Of all the arts, movies are the most powerful aid to empathy, and good ones make us into better people.  – Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert died yesterday. When I heard the news, I felt a great sense of grief and loss, as if one of my dearest friends had been taken from me.

I trusted Ebert’s judgments on film, respected his tenacity and honesty, admired his incredible work ethic. There was something effortless and unstudied about his film reviews, as if he were simply sharing his thoughts with friends. That his thoughts happened to be erudite, well-informed, and beautifully expressed was just a side effect of being in conversation together, as friends.

I knew Roger Ebert’s voice mostly as words on a screen. I followed his Twitter feed and read his reviews, and in every sentence, I sensed his passion for film, his unquenchable enthusiasm. I’ve never had a television at home, so I mostly missed the experience of hearing him debate with Gene Siskel (and later with Richard Roeper). By the time I had a chance to listen to his breathlessly enthusiastic commentary on Casablanca, Ebert’s own voice was already a thing of the past, stolen away by cancer. And yet he spoke to me. He spoke to us all.