“Myths of Death” podcast
Historian Torri Yates-Orr and mythologist John Bucher of the Skeleton Keys podcast discuss the mythology of death, as well as Thanatos, Hel, Gede, the Grim Reaper, and the afterlife.
History
An Online Symposium Celebrating 50 Years of “The Denial of Death”, With Caitlin Doughty & Sheldon Solomon
I’m looking forward to attending this upcoming online symposium, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Ernest Becker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Denial of Death. Published in 1973, the book helped spark the Happy Death Movement, a clear precursor to the current Death Positivity Movement. The event will be moderated by D.S. Moss and will feature speakers … Read moreAn Online Symposium Celebrating 50 Years of “The Denial of Death”, With Caitlin Doughty & Sheldon Solomon
“One life: imagining a radical acceptance of death”
My new article for OnlySky explores the philosophy of radical death acceptance via the nontheistic religion of Cavesword imagined in Gore Vidal’s 1954 novel Messiah, tracing the concept back to the garden-school of Epicurus and then to the bohemian counter-culture surrounding the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: The humanist point of view is centered on the … Read more“One life: imagining a radical acceptance of death”
Simon Critchley on Religion and Death
Duende or Struldbrugs? Choose now. Our operators are standing by.
Poetic Faith Discussion on “Sacred Tension”
Click here to listen to my recent discussion with Stephen Bradford Long on the Sacred Tension podcast, centered on the themes of mythmaking, poetic faith and nontheistic ritual/religion.
“Will I Go Gentle?”
Dale McGowan writes for OnlySky, the new secular/Humanist multimedia platform, on the vexing question of “what is it like to die?”: There are ways to diminish the fear of death and dying. Epicurus may have been the first to formally note that our existence is bounded by symmetrical eternities. We fear the eternity of nonexistence … Read more“Will I Go Gentle?”
“Burying the Dead Monuments”
Professor Elizabeth Scarborough muses on potential futures for discarded monumental statues: Monuments are objects designed and created intentionally to remind us of something worth honoring. According to J.B. Jackson, “A traditional monument, as the origin of the word indicates, is an object which is supposed to remind us of something important. That is to say, … Read more“Burying the Dead Monuments”
Mortem: an Online Residency for Thanatocurious Artists
Mortem is a two-week long, daily online artist residency arranged by Ayatana’s Biophilium: The virtual residency will involve daily live video lectures with international death care and funeral industry workers, historians, biologists and artists on a range of death related topics, one tethered international field trip in a graveyard near you and several short one … Read moreMortem: an Online Residency for Thanatocurious Artists
Old Leatherstocking
Folk banjoist Clifton Hicks conjures the Appalachian Reaper, “Old Leatherstocking”, in these memento mori songs from his album of that title.