Obituaries were among my favorite to write because they have elements no other news stories have - a story from start to finish with a proper conclusion. Tom Rachman More Quotes by Tom Rachman More Quotes From Tom Rachman You know, there's that silly saying 'We're born alone and we die alone' -it's nonsense. We're surrounded at birth and surrounded at death. It is in between that we're alone. Tom Rachman nonsense birth silly Remembering is the most overrated thing. Forgetting is far superior. Tom Rachman overrated forget remember During my past career as a journalist, I relished writing obits and equally dreaded phoning relatives for the necessary facts. But to my surprise and great relief, they often wanted to talk - they wanted their recently deceased loved ones recorded in print. Tom Rachman careers writing past Journalists who are devoted to strictly factual reporting take particular pleasure from satirical news outlets that have the liberty to laugh and even mock the hypocrisy that reporters and editors must simply observe without comment. Tom Rachman editors hypocrisy laughing Many things embarrass me, but reading isnt one of them. Im not ashamed of my slightly weird collection of prison memoirs. Nor the flaky meditation books. After all, I can pretend I never read those. Tom Rachman meditation reading book The training of a journalist, of working with words for thousands of hours, is extraordinarily useful for a fiction writer. Tom Rachman hours training fiction A common defense among obituary-fanciers such as myself is that the obit is not about death at all. It is about life. This is true since an article about the condition of deadness would make for turgid reading at best. Tom Rachman defense reading common People, it turns out, aren't a product of their own time. They're a product of the time before theirs Tom Rachman turns products people We enjoy this illusion of continuity and we call it memory. Which explains, perhaps, why our worst fear isn't the end of life, but the end of memories Tom Rachman end-of-life illusion memories Basically, financial reporting is this sinking hole at the centre of journalism. You start by swimming around it until finally, reluctantly, you can't fight the pull anymore and you get sucked down the drain into the biz pages. Tom Rachman swimming pages fighting Anything that's worth anything is complicated. Tom Rachman complicated Our worst fear isn't the end of life but the end of memories. Tom Rachman end-of-life ends memories Here is a fact: nothing in all civilization has been as productive as ludicrous ambition. Whatever its ills, nothing has created more. Cathedrals, sonatas, encyclopedias: love of God was not behind them, nor love of life. But the love of man to be worshiped by man. Tom Rachman love-life ambition men Art doesn't spring from the muses alone, but from hard work. Tom Rachman hard-work spring art When I left Toronto and entered journalism in the late 1990s, I had many notions about the news business, nearly all of them wrong, as it turned out. Tom Rachman journalism news late business I had pictured journalism as I'd seen it in the most ennobling films, where the reporter battles for the truth, propelled by conviction, and is triumphant. There are journalists who fit that ideal. Tom Rachman battles where journalism truth My own career started in New York at the 'Associated Press', a fast-paced news agency where we rarely had time for deep reporting. Tom Rachman deep news my-own time That's a paradox I've noticed, too: The news business held little romance for me, yet writing about it somehow stirred my affections. Tom Rachman me news business writing My parents used to rent old movies - my whole childhood is in black and white - and it was my dream to make films. Tom Rachman childhood black-and-white black white I went to the University of Toronto to study the history and theory of film, in the back of my mind thinking I'd go to NYU film school and see if I could make a career of it. Tom Rachman mind history school thinking
