In this retrospective, the Chron’s Carl Nolte said Caen had a special way of spinning items: “He called an L.A. cop ‘an equal opportunity bigot — he hates everyone’ … he said the Catholic archbishop had closed so many churches he made an unholy mess … he found a guy who played two saxophones at the same time and wondered if he was bisaxual … he called a bus driver with a perfect attendance record the Cal Ripken of the Muniserable railway … he gave Beaucaens, and sent Caengrats. He invented words. Beatnik was one.”