THE OBIT PATROL: On obituary writing: do's and dont's

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

On obituary writing: do's and dont's

A nice little editorial by Cathie Rov at the Coast Reporter that meditates on the do's and dont's of obituary writing.

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additional reading

52 McGs
The Best Obituaries from Legendary New York Times Reporter Robert McG. Thomas Jr.
Chris Calhoun, ed.
Scribner, New York 2001

The Dead Beat
Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries
Marilyn Johnson
HarperCollins, New York, 2006

Life on the Death Beat: A Handbook for Obituary Writers
Alana Baranick, Jim Sheeler and Stephen Miller
Marion Street Press, Inc., Oak Park, Ill., 2005

New York Times: The Obits Annual 2012

Edited by William McDonald

The Portable Obituary
How the Famous, Rich and Powerful Really Died
Michael Largo
HarperCollins, New York 2007

The Last Word
The New York Times Book of Obituaries and Farewells
A Celebration of Unusual Lives
Martin Siegel, ed.
William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York 1997

Obit.
Inspiring Stories of Ordinary People Who Led Extraordinary Lives
Jim Sheeler
Pruett Publishing Co., Boulder Colorado 2007

Final Exits
The Illustrated Encyclopedia of How We Die
Michael Largo
Harper, New York 2006

Rest in Pieces: The Curious Fates of Famous Corpses

Bess Lovejoy

Simon & Shuster, New York 2013

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Corpses

Mary Roach

W.W. Norton & Company, 2004

"The poetry of history lies in the quasi-miraculous fact that once, on this earth, on this familiar spot of ground, walked men and women, as actual as we are today, thinking their own thoughts, swayed by their own passions, but now all gone, one generation vanishing after another, gone as utterly as we ourselves shall be gone, like ghosts at cock-crow."
G.M. Trevelyan, "Autobiography of an Historian"

"When I read the book, the biography famous,
And is this then (said I) what the author calls a man's life?
And so will some one when I am dead and gone write my life?
(As if any man really knew aught of my life,
Why even I myself I often think know little or nothing of my real life,
Only a few hints, a few diffused faint clews and indirections
I seek for my own use to trace out here.)"
Walt Whitman, "When I Read the Book"

“What a wee little part of a person’s life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself. . . . His acts and his words are merely the visible thin crust of his world . . . and they are so trifling a part of his bulk! a mere skin enveloping it. The mass of him is hidden — it and its volcanic fires that toss and boil, and never rest, night nor day. These are his life, and they are not written, and cannot be written. . . . Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of the man — the biography of the man himself cannot be written.” -- Mark Twain, "Autobiography"

"And some there be, which have no memorial; who are perished, as though they had never been; and are become as though they had never been born; and their children after them. But these were merciful men, whose righteousness hath not been forgotten. With their seed shall continually remain a good inheritance, and their children are within the covenant.
Their seed standeth fast, and their children for their sakes. Their seed shall remain for ever, and their glory shall not be blotted out. Their bodies are buried in peace; but their name liveth for evermore. The people will tell of their wisdom, and the congregation will shew forth their praise." -- Ecclesiasticus 44:9 - 14

THE OBIT PATROL

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Tuesday, September 21, 2010

On obituary writing: do's and dont's

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