Christopher Hitchens (1949β2011) was a British American author, critic, and bon vivant whose trenchant polemics on politics and religion positioned him at the forefront of public intellectual life in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. He wrote critically of various public figures, including Mother Teresa and Henry Kissinger. An adamant leftist in his early years, Hitchens later moved to the right of the political spectrum, actively campaigning for the invasion of Iraq and endorsing George W. Bushβs reelection in the 2004 U.S. presidential election. Throughout he remained a committed and vocal atheist.
His notable works include The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice (1995) and the best-selling God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (2007). The latter was a rallying cry to the atheist movement; he dubbed the quartet formed by him and fellow atheists Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Daniel C. Dennett βthe Four Horsemen of the Counter-Apocalypse.β