born 12 March 1970

Ana Kvrgiæ, Zagreb, Yugoslavia, actress

Anna Björk, Trollhättan, Sweden, actress

Caroline Keenan, New Orleans, Louisiana, actress

Daan Wijnands, birthplace unspecified, Dutch actor

Dave Eggers, Lake Forest, Illinois, writer/editor

Josh Hepola, Wilmington, Delaware, person of no interest

Lee-Tzsche, Seoul, South Korea, composer

Marine Delterme, Toulouse, France, actress

Ray Prewitt, College Station, Texas, actor/aircraft broker/hot sauce aficionado

Rex Walters, Omaha, Nebraska, basketball player/coach

Today’s Winner has done a lot of good writing, and played a role in presenting a lot more good writing by other people. It’s striking how recent his credits in the IMDb are; clearly he’s a personality with a broad enough following at this moment that many more moving pictures will be added to his hefty resume. But for most of the last two decades, it’s all been on the page, not the screen.

I like his passion, and the fact that one can never tell what his next book might be about. There’s something a little, I don’t know, SEVERE about his aesthetic that sometimes I’m a little cool to. And I worry about the younger brother, who puts me in mind of the son from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, whom things did not turn out well for.

But, bah on me, that’s ultimately none of my business. I just hope that the unquenchable quality that is the Dave Eggers “brand”, such as it is, stays unquenchable for a long time to come. He may just turn out to be the most important person born in 1970. It’s still too soon to tell.