"The Dead Beat"

After all that angst, I decided to just let go of "Wickett's Remedy." I felt guilty for at least 10 minutes, but I have moved on. Now I'm reading "The Dead Beat," by Marilyn Johnson, which I picked up at the Harvard Book Store after hearing the author speak there. It's a book about..... obituaries! I know, you are wondering why on Earth anyone would want to read (or write) such a book. It turns out that there is quite a cult-ish group of people who zealously read obituaries, and after reading this book, I've become convinced that some of the best writing in journalism can be found on the obit page (depending on the newspaper, anyway). I have written more than my share of obits, but never one with a lede as spectacular as this, which Johnson quotes from the New York Times:

"Selma Koch, a Manhattan store owner who earned a national reputation by helping women find the right bra size, mostly through a discerning glance and never with a tape measure, died Thursday at Mount Sinai Medical Center. She was 95 and a 34B."

That's just one of the quirky tidbits scattered through this book. There's also a hilarious description of a convention of obituary writers and the frenzy that broke out when Ronald Reagan died on the last day of the convention. The chapter I'm on now describes the obituary obsession among London newspapers, who take a no-holds-barred, get-the-skeletons-out-of-the-closet approach to memorializing the dearly departed. The author includes a particularly amusing translation of some of the euphemisms often used in those papers - i.e., "tireless raconteur" = "crashing bore," and "affable and hospitable at every hour" = "chronic alcoholic," etc.

You might think that a book about obituaries would be hugely depressing, but this one has actually caused me to laugh out loud on the train (or at least crack a smile).