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35-year-old Somerville, MA resident Mitchell Heisman shot himself in Harvard Yard last Saturday in front of a tour group. Turns out he left a sprawling, deeply-researched suicide note, conveniently located at suicidenote.info

Heisman's suicide was notable for its setting: the steps of Memorial Church in picturesque Harvard Yard, with high school students on a tour ambling about. But Heisman's suicide note is interesting, too. The 1,900-page .pdf document is funny at points, impenetrably academic at others, and exhaustively researched with a selected bibliography of nearly 20 pages ("What suicide note would be complete without a bibliography," Heisman jokes.) In the introduction to Suicide Note, Heisman says it's a "a theoretical application of sociobiology to politics." But it's also a lot of creepy stuff about cyborgs and the Holocaust and overcoming our "will to live."

Heisman's mom told the Harvard Crimson she had no idea that the book he was working on was to be his suicide note: "All I knew was he was finishing his book and he was happy about that," she said.

Heisman's Suicide Note will never be taught in any classrooms, but it should definitely set a new standard for suicide notes everywhere. And it's creative commons, too!

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