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Do We Need A New Narrative For Death?

Part 2 of the TED Radio Hour episode Rethinking Death

About Amanda Bennett's TED Talk

Journalist Amanda Bennett explains why having hope while watching a loved one die shouldn't warrant a diagnosis of "denial." She calls for a more heroic narrative for death — to match the ones we have in life.

About Amanda Bennett

Amanda Bennett a freelance journalist and writer. She was formerly the Executive Editor of Projects and Investigations for Bloomberg News. She was also a reporter for The Wall Street Journal for more than 20 years, and at The Oregonian in Portland.

In 1997, Bennett shared the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting for a Wall Street Journal investigation on the struggle against AIDS, and in 2001 received a second Pulitzer Prize for public service, as the lead of a team at The Oregonian. In 2010, Bennett was elected as co-Chairman of the Pulitzer Prize Board.

Bennett has written six books. Her most recent book, The Cost of Hope, is part-memoir, part-investigative report, about her seven-year struggle within the American healthcare system to save her husband from cancer.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

NPR/TED Staff