Why and How to Tell Your Life Story: Start Now!

James R. Hagerty, who has written more than 900 obituaries for The Wall Street Journal, makes the case for telling your own story rather than leaving it to family and friends after you’re gone. 

Hagerty is the author of “Yours Truly,” a guide to writing life stories that has been praised in the New York Times and Washington Post. He will explain why and how people should take charge of the narrative of their lives by writing or recording their memories, in long or short form. Hagerty believes that everyone has interesting stories to tell and that preserving them can be the best gift ever given to friends and loved ones.

“Being famous is not a prerequisite for valuing and preserving your best stories and the lessons you’ve learned,” he says. Contrary to popular belief, telling and preserving those stories isn’t a chore to be taken up only in old age, Hagerty writes. Instead, young and middle-aged people should start keeping notes, recordings and annotated pictures.  Your friends and family members, including those not born, will want the original version of your stories, not the vaguely remembered second-hand versions typically supplied by others. No one can tell your story as well as you can.

Hagerty also will discuss other lessons he has learned from his seven years of writing obituaries for the Wall Street Journal, mostly about people who were not famous but had fascinating lives.

James R. Hagerty, known as Bob, has more than four decades of experience as a reporter and editor for the Wall Street Journal and the International Herald Tribune. He has been based in New York, Hong Kong, Paris, London and Atlanta. He now lives in Pittsburgh, where he manages a Scrabble club and helps run a senior softball league. 

This program is made possible with the support of The Friends of the Livingston Library and does not need registration.