Help! Terry Pratchett reading for a funeral?

[SelfPortraitWithHagstone]

I'm reading at a funeral for a very dear friend next week, and struggling (all my own books are in storage, which doesn't help). He was a wonderful (young) man, who had the same combination of warmth, wisdom and humour that I think Terry Pratchett had in spades - and I would love to read something that might make people smile while also speaking to the big truths about life and death and loss. Most of all I'd like something about love... Looking for a page or so of something that works out of context. (And won't annoy the anti-fantasy lot...)

If anyone has any ideas I would love to hear them!

“Wen considered the nature of time and understood that the universe is, instant by instant, recreated anew. Therefore, he understood, there is in truth no past, only a memory of the past. Blink your eyes, and the world you see next did not exist when you closed them. Therefore, he said, the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it.”

From Thief of Time.

And I’m sorry you’re in the position of having to read at the funeral of a young friend. I hope the day is filled with love and happy memories

Thank you so much for the suggestion, and for the flowers. He was really an extraordinary man, and I'm very anxious about finding something that will do him justice, while being conscious that I can't! But yes, lots and lots of happy memories, he was very loved.

I love that piece, but I think it might be a bit philosophical - my ideal reading, if it exists, would be a passage that's more about love, and the legacy people leave when they die. I love the bit in Reaper Man where Miss Flitworth dies and is reunited with her lover, and then it's followed with a bit about the Dark Morris, but that's a bit long and hard to put in context. I'm hoping that somewhere there is something like Granny Weatherwax consoling someone at a funeral, or Death arriving at a dance to take someone away - something that acknowledges that death is shit, while giving a glimmer of humour and hope. Argh. 🤞

No one is actually dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away…’ – Reaper Man

Or is there something in Going Postal about keeping someone’s name alive?

“It’s an inconvenience, true enough, and I don’t like it at all, but I know that you do it for everyone, Mister Death. Is there any other way?’
NO, THERE ISN’T, I’M AFRAID. WE ARE ALL FLOATING IN THE WINDS OF TIME. BUT YOUR CANDLE, MISTRESS WEATHERWAX, WILL FLICKER FOR SOME TIME BEFORE IT GOES OUT – A LITTLE REWARD FOR A LIFE WELL LIVED. FOR I CAN SEE THE BALANCE AND YOU HAVE LEFT THE WORLD MUCH BETTER THAN YOU FOUND IT, AND IF YOU ASK ME, said Death, NOBODY COULD DO ANY BETTER THAN THAT . . .

from The Shepherds Crown

Love that, @Elisheva , I was thinking a Granny Weatherwax one would be good.

No one is finally dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away, until the clock wound up winds down, until the wine she made has finished its ferment, until the crop they planted is harvested. The span of someone’s life is only the core of their actual existence.
Reaper Man

I love this!

And also this

My condolences @SelfPortraitWithHagstone 💐

“There have been times, lately, when I dearly wished that I could change the past. Well, I can’t, but I can change the present, so that when it becomes the past it will turn out to be a past worth having.” (I Shall Wear Midnight)

www.goodreads.com/quotes/6666092-no-one-is-finally-dead-until-the-ripples-they-cause

That's beautiful!