If you met him in person, David Lynch came across as a Midwestern pastor, all gee-whiz and aw-shucks. He was one of the few people who seemed wholly incapable of irony and, hearing him talk, you’d think the man must have enjoyed a pretty darn nice Montana childhood.

David Lynch died yesterday at the age of 78, after a career that made him perhaps the most consequential American art filmmaker in the history of the medium. But his singular voice extended far beyond cinema,