Pulitzer Prize-Winning Writer Art Buchwald Dies

Jan. 18, 2007 — -- Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post columnist Art Buchwald, 81, died in his Washington home on Wednesday.

In February, Buchwald voluntarily stopped dialysis treatment, after an extended stay in a Washington-area hospice. To the surprise and delight of his doctors, family and friends, Buchwald continued to live long after all expectations, even traveling to his beloved home on Martha's Vineyard for one last summer.

Buchwald declined further dialysis treatment after doctors amputated his right leg below the knee. The humorist, best known for his long-running Washington Post column, which earned a Pulitzer Prize in 1982, was given weeks to live.

From his so-called deathbed, Buchwald updated a living will, devoured McDonald's milkshakes, said farewell to friends, and even received a medal from the French ambassador to the United States honoring the writer's 50-year career.

Free from the constraints of 15 hours a week in the clinic, Buchwald met with Congress members, spoke with NPR, and, on March 10, 2006, granted ABC News what was then believed to be one of his last TV interviews.

In that interview, Buchwald then told "This Week With George Stephanopoulos" producer Lisa Koenig, "It was my decision," referring to his then monthlong refusal of dialysis.

"I thought it would be a lot faster than it is," he said. "I was supposed to be [in the hospice] for three weeks, four weeks, and it's about the ninth or eighth week that I'm still here."

Sixteen weeks later, Buchwald wrote in the column, announcing his trip out of bed and toward the beach, "The purpose of the hospice is to help you go gently into the night when all else fails. … It didn't work out that way for me."

With trademark humor, Buchwald said, "Most people that enter a hospice depart by a different door than the one they came in."

Initially, Buchwald told "This Week," his family was skeptical of his decision to stop treatment. "My son didn't like the idea at all, but he was so sweet in not pushing me."

"Finally, when they said, 'It's your decision,' the family came around. And it's a very interesting thing, because we sit here in the living room of this place and we discuss my funeral, where it's going to be, who my speakers are going to be. And planning your own funeral, to be sitting here talking about it, is wild. It's crazy."

Over the summer, Buchwald, long a staple of Washington society, met with members of the Kennedy family and persuaded longtime friend Carly Simon to sing at his funeral.

Of his hospice stay, Buchwald told ABC News in March, "I'm having the best time of my life. I mean, wouldn't you, to be sitting here and everybody thinks you're a wonderful person and you can't take it all because, first of all, you know, you're starting to feel like John Glenn. You know, you don't understand -- why is this as wild as it is?"

The author theorized about heaven with friends such as Larry Gelbert, author and director of "MASH," recalling for ABC News, "We laugh about [death]. We talk about it. We don't just sit there and bemoan it. And the friends I have feel good about it, because it's not a bad thing. In here, there's nothing you can do. You're here, and you're going. Everybody here is going."

Buchwald wrote about his experiences over the last year entitled "Too Soon to Say Goodbye," which was published in November.

Buchwald's son, Joel, told The Associated Press, "He went out the way he wanted to go, on his own terms."