JG Ballard, dead at 78

Various sources are reporting the death of J.G. Ballard, author of such controversial and thought-provoking novels as The Drowned World, Crash (the basis for the 1996 David Cronenberg film) and the autobiographical account of his childhood incarceration in a Japanese POW camp Empire of the Sun (the basis of the Steven Spielberg film.)

Author (and Ballard friend) Iain Sinclair told BBC News that Ballard had become a major figure in the literary world.

"He was one of the first to take up the whole idea of ecological catastrophe. He was fascinated by celebrity early on, the cult of the star and suicides of cars, motorways, edgelands of cities. All of these things he was one of the first to create almost a philosophy of. And I think as time has gone on, he's become a major, major figure."

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