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Amy Krouse Rosenthal, a popular author, filmmaker and speaker, has died at the age of 51, just over a week after she wrote an emotional essay about wanting to find someone to marry her husband Jason after her death.
Rosenthal had been diagnosed in 2015 with ovarian cancer. Her death was confirmed by her longtime literary agent, Amy Rennert, who said Rosenthal "was the most life-affirming person, and love-affirming person".
A Chicago native and longtime resident, Rosenthal completed more than 30 books, including journals, memoirs and the best-selling picture stories, Uni the Unicorn and Duck! Rabbit! She made short films and YouTube videos, gave TED talks and provided radio commentary.
While her books were noted for their exuberant tone, she started a very different conversation early this month with a widely-read column Modern Love she wrote for The New York Times.
Rosenthal told of learning about her fatal diagnosis, and, in the form of a dating profile, offered tribute to Jason Brian Rosenthal. The essay was titled, You May Want to Marry My Husband.
"If you're looking for a dreamy, let's-go-for-it travel companion, Jason is your man. He also has an affinity for tiny things: taster spoons, little jars, a mini-sculpture of a couple sitting on a bench, which he presented to me as a reminder of how our family began," she wrote.
"Here is the kind of man Jason is: He showed up at our first pregnancy ultrasound with flowers. This is a man who, because he is always up early, surprises me every Sunday morning by making some kind of oddball smiley face out of items near the coffeepot: a spoon, a mug, a banana.
"I am wrapping this up on Valentine's Day, and the most genuine, non-vase-oriented gift I can hope for is that the right person reads this, finds Jason, and another love story begins."
Rosenthal was a Tufts University graduate who worked in advertising for several years before she had what she called a "McEpiphany".
She was with her three children at McDonald's when she promised herself that she would leave advertising and become a writer.
Rosenthal more than kept her word and starting in the late 1990s, she regularly published at least a book a year, and sometimes three or four.
Ms Rennert said Rosenthal had completed seven more picture books before her death, including a collaboration with her daughter, Paris, called Dear Girl.
Rosenthal loved experimenting with different media, and blending the virtual and physical worlds.
One of her favorite projects began with a YouTube video, 17 Things I Made, featuring everything from books she had written to her three children to a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. At the end of the video, she welcomed fans to join her at Chicago's Millennium Park, on August 8, 2008. The goal was to make a "cool" 18th thing.
Hundreds turned out to "make" things — whether it be a grand entrance, a new friend, a splash, something pretty.
"I tend to believe whatever you decide to look for you will find, whatever you beckon will eventually beckon you," she said during a 2012 TED talk.
Her books were equally untraditional. Textbook Amy Krouse Rosenthal, published in 2016, is divided into chapters named for school subjects, from Geography to Language Arts. Subtitled Not Exactly a Memoir, the book features lists, illustrations, charts, emails and text messages. In a section called Midterm Essay, Rosenthal reflected on middle age and her youthful passion for life.
"If it is wonderful, splendid, remarkable — a view outside a window, a lit-up fountain at night, that fig-chorizo appetizer — I am compelled to seek some sort of saturation point, to listen/stare/savor on a loop, to greedily keep at it until I've absorbed, absconded with, and drained it of all its magic," she wrote.
"Invariably, I will have to move on before I have had enough. My first word was 'more.' It may very well be my last."
AP
Topics: ovarian-cancer, arts-and-entertainment, books-literature, united-states
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