MCLAUGHLIN: Why would anyone want the sheer misery of human life? It goes against all reason. But still, he says, that’s all I’ve got. It’s what I want. More life. Which is a deeply moving plea, the most fundamental human desire, something one sees at sickbeds and which all of us had witnessed in Sigrid’s last days, that primal desire for more, despite it all, just the raw yearning for that ineffable thing, life itself.
