To conclude this week’s special series on dying, we delve into the legacy left behind. Specifically, the writers who tell the stories of the recently deceased. We start with the obituary writers at the New York Times. Filmmaker Vanessa Gould captured the process of choosing subjects, researching and writing an obit in her documentary, Obit. Life on Deadline. We talked to Gould about what drove her to the topic and what she learned from the writers. We also speak with Chicago Sun-Times obituary writer Maureen O’Donnell about how she finds the right words, what she digs up in the paper’s archive, and how she’s captured so much of Chicago history in her obits.