American writer Paul Auster, to whom we owe the books Brooklyn Follies, Moon Palace and even City of Glass, is going through a particularly difficult time. At the age of 75 he is afflicted by a terrible double mourning. He has just lost his son Daniel (the child’s father) following the recent death of his granddaughter. The latter was charged with manslaughter after the death of his ten-month-old daughter from an overdose in mid-April.
It was the New York Police Department who unveiled the death of Daniel Auster, who was 44 on Tuesday the 26th was found “unconscious” on a Brooklyn subway platform on the morning of April 20 and taken to the hospital, where he died on April 26, a police spokesman told AFP. According to police sources quoted by the New York Post tabloid, Daniel Auster died of a “accidental overdose“.
As a reminder, the discreet 40-year-old was arrested ten days ago for manslaughter and criminal negligence against his daughter Ruby, charged and released on bail. During his detention on November 1 at his Brooklyn home, the baby was found unconscious. Hospital, Daniel Auster’s daughter died of acute poisoning from the combined effects of fentanyl and heroinso the police.
Daniel Auster’s drug problems didn’t appear to be new because, as AFP points out, in Paul Auster’s novel called The Night of the Oracle, the narrator is a writer whose son is a drug addict. Was he inspired by his own son for his story? The novelist who has won awards worldwide (Princess of Asturias Prize in Spain, Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters in France and Odyssey Prize in Quebec) is one of the most renowned New York writers to have been translated around the world. He is married to American writer and essayist Siri Hustvedt, but Daniel Auster’s mother is American writer Lydia Davis.