Hi, I was hoping this community can help me with some literature suggestions. I am doing my PhD in spatial descriptions of death and dying in literature.
What are some literary works (of high / canonised quality) that contain narratives of death / dying / any type of confrontation with death (morning, remembrance, existential denial of death, etc) that you can recommend?
I would love a broad overview of works (not only from the western canon, but also from other traditions if you know of any)
A few examples on my list so far, to give you an idea.
Epic of Gilgamesh, Ancient Mesapotamian text, c. 2nd century BCE
(where Enkido dies and Gilgamesh mourns him and finds himself confronting his own mortality)
Tolstoy's Death of Ivan Ilyich, 1886, Russian.
Dante's Divine Comedy, c. 1308-1320, Medieval
There are no rules of inclusion of exclusion yet, I just want to get a feel for the body of work available to me. Does not even have to be canonised either tbh, any literary work that has death narratives that have had an impact on you – I would love to hear!
Like you can see, ancient – modern, anything! (Even if its myths / fables / poetry)
Thank you in advance!
by FielaBaggins
9 Comments
Not sure if it fits or not, but try Abhorsen by Garth Nix. At least you’ll get to read a fun book. 🙂
Shark Heart by Emily Habeck. Modern work. Explores long term illness, death and grief in a really unique way. I thought it was beautiful and moving.
Hyperion Cantos , Dan Simmons.
Emma’s death in Madame Bovary is an interesting one. Painful, drawn out, self inflicted, written with dark humour but also heartbreaking for the husband and child.
Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel García Marquez
Replay by Ken Grimwood
I recently read a book called Hindu Myths A Modern Retelling that had a chapter about the afterlife in Hinduism and also spoke a lot about reincarnation in other chapters, and the nature of destruction as a whole conceptually in the chapter right before it, and the end of the world in the chapter right after it.
I had never heard of a Hindu afterlife, so looked it up and it turned out it’s really a belief.
The chapter itself felt a bit like Dante’s inferno, wasn’t very long though.
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson is written as a series of letters from a dying preacher to his young son
There’s the YA Piers Anthony book On A Pale Horse about the incarnation of Death.