March 25, 2008

Jon Hassler, 74, a Minnesota author who chronicled the foibles of small-town life in "Staggerford," "Grand Opening" and other novels after starting his career in middle age, died Thursday at Methodist Hospital in St. Louis Park, Minn. He had suffered for several years from progressive supranuclear palsy, similar to Parkinson's disease.

Despite his deteriorating health, Hassler continued working, finishing the book "Jay O'Malley" a few weeks ago.

In a 1995 interview, Hassler told the Associated Press that he liked writing about misfits. "You can't write a novel about somebody who's perfectly happy," he said.

Hassler was born in Minneapolis on March 30, 1933, and grew up in the small north-central Minnesota town of Staples, where his father owned a grocery store. He graduated from St. John's University in Collegeville in 1955 before receiving a master's from the University of North Dakota. He spent years teaching high school and college English before launching his writing career at 37.

He didn't publish his first novel, "Staggerford," a semi-autobiographical story about a high school teacher in a small town, until seven years later. Hassler's other works include "Simon's Night" (1979), "The Love Hunter" (1981), "A Green Journey" (1986), "North of Hope" (1990) and "Dear James" (1993).

In Belgium, artist, poet, playwright and novelist Hugo Claus, whose books painted a scathing picture of repression and hypocrisy in bourgeois Flanders, died Wednesday by euthanasia at a hospital in Antwerp, his wife said. He was 78.

Claus, who had Alzheimer's disease, died at Middelheim Hospital. "He himself picked the moment of his death and asked for euthanasia," not wanting to extend his suffering, his wife, Veerle De Wit, said in a statement.

De Wit did not say how the euthanasia, which is legal in Belgium, was carried out.

Claus produced about 200 works during his career but was best known for his classic "The Sorrow of Belgium" -- a scathing attack on social injustice, stifling family relationships and Roman Catholic repression in his native Flanders in northern Belgium.

The partly autobiographical work defined his career and shot him to prominence on the international scene.

Claus also directed several movies and belonged to the Cobra group of painters, centering on spontaneous, intuitive work.

He was married several times, including to actress Sylvia Kristel, star of the 1970s erotic movie series "Emmanuelle."