'New York Times' obituarist Sam Roberts says he writes about life – not death

Sam Roberts says when people find out what he does for work, they tend to shrink away. Roberts is a veteran obituarist for The New York Times. But the writer says he writes about life – not death. His new memoir Are They Dead Yet? is a behind-the-scenes look at the craft of writing obituaries. In today’s episode, he tells NPR’s Eyder Peralta about how the Times determines who gets an obituary, how Roberts weighs the unsavory parts of his subjects’ pasts and why he decided to publish an obituary for Jesus.

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