The Atlantic

How to Decide What to Leave Behind

Preparing for death can be a way to take inventory of a life well lived.
Source: Getty; The Atlantic

This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning.

In pop culture, questions of inheritance take on dramatic, often, you’d be forgiven for thinking that in all wealthy families, the specter of death elicits insults, infighting, and betrayal. For some families—even those without the wealth that the Roys are arguing over—that may well be true. But for others, deciding what to leave behind is a way to take inventory of a life well lived. It can also be an opportunity to codify our connections with the ones we love, whether or not they fall under the traditional definition of family.

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from The Atlantic

The Atlantic16 min read
The Georgia Voters Biden Really, Really Needs
Photographs by Arielle Gray for The Atlantic With 224 days to go before an election that national Democrats are casting as a matter of saving democracy, a 21-year-old canvasser named Kebo Stephens knocked on a scuffed apartment door in rural southwes
The Atlantic2 min read
The Secrets of Those Who Succeed Late in Life
This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning. “Today we live in a society structured to promote
The Atlantic6 min read
A Self-Aware Teen Soap
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here. Welcome back to The Daily’s Sunday culture edition,

Related Books & Audiobooks