Edward Albee, the celebrated playwright of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The Zoo Story and other works, died today at his home in Montauk after a brief illness.

He was 88.

Woolf? stunned Broadway when it debuted in 1962, winning the Tony for best play and putting Albee on the map as one of the preeminent playwrights of the 20th century. He later won the Pulitzer for Three Tall Women, A Delicate Balance and Seascape.

Albee was openly gay—stating he first became aware of his sexuality at age 12—but didn't want to be known as a "gay writer."

"A writer who happens to be gay or lesbian must be able to transcend self," he once remarked. "I am not a gay writer. I am a writer who happens to be gay."

Some may say, though, that being a gay man who came of age in the first half of the 20th century gave him a unique outsider's perspective that informed his work.

His longtime partner, sculptor Jonathan Thomas, died of cancer in 2005.

The film version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? directed Mike Nichols and starring with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, is a cinema classic. The work was most recently revived on Broadway in 2012 with Amy Morton and Tracy Letts.

Albee continued to create new works in recent years, including 2002's The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? and 2007's

Me Myself and I.