Death is an inevitable fact of life. Throughout the centuries, humanity has sought to understand this sobering thought through art and ritual. The theme of memento mori informs medieval Danse Macabre, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Renaissance paintings of dissected corpses and "anatomical Eves," Gothic literature, funeral effigies, Halloween, and paintings of the Last Judgment. Deceased ancestors are celebrated in the Mexican Day of the Dead, while the ancient Egyptians mummified their dead to secure their afterlife.

A volume of unprecedented breadth and sinister beauty, Death: A Graveside Companion examines a staggering range of cultural attitudes toward death. The book is organized into themed chapters: The Art of Dying, Examining the Dead, Memorializing the Dead, The Personification of Death, Symbolizing Death, Death as Amusement, and The Dead After Life. Each chapter begins with thought-provoking articles by curators, academics, and journalists followed by gallery spreads presenting a breathtaking variety of death-related imagery and artifacts. From skulls to the dance of death, statuettes to ex libris, memento mori to memorabilia, the majority of the images are of artifacts in the astonishing collection of Richard Harris and range from 2000 BCE to the present day, running the gamut of both high and popular culture.

Essays:

Death in Ancient and Present-Day Mexico, Eva Aridjis

The Power of Hair as Human Relic in Mourning Jewelry, Karen Bachmann

Medusa and the Power of the Severed Head, Laetitia Barbier

Anatomical Expressionism, Eleanor Crook

Poe and the Pathological Sublime, Mark Dery

Eros and Thanatos, Lisa Downing

Death-Themed Amusements, Joanna Ebenstein

The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, Bruce Goldfarb

Theatre, Death and the Grand Guignol, Mel Gordon, Holy Spiritualism, Elizabeth Harper

Playing dead - A Gruesome Form of Amusement, Mervyn Heard

The Anatomy of Holy Transformation, Liselotte Hermes da Fonseca

Collecting Death, Evan Michelson, Art and Afterlife: Ethel le Rossignol and Georgiana Houghton, Mark Pilkington

The Dance of Death, Kevin Pyle, Art

Science and the Changing Conventions of Anatomical Representation, Michael Sappol

Spiritualism and Photography, Shannon Taggart

Playing with Dead Faces, John Troyer

Anatomy Embellished in the Cabinet of Frederik Ruysch, Bert van de Roemer