Leonard Nimoy has died, aged 83. The actor had been suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease for some time.
He was a poet, a photographer, a singer, an artist, and, of course, an actor. For Tolkien fandom he’ll be recalled for the delightfully kitsch Ballad of Bildo Baggins but his key legacy to pop culture and the world will forever be his role as Mr Spock on Star Trek.
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP
— Leonard Nimoy (@TheRealNimoy) February 23, 2015
There are scores of obituaries already on the internet, many of them far more eloquent than anything I could hope to write. However, I particularly enjoyed the tribute in The Sydney Morning Herald from writer Michael Idato.
Nimoy’s Spock starred in Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: The Animated Series, a series of Star Trek feature films in the 1980s, a guest appearance in Star Trek: The Next Generation and, finally, a role in the recent J.J. Abrams reboot of the Star Trek franchise.
In that rare and intangible way, actor and character became one. Even when Nimoy threatened not to return to the role, and Star Trek’s creator Gene Roddenberry hatched plans to replace him with another Vulcan, Nimoy ultimately relented.
On some deeper level, he understood better than anyone, that his destiny, and his connection to that role, was inescapable.
