These range from those compiled by the New York Times, The Economist, and The Daily Telegraph (British). And that's just the ones I own. My guess is there are more.
The Introductions to these tomes are themselves splendid essays. I can never remember the source of where I read that Pete Hamill so beautifully observed that "life is the leading cause of death." After you read that, all else follows.
The lives recounted in The Daily Telegraph are of course British lives, and were all written by Hugh Massingberd. Absorbing British writing and lives takes you away from the species generally acknowledged here in the States to an array of aristocrats and titled peers whose walk through life is completely unlike what we're used to reading about. Take the Earl of Carnavon, Henry George Alfred Marius Victor Herbert, "Porchy, "a most uncompromisingly direct ladies' man" who liked staying at the Ritz, not necessarily with a room overlooking the park, "but rather one that overlooked the rent."
From these compilations are not necessarily the last words that will ever be written about these people, but are the last words written immediately after they've died. Some people will it seem never die. We're going to keep hearing about them for decades, perhaps centuries, depending on their place in history.
Take former president Lyndon Johnson. He's been dead since 1973, but as long as Robert Caro keeps pumping out words, the man will never leave our consciousness. There must be a biography published about Winston Churchill almost annually, and he left us in 1965.
Very few of us ever reach the perpetual exalted heights of notoriety. And very few of us even reach a bylined obit in any newspaper.
The current observed form of a NYT obit is to leave us with a final word, something said by the individual themselves, or said about them, that leaves us with an appreciation of how their life was lived.
I've been reading obits now for decades, but lately I've become very aware of the age of the deceased in relation to my age. Once upon a time they were always older than me. Now, not necessarily. Those that are at least 10 years younger than me really get my attention. I re-read the cause of death, if given. It is often suicide. This always adds an extra element of sadness to the obit. Someone checked themselves out, yet had accomplished enough to get a tribute notice.
Take Alan B. Krueger, an economist who reshaped policymaking, who has passed away at 58, apparently of a suicide.
Mr. Krueger gets a full six columns, along with two photos, one of which is his standing next to President Barack Obama as he's being introduced as the Chairman of Economic Advisers in a Rose Garden ceremony in 2011.
I like to read about leading-edge scientists, Nobel Prize winners and noted anyone who was a stand-out in their scientific field. Economists are particularly appealing to me because they don't just try and tell where the market is going, (if they are even doing that) they create studies that try and explain behavior driven by economic conditions.
Studies done by economists always entertain me because they seem to be trying to answer questions I certainly never thought of.
Should tax credits be given to businesses that offer new employment? Does poverty cause terrorism? Does raising the minimum wage cause there to be a decrease in low-wage employment? Do occupational licensing rules rules impede workers from seeking better-paying jobs?
Mr. Krueger did plenty of research driven off extensive surveys. He had an absolute Ivy League pedigree, wife, children, and success and respect that leave you wondering what was it that made him take his own life? Of course, that question is not part of the obit, and reminds me of the great W.H. Auden poem, 'The Unknown Citizen,' that ends with:
Was he free? Was he Happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.
The obit closes with words from Mr. Card, a frequent contributor with Mr. Krueger:
"He had headlights that went a lot further in the dark than anybody else."
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