Following the death of John Hinde, Crikey carried an item flagging the somewhat pungent obituary of New Zealand newspaper proprietor Ray Smith.It opens with:
Ray Smith, the newspaper owner who died in Rotorua on Sunday aged 85, was an austere man, who went through life with a perpetual scowl...
and then becomes really frank. Worth a read, if only as a studied exercise in how to speak ill (and therefore honestly) of the dead -- could Smith have been the real life Mr Gormsby? You also wonder what Phil Campbell, the journalist who wrote the story, would have done with the Kerry Packer obituary.
