Orin's interview with Steeply (p. 1038)
Because the question doesn’t mean anything is why. Insane is just like a catch-term, it doesn’t describe anything, it isn’t a reason for anything. The Stork was a full-blown demented alcoholic for the last three years of his life, and he put his head in the microwave, and I think just in terms of unpleasantness you’d have to be sort of insane to kill yourself in such a painful way. So but was he insane.
Context
"Helen Steeply's" first real question is about JOI, and Orin's answer is a long refusal to let "insane" mean anything. The flat unpunctuated "So but was he insane." is the closest Orin ever comes to actually looking at his father's suicide — immediately buried under JOI's résumé of high functioning.