How to Write an Obituary That Actually Sounds Like Them

Most obituaries could describe anyone. Born, worked, survived by, services on Thursday. The person who made a whole room laugh, who could fix anything with wire and patience, disappears into a template.

Writing an obituary that sounds like the person is not harder. It just starts from a different place: not from the dates, but from one true detail.

Start with a detail, not a date

Instead of: Marija N. passed away on August 5th. Try: Marija never once let a guest leave her kitchen hungry, and she considered this her life's work. The dates can come in the second paragraph. The first sentence should carry her voice.

The simple structure that works

One: a detail that makes them recognisable. Two: the outline of the life, born where, built what, loved whom. Three: what they gave to the people around them. Four: who remains, and how they will be remembered. Five: the practical part, services and donations, kept short.

What to skip

Skip the euphemisms if they would have hated them. A gardener did not pass into eternal rest; she planted her last tomatoes in April and expected someone to water them. Skip the full CV. Choose the one job, the one work, the one pride that mattered.

Read it aloud

Before publishing, read the text aloud. If you cannot hear the person in it, find one more true detail and put it in the first line. That detail is doing the remembering.

Where it lives afterwards

A newspaper obituary lasts a day. The same words on a permanent memorial page keep working for years, gathering the stories other people add to them. Write it once, properly, and give it a place that stays.