of drugs was something that happened to almost everyone one knew."^[29] Hitchens was inspired to become a journalist after reading a piece by James Cameron.^[30]

Hitchens was bisexual during his younger days, and joked that as he aged, his appearance "declined to the point where only women would go to bed with [him]."^[31] He said he had sexual relations with two male students at Oxford who would later become Tory ministers during the premiership of Margaret Thatcher, although he would not reveal their names publicly.^[31]

Hitchens joined the Labour Party in 1965, but along with the majority of the Labour students' organisation was expelled in 1967, because of what Hitchens called "Prime Minister Harold Wilson's contemptible support for the war in Vietnam."^[32] Under the influence of Peter Sedgwick, who translated the writings of Russian revolutionary and Soviet dissident Victor Serge, Hitchens forged an ideological interest in Trotskyism and anti-Stalinist socialism.^[17] Shortly after, he joined "a small but growing post-Trotskyist Luxemburgist sect" the International Socialists. ^{[33] [34]} Hitchens recruited James Fenton to the International Socialists.^[35]

Journalistic career in the UK (1971–1981)

Early in his career Hitchens began working as a correspondent for the magazine International Socialism,^[36] published by the International Socialists, the forerunners of today's British Socialist Workers Party. This group was broadly Trotskyist, but differed from more orthodox Trotskyist groups in its refusal to defend communist states as "workers' states". Their slogan was "Neither Washington nor Moscow but International Socialism".

In 1971 after spending a year travelling the United States on a scholarship, Hitchens went to work at the Times Higher Education Supplement where he served as a social science correspondent.^[37] Hitchens was fired after six months in the job.^[37] Next he was a researcher for ITV's Weekend World.^[38]

In 1973 Hitchens went to work for the New Statesman, where his colleagues included the authors Martin Amis, whom he had briefly met at Oxford, as well as Julian Barnes and James Fenton, with whom he had shared a house in Oxford.^[38] Amis described him at the time as, "handsome, festive [and] gauntly left-wing".^[39] Around that time, the Friday lunches began, which were attended by writers including Clive James, Ian McEwan, Kingsley Amis, Terence Kilmartin, Robert Conquest, Al Alvarez, Peter Porter, Russell Davies and Mark Boxer. At the New Statesman Hitchens acquired a reputation as a left-winger while working as a war correspondent from areas of conflict such as Northern Ireland, Libya, and Iraq.^[38]

In November 1973, while in Greece, Hitchens reported on the constitutional crisis of the military junta. It became his first leading article for the New Statesman.^[30] In December 1977 Hitchens interviewed Argentine dictator Jorge Rafael Videla, a conversation he later described as "horrifying".^[40] In 1977, unhappy at the New Statesman, Hitchens defected to the Daily Express where he became a foreign correspondent. He returned to the New Statesman in 1978 where he became assistant editor and then foreign editor.^[38]

American writings (1981–2011)

Hitchens went to the United States in 1981 as part of an editor exchange programme between the New Statesman and The Nation.^[41] After joining The Nation, he penned vociferous critiques of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and American foreign policy in South and Central America.^{[19] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46]}

Hitchens became a contributing editor of Vanity Fair in 1992,^[47] writing ten columns a year. He left The Nation in 2002 after profoundly disagreeing with other contributors over the Iraq War.^[48]

There is speculation that Hitchens was the inspiration for Tom Wolfe's character Peter Fallow in the 1987 novel The Bonfire of the Vanities,^[43] but others—including Hitchens—believe it to be Spy Magazines "Ironman Nightlife Decathlete", Anthony Haden-Guest.^[49] In 1987, Hitchens's father died from cancer of the oesophagus, the same disease that would later claim his own life.^[50] In April 2007, Hitchens became a US citizen; he later stated that he saw himself as Anglo-American.^[51]

He became a media fellow at the Hoover Institution in September 2008.^[52] At Slate, he usually wrote under the news-and-politics column Fighting Words.^[53]

Hitchens spent part of his early career in journalism as a foreign correspondent in Cyprus.^[54] Through his work there he met his first wife Eleni Meleagrou, a Greek Cypriot, with whom he had two children, Alexander and Sophia. His son, Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens, born in 1984, has worked as a policy researcher in London. Hitchens continued writing essay-style correspondence pieces from a variety of locales, including Chad, Uganda^[55] and the Darfur region of Sudan.^[56] In 1991, he received a Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction.^[57]

Hitchens met Carol Blue in Los Angeles in 1989 and they married in 1991. Hitchens called it love at first sight.^[58] In 1999, Hitchens and Blue, both harsh critics of President Clinton, submitted an affidavit to the trial managers of the Republican Party in the impeachment of Bill Clinton. Therein they swore that their then-friend Sidney Blumenthal had described Monica Lewinsky as a stalker. This allegation contradicted Blumenthal's own sworn deposition in the trial,^[59] and it resulted in a hostile exchange of opinion in the public sphere between Hitchens and Blumenthal. Following the publication of Blumenthal's The Clinton Wars, Hitchens wrote several pieces in which he accused Blumenthal of manipulating the facts.^{[59] [60]} The incident ended their friendship and sparked a personal crisis for Hitchens, who was stridently criticised by friends for what they saw as a cynical and ultimately politically futile act.^[19]

Before Hitchens's political shift, the American author and polemicist Gore Vidal was apt to speak of Hitchens as his "dauphin" or "heir".^{[61] [62]} In 2010 Hitchens attacked Vidal in a Vanity Fair piece headlined "Vidal Loco", calling him a "crackpot" for his adoption of 9/11 conspiracy theories.^{[63] [64]} On the back of Hitchens's memoir Hitch-22, among the praise from notable figures, Vidal's endorsement of Hitchens as his successor is crossed out in red and annotated "NO, C.H." Hitchens's strong advocacy of the war in Iraq gained him a wider readership, and in September 2005 he was named as fifth on the list of the "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines.^[65] An online poll ranked the 100 intellectuals, but the magazines noted that the rankings of Hitchens (5), Noam Chomsky (1), and Abdolkarim Soroush (15) were partly due to their respective supporters' publicising of the vote. Hitchens later responded to his ranking with a few articles about his status as such.^{[66] [67]}

Hitchens did not leave his position writing for The Nation until after the 11 September attacks, stating that he felt the magazine had arrived at a position "that John Ashcroft is a greater menace than Osama bin Laden".^[68] The 11 September attacks "exhilarated" him, bringing into focus "a battle between everything I love and everything I hate" and strengthening his embrace of an interventionist foreign policy that challenged "fascism with an Islamic face".^[46] His numerous editorials in support of the Iraq War caused some to label him a neoconservative, although Hitchens insisted he was not "a conservative of any kind", and his friend Ian McEwan described him as representing the anti-totalitarian left.^[69] Hitchens recalls in his memoir having been "invited by Bernard-Henri Lévy to write an essay on political reconsiderations for his magazine La Regle du Jeu. I gave it the partly ironic title: 'Can One Be a Neoconservative?' Impatient with this, some copy editor put it on the cover as 'How I Became a Neoconservative.' Perhaps this was an instance of the Cartesian principle as opposed to the English empiricist one: It was decided that I evidently was what I apparently only thought." Indeed, in a 2010 BBC interview, he stated that he "still [thought] like a Marxist" and considered himself "a leftist".^[70]

In 2007, Hitchens published one of his most controversial articles titled "Why Women Aren't Funny" in Vanity Fair. While providing no empirical evidence, he argued that there is less societal pressure for women to practice humour and that "women who do it play by men's rules".^[71] Over the following year, Vanity Fair published several letters that it received, objecting to the tone or premise of the article, as well as a rebuttal by Alessandra Stanley.^[72] Amid further criticism, Hitchens reiterated his position in a video and written response.^{[73] [74]}

In 2007 Hitchens's work for Vanity Fair won the National Magazine Award in the category "Columns and Commentary".^[75] He was a finalist in the same category in 2008 for some of his columns in Slate but lost out to Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone.^[76] Hitch-22 was short-listed for the 2010 National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. He won the National Magazine Award for Columns about Cancer in 2011.^{[77] [78]} Hitchens also served on the advisory board of Secular Coalition for America and offered advice to the Coalition on the acceptance and inclusion of nontheism in American life.^[79] In December 2011, prior to his death, Asteroid 57901 Hitchens was named after him.^[80]

Literature reviews

Hitchens wrote a monthly essay in The Atlantic^[81] and occasionally contributed to other literary journals. One of his books, Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere, collected these works. In Why Orwell Matters, he defends Orwell's writings against modern critics as relevant today and progressive for his time. In the 2008 book Christopher Hitchens and His Critics: Terror, Iraq, and the Left, many literary critiques are included of essays and other books of writers, such as David Horowitz and Edward Said.

During a three-hour In Depth interview on Book TV, he named authors who influenced his views, including Aldous Huxley, George Orwell, Evelyn Waugh, Kingsley Amis, P. G. Wodehouse and Conor Cruise O'Brien.^{[82] [83] [84]} When asked what the difference between an autobiography and a memoir was, he replied "Look, everyone has a book inside of them ... which is exactly where I think it should, in most cases, remain".^[85]

Professorships

Hitchens was a visiting professor in the following institutions:

• University of California, Berkeley^{[86] [87] [88]}
• The University of Pittsburgh^{[87] [89]}
• The New School of Social Research^{[86] [87] [88]}

Relationship with his brother

Journalist and author Peter Hitchens is Christopher's younger brother by two years. Christopher said in 2005 the main difference between the two is belief in the existence of God.^[90] Peter became a member of the International Socialists (forerunners of the modern Socialist Workers' Party) from 1968 to 1975 (beginning at age 17) after Christopher introduced him to them.^[91]

The brothers reportedly fell out after Peter wrote a 2001 article in The Spectator which allegedly characterised Christopher as a Stalinist.^{[90] [92]} After the birth of Peter's third child, the brothers were reconciled.^[93] Peter's review of God Is Not Great led to a public argument between the brothers but no renewed estrangement.^[94]

In 2007 the brothers appeared as panellists on BBC TV's Question Time, where they clashed on a number of issues.^[95] In 2008, in the US, they debated the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the existence of God.^[96] In 2010 at the Pew Forum, the pair debated the nature of God in civilisation.^[97] At the memorial service held for Christopher in New York, Peter read a passage from St Paul's Epistle to the Philippians.^[98]

Political views

In 2009 Hitchens was listed by Forbes magazine as one of the "25 most influential liberals in the U.S. media".^[99] The article also noted that he would "likely be aghast to find himself on this list", as it reduces his self-styled radicalism to mere liberalism. Hitchens's political perspectives also appear in his wide-ranging writings, which include many dialogues.^[100] He said of Ayn Rand's Objectivism, "I have always found it quaint, and rather touching, that there is a movement in the US that thinks Americans are not yet selfish enough."^[101]

Hitchens disagreed with the premise of a Jewish homeland^[102] and had said of himself, "I am an Anti-Zionist. I'm one of those people of Jewish descent who believes that Zionism would be a mistake even if there were no Palestinians."^[103]

Having long described himself as a socialist and a Marxist, Hitchens began his break from the established political left after what he called the "tepid reaction" of the Western left to the controversy over The Satanic Verses, followed by what he saw as the left's embrace of Bill Clinton and the anti-war movement's opposition to NATO intervention in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s. He later became a so-called liberal hawk and supported the War on Terror, but he had some reservations, such as his characterisation of waterboarding as torture after voluntarily undergoing the procedure.^{[104] [105]} In January 2006, he joined four other individuals and four organisations, including the ACLU and Greenpeace, as plaintiffs in a lawsuit, ACLU v. NSA, challenging Bush's NSA warrantless surveillance; the lawsuit was filed by the ACLU.^{[106] [107]}

Hitchens was an avid critic of President Slobodan Milošević of Serbia and other Serbian politicians of the 1990s. He called Milošević a "fascist" and a "Nazi" after the Bosnian genocide and ethnic cleansing of Albanians in Kosovo and expressed a positive reaction to his death. Hitchens often accused the Serbian government of committing numerous war crimes during the Yugoslav Wars. He denounced people like Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman, who criticised the NATO intervention there. Hitchens also criticised Croatian president Franjo Tuđman and the policies of the Croatian government, which he saw as reviving "Ustashe formations".^{[108] [109] [110]}

Hitchens held complex views on abortion; being ethically opposed to it in most instances, and believing that a fetus was entitled to personhood, while holding ambiguous and changing views on its legality.^[111] In a 1988 interview with Crisis Magazine, Hitchens wrote: "It might interest your readers to know that Margaret Thatcher voted to keep capital punishment, to keep homosexuality criminal, to make divorce harder to get, and for the abortion bill. I gather that she's since changed her position on the latter. My own vote would have been, as so often, exactly the reverse of hers."^[8] However, Hitchens argued that the issue was cynically used by self-described pro-life politicians, and doubted that they sincerely desired to legally prohibit abortion.^[111]

In the same 1988 interview with Crisis Magazine he stated:^[8] and that:^[8] Hitchens allegedly supported gun rights^{[9] [112]} and supported same-sex marriage.^{[113] [114]}

Hitchens was a supporter of the European Union. In an appearance on C-SPAN in 1993, Hitchens said, "As of 1992, there is now a Euro passport that makes you free to travel within the boundaries of ... member countries, and I've always liked the idea of European unity, and so I held out for a Euro passport. So I travel as a European." Speaking at the launch of his brother Peter Hitchens's book, The Abolition of Britain, at Conway Hall in London, Hitchens denounced the so-called Eurosceptic movement, describing it as "the British version of fascism". He went on to say, "Scepticism is a title of honour. These people are not sceptical. They're fanatical. They're dogmatic".

Critiques of specific individuals

Hitchens wrote book-length biographical essays on Thomas Jefferson (), Thomas Paine () and George Orwell (Why Orwell Matters).

He also became known for excoriating criticisms of public contemporary figures, including Mother Teresa, Bill Clinton and Henry Kissinger, the subjects of three full-length texts: , , and The Trial of Henry Kissinger respectively.

Writers Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy published an article in Time in 2007,^[115] claiming that Hitchens, while promoting his book , described the Christian evangelist Billy Graham as "a self-conscious fraud" and "a disgustingly evil man" and that the evangelist had made a living by "going around spouting lies to young people. What a horrible career. I gather it's soon to be over. I certainly hope so." They challenged Hitchens's suggestion that Graham went into ministry to make money. They argued that during his career Graham "turn[ed] down million-dollar television and Hollywood offers". They also pointed out that having established the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association in 1950, Graham drew a straight salary, comparable to that of a senior minister, irrespective of the money raised by his meetings.^[116]

In 1999, Hitchens wrote a profile of Donald Trump for The Sunday Herald. Trump had expressed interest in running in the 2000 US Presidential Election as a candidate for the Reform Party. Of Trump, Hitchens said, "Because the man with many monikers in many ways embodies his country and because this election cycle is now so absurd, and so much up for grabs, it is unwise to exclude anything ... The best guess has to be that here's a man who hates to be alone, who needs approval and reinforcement, who talks a better game than he plays, who is crude, hyperactive, emotional and optimistic."^[117] Hitchens had previously written that Trump demonstrated how "nobody is more covetous and greedy than those who have far too much."^[118]

Criticism of religion

See also: God Is Not Great. Hitchens was an antitheist, and said that a person "could be an atheist and wish that belief in God were correct", but that "an antitheist, a term I'm trying to get into circulation, is someone who is relieved that there's no evidence for such an assertion."^[119] He often spoke against the Abrahamic religions. When asked by readers of The Independent (London) what he considered to be the "axis of evil", Hitchens replied "Christianity, Judaism, Islam – the three leading monotheisms."^[120] In debates Hitchens often posed what has become known as "Hitchens's Challenge": to name at least one moral action that a person without a faith (e.g., an atheist or antitheist) could not possibly perform, and conversely, to name one immoral action that only a person with a faith could perform or has performed in the past.^{[121] [122]}

In his best-seller God Is Not Great, Hitchens expanded his criticism to include all religions, including those rarely criticised by Western secularists, such as Hinduism, Buddhism and neo-paganism. Hitchens said that organised religion is "the main source of hatred in the world", calling it "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children: [it] ought to have a great deal on its conscience".^[123] In the same work Hitchens says that humanity therefore needs a renewed Enlightenment.^[124] The book received mixed responses, ranging from praise in The New York Times for his "logical flourishes and conundrums"^[125] to accusations of "intellectual and moral shabbiness" in the Financial Times.^[126] God Is Not Great was nominated for a National Book Award on 10 October 2007.^[127]

God Is Not Great affirmed Hitchens's position in the "New Atheism" movement. Hitchens was made an Honorary Associate of the Rationalist International and the National Secular Society shortly after its release and he was later named to the Honorary Board of distinguished achievers of the Freedom From Religion Foundation.^{[128] [129]} He also joined the advisory board of the Secular Coalition for America, a group of atheists and humanists.^[79] Hitchens said he would accept an invitation from any religious leader who wished to debate with him. On 30 September 2007, Richard Dawkins, Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett met at Hitchens's residence for a private, unmoderated discussion lasting two hours. The event was videotaped and entitled "The Four Horsemen".^[130] In it, Hitchens stated at one point that he saw the Maccabean Revolt as the most unfortunate event in human history due to the reversion from Hellenistic thought and philosophy to messianism and fundamentalism that its success constituted.^{[131] [132]}

That year Hitchens began a series of written debates on the question "Is Christianity Good for the World?" with Christian theologian and pastor Douglas Wilson, published in Christianity Today magazine.^[133] This exchange eventually became a book with the same title published in 2008. During their promotional tour of the book, they were accompanied by the producer Darren Doane's film crew. Thence Doane produced the film Collision: Is Christianity GOOD for the World?, which was released on 27 October 2009.^{[134] [135]} On 4 April 2009, Hitchens debated William Lane Craig on the existence of God at Biola University.^[136] On 19 October 2009, Intelligence Squared explored the question "Is the Catholic Church a force for good in the world?".^[137] John Onaiyekan and Ann Widdecombe argued that it was, while Hitchens joined Stephen Fry in arguing that it was not. The latter side won the debate according to an audience poll.^[138] On 5 October 2010, Hitchens debated with Tariq Ramadan, as to whether Islam was a religion of peace, at 92 NY.^[139] On 26 November 2010, Hitchens appeared in Toronto, Ontario, at the Munk Debates, where he debated religion with former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, a convert to Roman Catholicism. Blair argued religion is a force for good, while Hitchens argued against that.^[140]

Throughout these debates, Hitchens became known for his persuasive and enthusiastic rhetoric in public speaking. "Wit and eloquence", "verbal barbs and linguistic dexterity" and "self-reference, literary engagement and hyperbole" are all elements of his speeches.^{[141] [142] [143]} The term "hitch-slap" has been used as an informal term among his supporters for a carefully crafted remark designed to humiliate his opponents.^{[143] [144]} Hitchens's line "one asks wistfully if there is no provision in the procedures of military justice for them to be taken out and shot," condemning the perpetrators of the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, was cited by The Humanist as an example.^[145] A tribute in Politico stated that this was a trait Hitchens shared with fellow atheist and intellectual Gore Vidal.^[146]

Personal life

Hitchens was raised nominally Christian and attended Christian boarding schools, but from an early age he declined to participate in communal prayers. Later in life, Hitchens discovered that he was of Jewish descent on his mother's side and that his Jewish ancestors were immigrants from Eastern Europe (including Poland).^{[30] [147]} Hitchens was married twice, first to Eleni Meleagrou, a Greek Cypriot, in 1981; the couple had a son, Alexander, and a daughter, Sophia.^[148]

In 1991 Hitchens married his second wife, Carol Blue, an American screenwriter,^[19] in a ceremony held at the apartment of Victor Navasky, editor of The Nation. They had a daughter together, Antonia.^[19]

Hitchens considered reading, writing, and public speaking not as a job or career but as "what I am, who I am, [and] what I love."^[149]

In November 1973 Hitchens's mother died by suicide in Athens in a pact with her lover, a defrocked clergyman named Timothy Bryan.^[17] The pair overdosed on sleeping pills in adjoining hotel rooms and Bryan slashed his wrists in the bathtub. Hitchens flew alone to Athens to recover his mother's body, initially under the impression that she had been murdered.

In 2007, after living in the United States for twenty-five years, he became an American citizen, electing to retain his UK citizenship.^[150]

Illness and death

On 8 June 2010, Hitchens was on tour in New York promoting his memoirs Hitch-22 when he was taken into emergency care suffering from a severe pericardial effusion. Soon after, he announced he was postponing his tour to undergo treatment for oesophageal cancer.^[151]

In a Vanity Fair piece published in 2010, titled "Topic of Cancer",^[50] he stated that he was undergoing treatment for cancer. He said that he recognised the long-term prognosis was far from positive and he would be a "very lucky person to live another five years."^[152] A heavy smoker and drinker since his teenage years, Hitchens acknowledged that these habits were likely to have contributed to his illness. During his illness, Hitchens was under the care of Francis Collins and was the subject of Collins's new cancer treatment, which maps out the human genome and selectively targets damaged DNA.^[153]

According to Christopher Buckley, before Hitchens died, his estranged friend Sidney Blumenthal wrote to Hitchens. Buckley said the letter contained words of "tenderness and comfort and implicit forgiveness."^[154]

Hitchens died of pneumonia on 15 December 2011 in the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, aged 62.^[148]

According to Andrew Sullivan, his last words were "Capitalism. Downfall."^[155]

In accordance with his wishes, his body was donated to medical research.^[156] Mortality, a collection of seven of Hitchens's Vanity Fair essays about his illness, was published posthumously in September 2012.^{[157] [158]}

Reactions to death

Former British prime minister Tony Blair said, "Christopher Hitchens was a complete one-off, an amazing mixture of writer, journalist, polemicist and unique character. He was fearless in the pursuit of truth and any cause in which he believed. And there was no belief he held that he did not advocate with passion, commitment and brilliance. He was an extraordinary, compelling and colourful human being whom it was a privilege to know."^{[159] [160]}

Richard Dawkins said of Hitchens, "He was a polymath, a wit, immensely knowledgeable, and a valiant fighter against all tyrants, including imaginary supernatural ones."^[160] Dawkins later described Hitchens as "probably the best orator I've ever heard", and called his death "an enormous loss".^[161] American theoretical physicist and cosmologist Lawrence Krauss said, "Christopher was a beacon of knowledge and light in a world that constantly threatens to extinguish both. He had the courage to accept the world for just what it is and not what he wanted it to be. That's the highest praise, I believe, one can give to any intellect. He understood that the universe doesn't care about our existence or welfare, and he epitomized the realization that our lives have meaning only to the extent that we give them meaning."^{[162] [163]} Bill Maher paid tribute to Hitchens on his show Real Time with Bill Maher, saying, "We lost a hero of mine, a friend, and one of the great talk show guests of all time."^[164] Salman Rushdie and English comedian Stephen Fry paid tribute at the Christopher Hitchens Vanity Fair Memorial 2012.^{[165] [166] [167] [168]}

British Conservative and friend of Hitchens Douglas Murray paid tribute to Hitchens in an article in The Spectator, recalling personal experiences with him.^[169]

Three weeks before Hitchens's death, George Eaton of the New Statesman wrote, "He is determined to ensure that he is not remembered simply as a 'lefty who turned right' or as a contrarian and provocateur. Throughout his career, he has retained a commitment to the Enlightenment values of reason, secularism, and pluralism. His targets—Mother Teresa, Bill Clinton, Henry Kissinger, God—are chosen not at random, but rather because they have offended one or more of these principles. The tragedy of Hitchens's illness is that it came at a time when he enjoyed a larger audience than ever. The great polemicist is certain to be remembered, but, as he was increasingly aware, perhaps not as he would like."^[170] The Chronicle of Higher Education asked if Hitchens was the last public intellectual.^[171]

The Hitchens Prize

In 2015, an annual prize of $50,000 was established in his honour by The Dennis and Victoria Ross Foundation for "an author or journalist whose work reflects a commitment to free expression and inquiry, a range and depth of intellect, and a willingness to pursue the truth without regard to personal or professional consequence." The foundation's website states the Hitchens Prize "seeks to advance what he was dedicated to throughout his life: vigorous, honest, and open public debate and discussion, with no tolerance of orthodoxy, no reverence for authority, and a belief in reasoned dialogue as the best path to the truth." The 2024 winner was Errol Morris.^[172]

Film and television appearances

Year	Film, DVD, or TV episode
1984	Opinions "Greece to their Rome"
	Firing Line "Is There a Liberal Crack-Up?"
1989	Frontiers "Cyprus: Stranded in Time"
1993	Everything You Need to Know
	The Opinions Debate^[173]
1994	Tracking Down Maggie: The Unofficial Biography of Margaret Thatcher
	Hell's Angel (documentary)
1996	Where's Elvis This Week?
1996–2010	Charlie Rose (13 episodes)
1998	Real Stories: Diana: The Mourning After^[174]
	Uncommon Knowledge "The Sixties"
1999–2001	Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher
1999–2002	Dennis Miller Live (TV show; 4 episodes)
2000	The Other Side: Hitch Hike
2002	The Trials of Henry Kissinger
2003	Hidden in Plain Sight
2003–09	Real Time with Bill Maher (TV show; 6 episodes)
2004	Mel Gibson: God's Lethal Weapon
	Texas: America Supersized^[175]
2004–06	Newsnight (TV show; 3 episodes)
2004–10	The Daily Show (TV show; 4 episodes)
2005	(TV show; 1 episode, s03e05)
	The Al Franken Show (Radio show; 1 episode)
	Confronting Iraq: Conflict and Hope
2005–08	Hardball with Chris Matthews (TV show; 3 episodes)
2006	American Zeitgeist
	Blog Wars
2007	Manufacturing Dissent
	Question Time (1 episode)
	Your Mommy Kills Animals
	Personal Che
	Heckler
	In Pot We Trust
	Hannity's America
	In Depth (C-Span2 Book TV)
2008	Can Atheism Save Europe? (DVD; 9 August 2008 debate with John Lennox at the Edinburgh International Festival)
	Discussions with Richard Dawkins: Episode 1: "The Four Horsemen" (DVD; 30 September 2007)
2009	Holy Hell (Chap. 5 in 6 Part Web Film on iTunes)^[176]
	God on Trial (DVD; September 2008 debate with Dinesh D'Souza)
	President: A Political Road Trip
	Collision: "Is Christianity GOOD for the World?" (DVD; Fall 2008 debates with Douglas Wilson)
	Does God Exist? (DVD; 4 April 2009 debate with William Lane Craig)
	Fighting Words^[177] (TV movie; 2009)
2010
	The God Debates, Part I: A Spirited Discussion (DVD; debate with Shmuley Boteach; Host: Mark Derry; Commentary: Miles Redfield)
2011	Is God Great? (DVD; 3 March 2009 debate with John Lennox at Samford University)
	92Y: Christopher Hitchens (DVD; 8 June 2010 dialogue with Salman Rushdie at 92nd Street Y)
	ABC Lateline^[178] (TV show, 2 episodes)
	Texas Freethought Convention (DVD; 8 October 2011 Recipient of Richard Dawkins Award, final public appearance)
2013	Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia^[179] (DVD Documentary)
2015	Best of Enemies (Posthumous release)

Books

See main article: Christopher Hitchens bibliography.

• 1984 Cyprus. Quartet. Revised editions as Hostage to History: Cyprus from the Ottomans to Kissinger, 1989 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux) and 1997 (Verso)
• 1987 , Hill and Wang
• 1988 Blaming the Victims: Spurious Scholarship and the Palestinian Question (contributor; co-editor with Edward Said) Verso, Reissued, 2001
• 1988 Prepared for the Worst: Selected Essays and Minority Reports Hill and Wang,
• 1990 The Monarchy: A Critique of Britain's Favorite Fetish, Chatto & Windus Ltd
• 1990 Blood, Class and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies, Farrar Straus & Giroux (T)
• 1993 "For the Sake of Argument" Verso
• 1995 , Verso
• 1997 The Parthenon Marbles: The Case for Reunification, Verso
• 1999 No One Left to Lie To: The Values of the Worst Family, original hardcover title: "No One Left to Lie To: The Triangulations of William Jefferson Clinton," Verso
• 2000 Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere, Verso
• 2001 The Trial of Henry Kissinger. Verso.
• 2001 Letters to a Young Contrarian, Basic Books
• 2002 Orwell's Victory, Allen Lane/Penguin Press. . (UK Edition)

• 2002 as US edition: Why Orwell Matters, Basic Books .
• 2003 . Plume/Penguin Group,
• 2004 , Thunder's Mouth, Nation Books,
• 2005 , Eminent Lives/Atlas Books/HarperCollins Publishers,
• 2007 "Thomas Paine's Rights of Man: A Biography ", Atlantic Monthly Press,
• 2007 God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Twelve/Hachette Book Group USA/Warner Books, / Published in the UK as God is not Great: The Case Against Religion, Atlantic Books,
• 2007 , [Editor] Perseus Publishing.
• 2008 Christopher Hitchens and His Critics: Terror, Iraq and the Left (with Simon Cottee and Thomas Cushman), New York University Press,
• 2008 Is Christianity Good for the World? – A Debate (co-author, with Douglas Wilson), Canon Press,
• 2010 , Twelve,
• 2011 Arguably: Essays by Christopher Hitchens, Twelve. UK edition as Arguably: Selected Prose, Atlantic,
• 2012 Mortality, Twelve, . UK edition as Mortality, Atlantic Books,
• 2015 And Yet...: Essays, Simon & Schuster,
• 2024 A Hitch in Time: Reflections Ready for Reconsideration, Twelve, ^[180]

See also

• List of people from Washington, D.C.

External links

• 2010 archive of official website
• Memorial webpage
• Contributor page at Vanity Fair
• Columnist at Slate
• Column archive at The Atlantic
• Article archive at The Guardian

Notes and References

1. Web site: 'God is Not Great' Author Christopher Hitchens on Religion, Iraq, and His Own Reputation – New York Magazine – Nymag. 26 April 2007. 19 April 2023. 19 April 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230419092134/https://nymag.com/arts/books/features/31244/. live.
2. News: Author Christopher Hitchens targets God and faith. Reuters. 18 June 2007. 19 April 2023. 19 April 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230419093524/https://www.reuters.com/article/us-religion-hitchens-idUSN0726901520070618. live.
3. News: What does 'Hitchens' razor' means in Philosophy?. The Hindu. 17 December 2017. 19 April 2023. 19 April 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230419092134/https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/what-does-hitchens-razor-means-in-philosophy/article21827514.ece/amp/. live.
4. Book: Ratcliffe. Susan. Oxford Essential Quotations: Facts. 2016. "Oxford Reference" website. Oxford University Press. 4. What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.. 9780191826719. 4 November 2020. 26 September 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190926013021/https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780191826719.001.0001/q-oro-ed4-00004248. live.
5. Web site: Pallardy. Richard. 9 April 2022. Christopher Hitchens. 23 November 2022. Encyclopædia Britannica. en. After the September 11 attacks of 2001, Hitchens was widely perceived as having migrated to the right on the political spectrum, actively campaigning for the invasion of Iraq and deposal of Saddam Hussein and endorsing George W. Bush in the 2004 US presidential election. Hitchens dropped his column for The Nation in 2002. He maintained that the shifts in his political allegiances were motivated by the right's stronger and more-interventionist stance against what he deemed "fascism with an Islamic face.". 23 November 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221123140826/https://www.britannica.com/biography/Christopher-Hitchens. live.
6. Seymour. Richard. 27 March 2012. The late Christopher Hitchens. International Socialism. 134. 25 August 2021. 20 November 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20191120052603/http://isj.org.uk/the-late-christopher-hitchens/. live.
7. Hitchens, Christopher (2002), Why Orwell Matters, Basic Books, pg 105
8. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. 5 December 2019. A Left-Wing Atheist's Case Against Abortion. 26 November 2022. Crisis Magazine. Sophia Institute Press. 26 November 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221126160401/https://www.crisismagazine.com/opinion/a-left-wing-atheists-case-against-abortion. live.
9. Web site: Carter. Graydon. 17 December 2021. Christopher Hitchens Was Fearless. 26 November 2022. The Atlantic. ..., I asked him if he'd be up for writing a column on gun control. He told me that he'd love to. But he wanted to let me know up front that he was opposed to controls.. 7 December 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221207230915/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/christopher-hitchens-was-fearless/621020/. live.
10. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. 12 October 2009. Legalize It. 26 November 2022. Foreign Policy. 26 November 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221126161852/https://foreignpolicy.com/2009/10/12/legalize-it/. live.
11. News: Anthony. Andrew. 17 September 2005. The big showdown. The Observer. 2023-02-28. 0029-7712. 28 February 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230228085821/https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2005/sep/18/otherparties.iraq. live.
12. Web site: Staff. 13 December 2021. Why Christopher Hitchens Still Matters. 26 November 2022. Areo. 26 November 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221126161853/https://areomagazine.com/2021/12/13/why-christopher-hitchens-still-matters/. live.
13. Parker. Ian. 16 October 2006. He Knew He Was Right: How a former socialist became the Iraq war's fiercest defender.. The New Yorker. 23 November 2022. 6 April 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20140406220226/http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/16/061016fa_fact_parker?currentPage=all. live.
14. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. 31 October 2004. Christopher Hitchens: Why I'm voting for Bush (but only just). 23 November 2022. The Guardian. en. 23 November 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221123123332/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/oct/31/uselections2004.comment2. live.
15. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. 2005. Letters to a Young Contrarian. Basic Books. 55, 57. 0465030335. I am [not a] part of the generalised agnosticism of our culture. I am not even an atheist so much as I am an anti-theist... all religions are versions of the same untruth... the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief, is positively harmful... cradle-to-grave divine supervision; a permanent surveillance and monitoring... I am [not] privy to the secrets of the universe or its creator... even [the best of the theisms] are complicit in this quiet and irrational authoritarianism..
16. Web site: Why Christopher Hitchens Was a Hero to Scientists . 15 December 2016 .
17. News: John. Walsh. The Independent. Hitch-22: a memoir by Christopher Hitchens. 27 May 2010. 28 May 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20100530030603/http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/hitch22-a-memoir-by-christopher-hitchens-1984845.html. 30 May 2010. live.
18. Web site: Siegel . Lee . Me and Hitch: How We Split on Booze, Jews . Observer . 2010-06-09 . 2024-04-23.
19. Web site: Meryl. Gordon. The Boy Can't Help It. NYMag.com. 8 May 2007. 30 September 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141001172127/http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/media/features/868/. 1 October 2014. live.
20. Web site: Marc. Tracy. On Christopher Hitchens's Jewishness. Tablet Magazine. 19 December 2011. 23 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160528063356/http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/books/86541/the-tenth-man-2. 28 May 2016. live.
21. News: Lynn. Barber. Lynn Barber. Look who's talking. The Observer. 14 April 2002. 1 June 2005. https://web.archive.org/web/20071231024108/http://observer.guardian.co.uk/worldview/story/0,11581,683899,00.html. 31 December 2007. dead.
22. Web site: Hitchens, death and the Malta connection. 25 January 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20190403092229/https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/national/14656/hitchens-death-and-the-malta-connection. 3 April 2019. dead.
23. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. The Commander: My Father, Eric Hitchens. Slate.com. 2 June 2010. 14 April 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20120415061656/http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words/features/2010/hitch22/the_commander_my_father_eric_hitchens.html. 15 April 2012. live.
24. Web site: Yglesias. Matthew. The Commander: My Father, Eric Hitchens. Slate. 20 October 2003. 16 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20110816133539/http://www.slate.com/id/2255781/entry/2255782/. 16 August 2011. live.
25. Web site: Obituary: Christopher Hitchens. BBC. 16 December 2011. 21 June 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20180727185452/https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-16214335. 27 July 2018. live.
26. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. Hitch-22. What she [Yvonne] wanted was to see me represent Balliol on the University Challenge team, where I did actually make my first-ever television appearance..
27. Web site: Blake. Morrison. Blake Morrison. I contain multitudes. The Guardian. 29 May 2010. 16 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160306044618/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/may/29/hitch-22-christopher-hitchens-review. 6 March 2016. live.
28. Book: Christopher Hitchens and His Critics : Terror, Iraq, and the Left. New York University Press. 2008. 978-0814716861. Cottee. Simon. Simon Cottee. New York, London. 168. 183392372. Cushman. Thomas.
29. Web site: Peter. Robinson. You said you wanted a revolution: 1968 and the Counter-Counterculture (Peter Robinson interview with William Buckley Jr and Christopher Hitchens). https://web.archive.org/web/20070915092414/http://www.hoover.org/multimedia/uk/3420306.html. 15 September 2007. Hoover Institution. 15 September 2007. 12 October 2012.
30. News: Barber. Lynn. Lynn Barber. Look who's talking. The Observer. 14 April 2002. 30 June 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20190410124847/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/apr/14/politics. 10 April 2019. live.
31. Web site: Decca. Aitkenhead. Christopher Hitchens: 'I was right and they were wrong'. The Guardian. Decca Aitkenhead. 21 May 2010. 26 January 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20130624142037/http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/may/22/christopher-hitchens-decca-aitkenhead. 24 June 2013. live.
32. News: Christopher. Hitchens. Long Live Labor – Why I'm for Tony Blair. Slate. 25 April 2005. 16 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20110831133955/http://www.slate.com/id/2117328/. 31 August 2011. live.
33. Web site: Christopher. Hithens. Heaven on Earth – Interview with Christopher Hitchens. PBS. 1 January 2005. 1 January 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20060612210516/http://www.pbs.org/heavenonearth/interviews_hitchens.html. 12 June 2006. dead.
34. Web site: Wilby. Peter. 1 September 2017. Hitchens, Christopher Eric (1949–2011). 7 December 2023. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 26 September 2004. https://web.archive.org/web/20040926035703/http://www.oxforddnb.com/. live.
35. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. Hitch-22: A Memoir. Atlantic Books. 2010. 9781838952334. London. 144.
36. Encyclopedia: Christopher. Hitchens. International Socialism: Christopher Hitchens "Workers' Self Management in Algeria" (1st series). 51, April–June 1972. 33. Encyclopedia of Trotskyism. 1 April 1972. 15 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20180716033112/https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/isj/1972/no051/hitchens2.htm. 16 July 2018. live.
37. News: Farndale. Nigel. An audience with Christopher Hitchens. 25 September 2019. The Daily Telegraph. 2 June 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20190925125238/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/7778346/An-audience-with-Christopher-Hitchens.html. 25 September 2019. live.
38. Web site: Eaton. George. George Eaton (journalist). Christopher Hitchens: the New Statesman years. The New Statesman. 2 January 2012. 23 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160423171507/http://www.newstatesman.com/magazines/2012/01/hitchens-write-editor-fenton. 23 April 2016. live.
39. Book: Amis, Martin. Experience. Random House. 2010. 978-1446401453. 26. Martin Amis. 28 May 2020. 20 April 2024. https://web.archive.org/web/20240420103810/https://books.google.com/books?id=biWjc8p2pzcC. live.
40. Christopher. Hitchens. Kissinger Declassified. Vanity Fair. 17 October 2006. 23 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160419154714/http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2004/12/hitchens200412. 19 April 2016. live.
41. News: Remembering Hitchens. Victor. Navasky. Victor Navasky. The Nation. 21 December 2011. 15 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20150315045246/http://www.thenation.com/article/165318/remembering-hitchens. 15 March 2015. live.
42. Web site: For the Sake of Argument by Christopher Hitchens. https://web.archive.org/web/20101117155612/http://booknotes.org/Watch/51559-1/Christopher%2BHitchens.aspx. dead. 17 November 2010. Brian. Lamb. Brian Lamb. 17 October 1993. 1 April 2012.
43. Web site: Free Radical. Southan. Rhys. Reason. November 2001. 10 June 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20190324224737/https://reason.com/archives/2001/11/01/free-radical. 24 March 2019. live.
44. News: Christopher Hitchens. The Atlantic. 1 January 2003. 1 January 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20190506021625/https://www.theatlantic.com/author/christopher-hitchens/. 6 May 2019. live.
45. Web site: Guy. Raz. Guy Raz. Christopher Hitchens, Literary Agent Provocateur. https://web.archive.org/web/20120101010101/http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5498172. National Public Radio. 21 June 2006. 10 June 2008. dead. 1 January 2012.
46. The New Yorker. He Knew He Was Right. Ian. Parker. 16 October 2006. 10 June 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20080407065449/http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/16/061016fa_fact_parker?currentPage=all. 7 April 2008. live.
47. Christopher Hitchens – Contributing Editor. Vanity Fair. 23 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20111222152010/http://www.vanityfair.com/contributors/christopher-hitchens. 22 December 2011. live.
48. https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/taking-sides/ Taking Sides
49. News: Timothy. Noah. Timothy Noah. Meritocracy's lab rat. Slate. 9 January 2002. 1 January 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20180806025424/http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/chatterbox/2002/01/meritocracys_lab_rat.html. 6 August 2018. live.
50. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. Topic of Cancer. https://web.archive.org/web/20111217040857/http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2010/09/hitchens-201009%23. 17 December 2011. Vanity Fair. 1 September 2010. 8 August 2014. dead.
51. Christopher Hitchens: "Hitch-22". 7 June 2010. Audio-visual recording. en. ABC. Sydney Writer's Festival, Sydney, Australia. 6 August 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20161207235247/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWXwKk-9YNA. 7 December 2016. live. Interview. Julian Morrow: "How do you identify yourself now?" Christopher Hitchens: "Anglo-American. I mean I didn't move to the United States until I was about 30, so it would be silly to say I'd left everything behind." Audience member: "If you had to give up one, which passport would it be? The British or the American?" Christopher Hitchens: "That's a waste of a question." Audience member:<embarrassed groan> Christopher Hitchens:<adamantly>"Anglo-American". Morrow, Julian (Producer).
52. Web site: Christopher. Hitchens. Christopher Hitchens on Sarah Palin: 'A Disgraceful Opportunist and Moral Coward'. PoliticalArticles.NET. 18 December 2009. 26 April 2011. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20110514004329/http://www.politicalarticles.net/blog/2009/12/18/christopher-hitchens-on-sarah-palin-a-disgraceful-opportunist-and-moral-coward/. 14 May 2011.
53. Web site: Fighting Words. Slate. 21 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160401131328/http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words.html. 1 April 2016. live.
54. Web site: Heather. Christie. At the ROM: Three New Commandments. She Does The City. 30 April 2009. 1 January 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20180806024540/http://www.shedoesthecity.com/at_the_rom_three_new_commandments. 6 August 2018. dead.
55. News: Christopher. Hitchens. Childhood's End. Vanity Fair. September 2006. 1 April 2013. https://web.archive.org/web/20130412232442/http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2006/01/hitchens200601. 12 April 2013. live.
56. News: Christopher. Hitchens. Realism in Sudan. Slate. 7 November 2005. 1 July 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20110826222014/http://www.slate.com/id/2129657/. 26 August 2011. live.
57. Web site: Detailed Biographical Information – Christopher Hitchens. 27 April 2010. bot: unknown. https://web.archive.org/web/20041114040751/http://www.lannan.org/lf/bios/detail/christopher-hitchens/. 14 November 2004. Lannan Foundation.
58. Web site: Carol. Blue. An afterword to the life of Christopher Hitchens – Late Night Live – ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation). Radio National. 15 October 2012. 30 September 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141007090735/http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/latenightlive/an-afterword-to-the-life-of-christopher-hitchens-v2/4305582. 7 October 2014. live.
59. Web site: Joshua Micah. Marshall. Josh Marshall. Salon Newsreal | Stalking Sidney Blumenthal. Salon.com. 9 February 1999. 26 April 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20140107093012/http://www.salon.com/1999/02/09/newsa_35/. 7 January 2014. live.
60. Thinking Like an Apparatchik. Christopher. Hitchens. The Atlantic Monthly. July–August 2003. 26 April 2011. 292. 1. 129–42. https://web.archive.org/web/20190217143959/https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/2003/07/hitchens.htm. 17 February 2019. live.
61. Web site: Hitchens on Books. 17 February 2009. Andrew. Werth. January–February 2004. The Atlantic. https://web.archive.org/web/20090626141928/http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2004/01/letters.htm. 26 June 2009. live.
62. News: Gore should be so lucky. 17 February 2009. John. Banville. 3 March 2001. The Irish Times. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20090106195116/http://osdir.com/ml/politics.leftists.monkeyfist/2001-04/msg00016.html. 6 January 2009.
63. News: Vidal Loco. 24 June 2010. Christopher. Hitchens. February 2010. Vanity Fair. https://web.archive.org/web/20100528034636/http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2010/02/hitchens-201002. 28 May 2010. live.
64. News: Hitchens attacks Gore Vidal for being a 'crackpot'. 17 February 2009. 7 February 2010. The Independent. London. Kate. Youde. https://web.archive.org/web/20100210175549/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/hitchens-attacks-gore-vidal-for-being-a-crackpot-1891753.html. 10 February 2010. live.
65. Web site: Top 100 Public Intellectuals Results. The Foreign Policy Group. 15 May 2008. 1 January 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20150611230220/http://foreignpolicy.com/2005/10/15/prospectfp-top-100-public-intellectuals-results/. 11 June 2015. dead.
66. News: Christopher. Hitchens. How to be a public intellectual. Prospect. 24 May 2008. 1 May 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20190221154018/http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/what-is-a-public-intellectual. 21 February 2019. dead.
67. Web site: Christopher. Hitchens. The Plight of the Public Intellectual. Foreign Policy. 7 October 2009. 1 May 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160508054804/http://foreignpolicy.com/2009/10/07/the-plight-of-the-public-intellectual/. 8 May 2016. live.
68. News: Noam. Chomsky. Noam Chomsky. Reply to Hitchens's Rejoinder. The Nation. 15 October 2001. 1 June 2005. https://web.archive.org/web/20100614060958/http://www.thenation.com/article/reply-hitchenss-rejoinder. 14 June 2010. live.
69. Web site: Eaton. George. George Eaton (journalist). The New Statesman. Interview: Christopher Hitchens. 12 July 2010. 7 November 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20110101021515/http://www.newstatesman.com/books/2010/07/conservative-course-presidency. 1 January 2011. live.
70. Web site: Jeremy. Paxman. Jeremy Paxman. Paxman meets Hitchens. 10 August 2010. Two. BBC newsnight. 12 July 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20170615232121/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-s9AyNQyCw. 15 June 2017. live.
71. Web site: Why Women Aren't Funny. Vanity Fair. January 2007. 17 January 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190322164803/https://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2007/01/hitchens200701. 22 March 2019. live.
72. Web site: Who Says Women Aren't Funny?. Vanity Fair. 3 March 2008. 17 January 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20180614073208/https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2008/04/funnygirls200804. 14 June 2018. live.
73. Web site: Christopher Hitchens: Why Women Still Aren't Funny Vanity Fair. YouTube. 3 March 2008. 17 January 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190118092805/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7izJggqCoA. 18 January 2019. live.
74. Why Women Still Don't Get It. Christopher. Hitchens. Vanity Fair. 3 March 2008. 4 February 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20180614080320/https://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2008/04/hitchens200804. 14 June 2018. live.
75. Web site: 2007 National Magazine Award Winners Announced. Magazine Publishers of America. 1 May 2007. 1 June 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20090114030507/http://www.magazine.org/ASME/ABOUT_ASME/ASME_PRESS_RELEASES/22246.aspx. 14 January 2009. dead.
76. Web site: National Magazine Awards Winners and Finalists. Magazine Publishers of America. 16 December 2008. 1 January 2009. https://web.archive.org/web/20080728065940/http://www.magazine.org/asme/magazine_awards/nma_winners/index.aspx. 28 July 2008. dead.
77. Web site: Christopher Hitchens Wins National Magazine Award for Columns About Cancer. Vanity Fair. 10 May 2011. 16 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20110805102119/http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2011/05/christopher-hitchens-wins-national-magazine-award-for-columns-about-cancer.html. 5 August 2011. live.
78. Web site: 2011 National Magazine Awards Winners and Finalists. 9 May 2011. 1 June 2011. Magazine Publishers of America. https://web.archive.org/web/20110701221749/http://www.magazine.org/asme/magazine_awards/nma_winners/index.aspx. 1 July 2011. dead.
79. Web site: Secular Coalition for America Advisory Board Biography. Secular.org. 20 July 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20111103015717/http://www.secular.org/bios/Christopher_Hitchens.html. 3 November 2011. dead.
80. News: Weiner. Juli. Asteroid Named for Christopher Hitchens. Vanity Fair. 6 December 2011. 18 February 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20140407001700/http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2011/12/Asteroid-Named-for-Christopher-Hitchens. 7 April 2014. live.
81. Web site: Authors – Christopher Hitchens. The Atlantic. 1 April 2010. https://web.archive.org/web/20080514153412/http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/by/christopher_hitchens. 14 May 2008. live.
82. In Depth with Christopher Hitchens. BookTV. C-SPAN. 28 August 2007. 23 April 2016. 1:13:03–1:13:59. I don't know where to begin as to say which was the most influential author. I can remember the dystopian writers of Aldous Huxley...Arthur Koestler...[on-screen list as follows] George Eliot, George Orwell, Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Salman Rushdie, Colm Tóibín, Karl Marx, Richard Dawkins, P.G. Woodhouse, Evelyn Waugh, Paul Scott, James Fenton, James Joyce, [and Hitchens mentions] Conor Cruise O'Brien's 'Writers and Politics' I read in 1967 ... I remember thinking very, very distinctly that, I'd like to be able to write like that and on topics of that sort.. https://web.archive.org/web/20160405101804/http://www.c-span.org/video/?198800-1%2Fdepth-christopher-hitchens. 5 April 2016. live.
83. In Depth with Christopher Hitchens. BookTV. C-SPAN. 28 August 2007. 22 June 2019. 1:36:00–1:37:00. I think there are certain authors of whom one should have all of their books ... George Orwell, most of Marcel Proust, most of James Joyce, not all of P. G. Woodhouse ... Karl Marx, Leon Trotsky, Vladimir Nabokov...Salman Rushdie, Martin and Kingsley Amis, Ian McEwan. https://web.archive.org/web/20180923235429/https://www.c-span.org/video/?198800-1%2Fdepth-christopher-hitchens. 23 September 2018. live.
84. In Depth with Christopher Hitchens. BookTV. C-SPAN. 28 August 2007. 22 June 2019. 1:38:54–1:39:12. [On screen] People Who Have Inspired Christopher Hitchens: Richard Llewellyn, Arthur Koestler, Albert Camus, George Orwell, Karl Marx, Oscar Wilde, Wilfred Owen. https://web.archive.org/web/20180923235429/https://www.c-span.org/video/?198800-1%2Fdepth-christopher-hitchens. 23 September 2018. live.
85. Web site: Everyone has a book inside them. 1997. Christopher. Hitchens. YouTube. 25 June 2021. 25 June 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210625115338/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6MPebmQSQ0. live.
86. News: Wilby. Peter. Peter Wilby. 16 December 2011. Christopher Hitchens obituary. The Guardian. 22 June 2019. Hitchens was ... a liberal studies professor at the New School in New York and, for a time, visiting professor at Berkeley in California. https://web.archive.org/web/20190909004551/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/dec/16/christopher-hitchens-obituary. 9 September 2019. live.
87. Web site: Christopher Hitchens/Biography. . 2003. The Atlantic. The Atlantic Monthly Group.. 15 June 2019. He has also taught as a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley; the University of Pittsburgh; and the New School of Social Research. https://web.archive.org/web/20170217200429/http://www.theatlantic.com/past/about/people/chbio.htm. 17 February 2017. live.
88. Web site: Christopher Hitchens. . Simon & Schuster. Simon & Schuster, Inc.. 22 June 2019. A visiting professor of liberal studies at the New School in New York City, he was also the I.F. Stone professor at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California, Berkeley.. https://web.archive.org/web/20190622141507/https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Christopher-Hitchens/39628932. 22 June 2019. live.
89. News: Maccabe. Colin. 27 February 2011. The Next Page / A conversation with Christopher Hitchens: How Pittsburgh Made Me. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. 22 June 2019. Hitchens [shown in photo above] in 1997, as a visiting professor in the University of Pittsburgh English Department.. https://web.archive.org/web/20190622141502/https://www.post-gazette.com/ae/books/2011/02/27/The-Next-Page-A-conversation-with-Christopher-Hitchens-How-Pittsburgh-Made-Me/stories/201102270223. 22 June 2019. live.
90. News: Katz. Ian. When Christopher met Peter. The Guardian. 31 May 2005. 4 July 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20080517104151/http://books.guardian.co.uk/hay2005/story/0,15880,1495897,00.html. 17 May 2008. live.
91. News: Jones. Owen. Peter Hitchens got me thinking: do lefties always have to turn right in old age?. The Guardian. 9 September 2015. 4 July 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190704231447/https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/09/peter-hitchens-tory-trotskyite-left-right. 4 July 2019. live.
92. Web site: O Brother, Where Art Thou?. The Spectator Archive. 5 January 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20171224013608/http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/13th-october-2001/18/o-brother-where-art-thou. 24 December 2017. live.
93. News: Katz. Ian. War of Words. The Guardian. 28 October 2006. 17 March 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20071013172950/http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1933179,00.html. 13 October 2007. live.
94. James Macintyre, The Hitchens brothers: Anatomy of a row, The Independent, 11 June 2007. Retrieved 11 June 2007.
95. News: Boris steals Question Time's Hitchens show. Tryhorn, Chris. The Guardian. 22 June 2007. 22 August 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20180823005841/https://www.theguardian.com/media/organgrinder/2007/jun/22/borisstealsquestiontimeshi. 23 August 2018. live.
96. Web site: Hitchens vs Hitchens Debate – On God, War, Politics, and Culture. 7 May 2008. cfimichigan.org. 3 May 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20120516061109/http://www.cfimichigan.org/hitchens. 16 May 2012. live.
97. News: Marrapodi. Eric. 13 October 2010. Hitchens brothers debate if civilisation can survive without God. live. https://web.archive.org/web/20101015191444/http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/13/hitchens-brothers-square-off-in-debate-over-god-in-civilization/. 15 October 2010. 14 October 2010. CNN.
98. News: Christopher Hitchens remembered at memorial service in NYC. The Washington Post. 20 April 2012. 28 April 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20120421015820/http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/reliable-source/post/christopher-hitchens-remembered-at-memorial-service-in-nyc/2012/04/20/gIQA1usIWT_blog.html. 21 April 2012. live.
99. News: The 25 Most Influential Liberals in the US Media. 22 January 2009. Forbes. 23 November 2009. https://web.archive.org/web/20091125085213/http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/22/influential-media-obama-oped-cx_tv_ee_hra_0122liberal_slide_13.html. 25 November 2009. live.
100. News: The Brothers Grim. June–July 2010. Dalrymple. Theodore. Theodore Dalrymple. First Things. 25 December 2013. https://web.archive.org/web/20110825051556/http://www.firstthings.com/article/2010/05/the-brothers-grim. 25 August 2011. dead.
101. Web site: Libertarianism is for petulant children: Ayn Rand, Rand Paul and the movement's sad "rebellion". Masciotra, David. salon.com. 1 March 2015. 19 June 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20170909185804/http://www.salon.com/2015/03/01/libertarianism_is_for_petulant_children_ayn_rand_rand_paul_and_the_movements_sad_rebellion_partner/. 9 September 2017. live.
102. News: Kirchick. James. 17 December 2011. Despite Criticism of Israel, Hitchens Was Ardent Foe of anti-Semitism. Haaretz. 11 September 2021. 11 September 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220911192727/https://www.haaretz.com/2011-12-17/ty-article/despite-criticism-of-israel-hitchens-was-ardent-foe-of-anti-semitism/0000017f-f758-d5bd-a17f-f77a6ffa0000?_amp=true. live.
103. Book: Walter. Hölbling. Klaus. Rieser-Wohlfarter. What is American?: new identities in U.S. culture. 6 April 2011. 2004. LIT Verlag Münster. 978-3-8258-7734-7. 351–.
104. News: Christopher. Hitchens. Believe Me, It's Torture. Vanity Fair. 1 August 2008. 1 September 2008. https://web.archive.org/web/20080901000428/http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens200808. 1 September 2008. live.
105. Video: On the Waterboard. https://web.archive.org/web/20110809003051/http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/video/2008/hitchens_video200808. 9 August 2011. Vanity Fair.
106. News: Lichtblau. Eric. Eric Lichtblau. Two Groups Planning to Sue Over Federal Eavesdropping. The New York Times. 17 January 2006. 18 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20160531150200/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/17/politics/17nsa.html. 31 May 2016. live.
107. News: Christopher. Hitchens. Statement – Christopher Hitchens, NSA Lawsuit Client. Aclu.org. 16 January 2006. 18 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20091026145005/http://www.aclu.org/safefree/nsaspying/23485res20060116.html. 26 October 2009. live.
108. News: Hari. Johann. Christopher Hitchens: In enemy territory. The Independent. 22 September 2004. 25 March 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20200325045006/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/christopher-hitchens-in-enemy-territory-550522.html. 25 March 2020. live.
109. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. No Sympathy for Slobo. Slate.com. 13 March 2006. 25 March 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20200325045002/https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2006/03/slobodan-milosevic-resentful-nonentity-bloodthirsty-dictator.html. 25 March 2020. live.
110. Web site: Book Excerpt: Hitchen's 'God is Not Great'. Newsweek.com. 21 August 2007. 25 March 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20190704202311/https://www.newsweek.com/book-excerpt-hitchenss-god-not-great-99357. 4 July 2019. live.
111. 1 February 2003. Fetal Distraction. 2022-11-26. Vanity Fair. en-US. 3 February 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230203050033/https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2003/02/hitchens200302. live.
112. Hitchens . Christopher . 24 January 1994 . 2017-10-02 . The Myth of Gun Control . 2023-08-06 . Scraps from the Loft . . 6 August 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230806073655/https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/journalism/the-myth-of-gun-control/ . live.
113. News: Hitchens. Christopher. 3 March 2004. The Married State. en-US. The Wall Street Journal. 2022-05-29. 0099-9660. 29 May 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220529015018/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB107827627378044934. live.
114. Web site: Miniter. Richard. Christopher Hitchens, As I Knew Him. 2022-05-29. Forbes. en. 11 May 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220511084236/https://www.forbes.com/sites/richardminiter/2011/12/16/christopher-hitchens-as-i-knew-him/. live.
115. Web site: Why Christopher Hitchens Is Wrong About Billy Graham. 1 April 2024. 1 April 2024. https://web.archive.org/web/20240401191359/https://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1662757,00.html. live.
116. Web site: Will & Testament: "A disgustingly evil man ...". Crawley. William. en. BBC. 14 February 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20180224162818/http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ni/2007/09/a_disgustingly_evil_man.html. 24 February 2018. live.
117. News: Glasgow. The Sunday Herald. Christopher. Hitchens. Holding the Trump card. 5 December 1999.
118. News: New York. The Nation. Christopher. Hitchens. Billionaire Populism. July 1992.
119. News: https://web.archive.org/web/20070516100646/http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/nothing_sacred.html. Nothing sacred – Journalist and provocateur Christopher Hitchens picks a fight with God. 2 May 2014. Andre. Mayer. Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 14 May 2007. 16 May 2007. dead.
120. News: Christopher Hitchens: You ask the questions. The Independent. London. 6 March 2002. 1 May 2008. https://web.archive.org/web/20160530191743/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/christopher-hitchens-you-ask-the-questions-9242892.html. 30 May 2016. live.
121. Web site: Hitchens' Challenge. Cyber Atheist. 2 May 2015. 16 December 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20191216132705/https://cyberatheist.wordpress.com/2015/05/02/hitchens-challenge-2/. 16 December 2019. live.
122. Web site: Hitchens. Christopher. Hitchens Challenge. Youtube. 22 December 2007 . 19 December 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190508031019/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TnA3b8MhD0. 8 May 2019. live.
123. Web site: Christopher. Hitchens. Free Speech. Onegoodmove. 1 March 2007. 1 May 2007. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20120212073345/http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/2007/03/free_speech_6.html. 12 February 2012.
124. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. 2007. Twelve Books. New York. 978-0446579803. 14 November 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20200326153533/https://archive.org/details/godisnotgreathow00hitc. 26 March 2020. live.
125. News: Michael. Kinsley. In god, Distrust. The New York Times Book Review. 13 May 2007. 1 June 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20190704085534/https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/books/review/Kinsley-t.html. 4 July 2019. live.
126. News: Here's the hitch. Michael. Skapinker. Michael Skapinker. Financial Times. 22 June 2007. 30 June 2007. subscription. https://web.archive.org/web/20070702204245/http://www.ft.com/cms/s/6afa3a28-1ecd-11dc-bc22-000b5df10621.html. 2 July 2007. dead.
127. News: Hillel. Italie. The Associated Press: Hitchens Among Book Award Finalists. Associated Press. 14 October 2007. 1 December 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20180806024553/http://www.seacoastonline.com/article/20071014/ENTERTAIN/710140312. 6 August 2018. dead.
128. Web site: . Honorary Associate: Christopher Hitchens. National Secular Society. 28 September 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20190605094639/https://www.secularism.org.uk/patrickharviemsp1.html. 5 June 2019. dead.
129. Web site: Honorary FFRF Board Announced. 20 August 2008. https://web.archive.org/web/20101217052917/http://ffrf.org/news/releases/honorary-ffrf-board-announced/. 17 December 2010.
130. Web site: Dawkins. Richard. Richard Dawkins. 1 October 2013. The Four Horsemen DVD. live. https://web.archive.org/web/20170611214236/https://richarddawkins.net/2013/10/the-four-horsemen-dvd-19-95/. 11 June 2017. 13 April 2016. Richard Dawkins Foundation. en-US.
131. . Approximately 112 minutes in, Hitchens contends, "The moment where everything went wrong is the moment when the Jewish Hellenists were defeated by the Jewish messiahs, the celebration now benignly known as Hanukkah."
132. Christopher Hitchens, "Bah, Hanukkah", Slate, 3 December 2007: "As a consequence of the successful Maccabean revolt against Hellenism, so it is said, a puddle of olive oil that should have lasted only for one day managed to burn for eight days. Wow! Certain proof, not just of an Almighty, but of an Almighty with a special fondness for fundamentalists."
133. Christopher. Hitchens. Is Christianity Good for the World? Christopher Hitchens and Douglas Wilson debate. Christianity Today. 8 May 2007. 1 June 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20070612232913/http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/mayweb-only/119-12.0.html. 12 June 2007. live.
134. http://www.collisionmovie.com/
135. Web site: Hitchens vs. Wilson, Part 1. 8 May 2007. 17 May 2007. 12 June 2007. https://web.archive.org/web/20070612232913/http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/mayweb-only/119-12.0.html. live.
136. Stan. Guthrie. Hitchens vs. Caig: Round Two. Christianity Today. 6 April 2009. 1 May 2009. https://web.archive.org/web/20150727220243/http://www.christianitytoday.com/gleanings/2009/april/hitchens-vs-craig-round-two.html. 27 July 2015. live.
137. News: For the sake of argument. Helen. Kirwan-Taylor. Wall Street Journal. 11 December 2009. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171226130418/https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB126046645081385887. 26 December 2017. live.
138. Web site: Fry & Hitch v the Catholic Church. New Humanist. 20 October 2009. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171226182121/http://blog.newhumanist.org.uk/2009/10/fry-hitch-v-catholic-church.html. 26 December 2017. live.
139. Web site: 2012-03-15. Christopher Hitchens and Tariq Ramadan Debate: Is Islam a Religion of Peace?. 2023-09-11. Time Out New York. en-US. 19 September 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230919171634/https://www.timeout.com/newyork/things-to-do/christopher-hitchens-and-tariq-ramadan-debate-is-islam-a-religion-of-peace. live.
140. News: Hitchens apparent winner in religion debate. CBC News. 27 November 2010. 26 April 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20171011164218/http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hitchens-apparent-winner-in-religion-debate-1.930421. 11 October 2017. live.
141. He knew he was right. Ian. Parker. The New Yorker. 16 October 2006. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171011153605/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/10/16/he-knew-he-was-right-2. 11 October 2017. live.
142. News: Hitchens cleared space for real debate. Doug. Sanders. The Globe and Mail. 16 December 2011. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20180618084341/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/hitchens-cleared-space-for-real-debate/article4247740/. 18 June 2018. live.
143. Antitheism and the art of the "Hitch Slap". Iain. Ellis. Pop Matters. 21 January 2015. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171226132522/https://www.popmatters.com/189249-antitheism-and-the-art-of-the-hitch-slap-2495575192.html. 26 December 2017. live.
144. A Remembered 'Hitchslap' For The Worst Censors of All, Ourselves. Janus. Kopfstein. Vice. 18 December 2011. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20180806024747/https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/z44zj3/free-speaking-and-listening-remembering-when-censorship-got-hitchslapped. 6 August 2018. dead.
145. Web site: Prick the Bubbles, Pass the Mantle: Hitchens as Orwell's Successor. Anthony. Lock. The Humanist. 29 June 2012. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20180806024738/https://thehumanist.com/magazine/july-august-2012/features/prick-the-bubbles-pass-the-mantle-hitchens-as-orwells-successor. 6 August 2018. dead.
146. Web site: Gore Vidal, gentleman bitch. Jed. Lipinski. Tom. McGeveran. Politico. 1 August 2012. 26 December 2017. https://web.archive.org/web/20171226200551/https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2012/08/gore-vidal-gentleman-bitch-067223. 26 December 2017. live.
147. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. 2010. Hitch-22: A Memoir. Twelve. 978-0446540339. 352.
148. News: Christopher Hitchens, Polemicist Who Slashed All, Freely, Dies at 62. William. Grimes. William Grimes (journalist). The New York Times. 16 December 2011. 10 January 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20190509050553/https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/16/arts/christopher-hitchens-is-dead-at-62-obituary.html. 9 May 2019. live.
149. In Depth with Christopher Hitchens. BookTV. C-SPAN. 28 August 2007. 22 June 2019. 1:36:59–1:37:20. I like to think that I have a life rather than a job or than a career, and it's all to do with reading and writing: the only two things I was ever any good at—and public speaking, which I can also do. that's how I make my living, but it's also what I am, who I am, what I love.. https://web.archive.org/web/20180923235429/https://www.c-span.org/video/?198800-1%2Fdepth-christopher-hitchens. 23 September 2018. live.
150. Web site: 16 December 2011. Christopher Hitchens obituary. 2022-01-27. The Guardian. en. 6 October 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141006221103/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/dec/16/christopher-hitchens-obituary. live.
151. News: Reliable Source – Christopher Hitchens diagnosed with cancer, cuts short his book tour. The Washington Post. 16 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20190324224733/http://voices.washingtonpost.com/reliable-source/2010/06/rs-_hitchens.html. 24 March 2019. dead.
152. News: Hitchens Talks to Goldblog About Cancer and God. Jeffrey. Goldberg. Jeffrey Goldberg. 6 August 2010. 17 September 2010. The Atlantic. https://web.archive.org/web/20100816121945/http://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/08/hitchens-talks-to-goldblog-about-cancer-and-god/61072/. 16 August 2010. live.
153. Web site: Ethan. Cole. Atheist Hitchens Credits Evangelical Francis Collins for Cancer Hope. The Christian Post. In an interview with U.K. Telegraph Magazine, Hitchens said that Collins, who was formerly the director of the National Center for Human Genome Research and now serves as director of the National Institutes of Health, is partially responsible for developing a new cancer treatment that maps out the patient's entire genetic make-up and targets damaged DNA.. 29 March 2011. 16 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20111229151408/http://www.christianpost.com/news/atheist-hitchens-credits-evangelical-francis-collins-for-cancer-hope-49615. 29 December 2011. live.
154. 15 December 2011. Postscript: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011. 5 December 2021. The New Yorker. en-US. 26 January 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210126214713/https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/postscript-christopher-hitchens-1949-2011. live.
155. Web site: Sullivan. Andrew. 2012-04-20. The Hitch Has Landed. live. https://web.archive.org/web/20190914003059/http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2012/04/20/hitchs-service/. The Dish. 14 September 2019. Then he dozed a little, and then roused himself and uttered a couple of words that were close to inaudible. Steve asked him to repeat them. There were two:
     'Capitalism.'
     'Downfall.'
     In his end was his beginning..
156. Web site: 24 December 2011. Memorial gatherings and the body of Christ(opher). Daily Hitchens at Blogspot. 10 June 2015. https://web.archive.org/web/20150615182659/http://dailyhitchens.blogspot.com/2011/12/memorial-gatherings.html. 15 June 2015. live.
157. News: Mortality review. The New York Times. 30 August 2012. 21 November 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20181122010946/https://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/02/books/review/mortality-by-christopher-hitchens.html. 22 November 2018. live. Buckley. Christopher.
158. Book: Hitchens, Christopher. Mortality. 978-0771039225. 2012. McClelland & Stewart.
159. News: Christopher Hitchens: tributes; Contemporaries, friends and admirers of Christopher Hitchens, who has died aged 62, have paid tribute to the contrarian. The Daily Telegraph. 16 December 2011. 15.
160. News: . Quotes on the death of pundit Christopher Hitchens. Associated Press. 16 December 2011. 22 July 2013. https://web.archive.org/web/20190324224735/https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/dec/16/quotes-on-the-death-of-pundit-christopher-hitchens/. 24 March 2019. live.
161. Web site: Richard Dawkins: I'm not like Christopher Hitchens!. D'Addario. Daniel. 29 September 2013. Salon. 24 April 2021. 24 April 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210424184946/https://www.salon.com/2013/09/29/richard_dawkins_im_not_like_christopher_hitchens/. live.
162. Web site: Lawrence. Krauss. Lawrence M. Krauss. Remembering Christopher Hitchens. 23 December 2011. https://web.archive.org/web/20120424194902/http://richarddawkins.net/articles/644326-remembering-christopher-hitchens. 24 April 2012. richarddawkins.net.
163. Web site: Transcript of Lawrence Krauss' tribute to Christopher Hitchens. 2012. atheistfoundation.org. 29 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20190324224741/http://atheistfoundation.org.au/lawrence-krauss-tribute-to-christopher-hitchens/. 24 March 2019. dead.
164. Real Time with Bill Maher Season 10, episode 1
165. Web site: Christopher Hitchens: tributes and reactions. Alison. Flood. The Guardian. 16 December 2011. 28 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160419135038/http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2011/dec/16/christopher-hitchens-tributes. 19 April 2016. live.
166. Web site: Christopher Hitchens's Memorial: Sean Penn, Martin Amis, Salman Rushdie, and Others Pay Tribute. Vanity Fair. 20 April 2012. 28 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20141006084009/http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2012/04/christopher-hitchens-memorial-vanity-fair. 6 October 2014. live.
167. News: . Tributes paid to journalist Christopher Hitchens. 16 December 2011. 28 April 2016. BBC News. https://web.archive.org/web/20160105071240/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16226580. 5 January 2016. live.
168. Web site: Christopher Hitchens' wit and warmth remembered as New York pays tribute. Ed. Pilkington. The Guardian. 20 April 2012. 11 December 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160905155523/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/apr/20/christopher-hitchens-memorial-new-york. 5 September 2016. live.
169. Web site: Murray. Douglas. 16 December 2011. Remembering Christopher Hitchens The Spectator. 2022-07-05. spectator.co.uk. en. 10 October 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20221010050522/https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/remembering-christopher-hitchens. live.
170. News: Hitch's Rolls-Royce mind is still purring. George. Eaton. George Eaton (journalist). The New Statesman. 24 November 2011. 28 April 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160305035326/http://www.newstatesman.com/ideas/2011/11/hitchens-remembered-polemicist. 5 March 2016. live.
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