Missionary of grief

“I became a complete person after my son died.” The spirit of singer Nick Cave’s 15-year-old son Arthur, who died in a fall from a cliff in the British seaside town of Brighton in 2015, animates the space between the lines of Faith, Hope and Carnage, Cave’s book-length interview with journalist Seán O’Hagan.

The shattering experience of Arthur’s death changed everything for Cave, “on an almost cellular level.” It made Cave a religious person—although not a traditional Christian or even someone who necessarily believes in God. Rather, he says, “I felt on a profound level a kind of deep inclusion in the human predicament” and “an understanding of our vulnerability and the sense that, as individuals, we are, each of us, imperiled.”

“Anything can turn catastrophic at any time,” Cave says. “Each life is precarious, and some of us understand it and some don’t. But certainly everyone will understand it in time.”