Clive Cussler dies at 88: The enduring legacy of writing

Clive Cussler was one of my favorite adventure writers. His
books about underwater explorer Dirk Pitt sold millions of copies and were made
into popular movies. I read his novels with gratitude for their historical
context and geopolitical intrigue.

In many ways, the author patterned his most famous character
on himself. Cussler participated in dozens of searches for old ships, including
one that found a steamship belonging to Cornelius Vanderbilt. Like Pitt, he was
a collector of antique cars. He lived large and invited us to do the same.

His writing career almost didn’t become a career, however.

He was working as an advertising copywriter in the 1960s (he
helped coin the Ajax laundry detergent slogan, “It’s stronger than
dirt”) while writing fiction on the side. He finished two manuscripts but
had no literary agent.

So he created one out of thin air. He invented “The
Charles Winthrop Agency,” got a friend to design a logo for it, and sent
an inquiry in its name to the William Morris Agency. The ruse worked—Cussler’s
book, Mediterranean Caper, was published in 1973.

He went on to write more than twenty Dirk Pitt novels as well as other adventure series and children’s books. Cussler died Monday at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona, at the age of eighty-eight.

The enduring legacy of writing

You and I know of the Apostle Paul because of the New Testament books that he wrote and that were written about him.

We know of St. Augustine because of his autobiography and other brilliant works of theology.

Thomas Aquinas authored Summa Theologica, a masterful exposition of Christian theology that remains foundational to Catholic thinking today.

Martin Luther launched the Protestant Reformation with a document he nailed to the door of the Wittenberg church.

John Calvin’s written systematic theology undergirds Reformed thinking more than four centuries later.

The martyred pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer…