When I read obituaries, my imagination always runs wild

IIn the Netherlands, more than 3,000 people die every week. For some of these deaths, an obituary is published in a national or local newspaper – a Dutch custom that is usually not found abroad.

In some countries, instead of advertisements, small posters with death announcements are pasted on walls. The purpose of obituaries, of course, is to inform others of the end of a family member’s life or to pay tribute to a friend or colleague.

I don’t know if this only happens to me, but my imagination always runs wild when I read obituaries. Sometimes there is a sentence about a ‘year-long battle’ that the deceased fought ‘bravely and combatively’ until, ‘tired and longing for rest’, he eventually had to stop the ‘uneven fight’.

I imagine someone who, after a serious illness, has undergone severe treatments with a lot of misery and has continued to fight against death until the end. Or perhaps someone for whom it has been clear for a long time that he or she would die from the disease, but who has nevertheless undergone endlessly difficult therapies, which were actually determined in advance that they would have little effect, but which would cause a lot of misery. caused.

Fortunately, more and more patients (and their doctors) are now able to stop treatment in a timely manner, which may prolong life slightly but certainly does not add quality to the last days of life. It is often wiser for the person in the final phase of life (and also for the surviving relatives) if the last weeks are spent with family and friends, instead of endless hospital visits and other medical unpleasantness.

Nowadays I secretly find myself checking the age of the deceased. Growing older comes with the confronting truth that people younger than yourself are increasingly dying.

Sometimes advertisements also contain puns; For example, a lawyer’s obituary stated that ‘no appeal was possible against this verdict’. Or with a dentist that ‘this void could not be filled’.

A separate category is the obituaries that people have published about themselves after death. Perhaps motivated by the need to have a last word or to retain some control even after death.

Sometimes these advertisements contain encouragement to survivors, such as an urgent call to quit cigarettes by an inveterate smoker who died of lung cancer. And sometimes they are morbid, but funny. Such as Bertus from Beilen, who informs family and friends in his obituary that he has ‘moved to a smaller home’.

Finally: a colorful and sometimes cynical doctor announced his own death in a message in which he referred to his cremation as ‘my own burnout’.

Marcel Levi is chairman of the board of directors of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). Previously he was CEO of University College London Hospitals and chairman of the board of the AMC. He writes a weekly column for Het Parool.

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