Even Amy Winehouse had a right to make the wrong choices

IN On the Road, Jack Kerouac wrote about “the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow Roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars”.

The sky shines a little less brightly this week after Amy Winehouse was found dead on Saturday, presumably from some overdose or other. There are plenty who will look back at the beehived catastrophe that was Amy Winehouse and think: So what? You reap what you sow; others will say, “that’s what drugs do for you”.

For me, she’s a woman who’ll be remembered for her music, for how she touched those who heard her songs. But she’s a woman who’ll also be remembered for the dubious distinction of dying young. She was a ride-or-die chick from another era, the Jewish-English lass rolling with the boys. And she really was frighteningly ready to die.