The power of the evasive word

The Economist Book of Obituaries, by Keith Colquhoun and Ann Wroe

De mortuis nil nisi bonum, or so it used to be said. That was then. Now, since the late Hugh Montgomery- Massingbird became obituaries editor of the Telegraph, James Fergusson of the Independent, and Keith Colquhoun and Ann Wroe of the Economist, all has changed, changed utterly. Now obituaries are light entertainment. The great and the good can no longer console themselves for mortality with the expectation of unctuous posthumous tributes: the first paragraph of the Economist’s treatment of Edward Heath warns them what to expect:

The tributes spoke of his integrity, his long service and the strength of his convictions. Many of his fellow conservatives were especially keen to emphasise his love of music and sailing. Unspoken, at least for a few hours after his death, were the thoughts uppermost in many minds: his general grumpiness, his undisguised bitterness, and, in particular, his loathing for ‘that woman’.

Not that the Economist confines itself to the great and the good, at least as generally understood. It spreads its net to include film stars, clowns, cartoonists, third-world dictators, gardeners, poets, astronauts, explorers, cosmeticians, two rather off-beat dukes, the inventor of frozen non-dairy topping, at least one ‘extreme microbiologist’, a ‘possible victim of alien abduction’, and a (admittedly very remarkable) parrot. Barbara Cartland was perhaps a predictable target for its attentions, as was that grande horizontale Pamela Harriman, whose life is described as ‘an astonishing tale of sex, money and, far sweeter-smelling than both of these coarse commodities — power’; but a little more surprising is the inclusion of a rather less grande horizontale — one Anna Nicole Smith, described here as ‘a peculiarly modern celebrity’ who apparently owed her fame and fortune to her ‘celebrated American breasts’.