Obituaries, past and present: from the fast food biographical narrative to a newspaper literature
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2017v70n1p143Abstract
This article offers a panorama of the cultural phenomena of obituary publishing and reading, both on newspapers in English, their original locus, and anthologies. It relates the appearance of this specific genre and its hegemonic lasting in contemporary American and British newspapers to the biographical, instantaneous and literary aspects of its narrative. The reasons for the extemporaneous interest of the reader in a genre that often migrates from the ephemerality of newspapers to long-lasting print anthologies is searched for in its romanesque configuration, itself originated from other genres and formed by discourses of life and death, ultimately legitimized by the truth discourse of the Press. Hence, the obituary would be consumed, esthetically, both as an ethically profound true story and as easy literature.
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