ITEMS

Undeath Graphic

2017

11 Undeath.pdf

Undeath

As the macabre and gruesome depictions of death and dying suggest, the event of death itself is one many wish to avoid or circumvent. This desire often manifests in spiritual or religious responses, but sometimes it enters the realm of the paranormal or supernatural. Witchcraft and black magic offered the possibility of bypassing death, sometimes in the form of the dead rising from their graves, but also through communication with lost loved ones. These representations and beliefs provide an important cultural understanding of death and mourning.

Secrets of Black Arts: Witchcraft, Demonology, Omens. Utah State University, Merrill Cazier Library, Art Book Room, Beat LCBF 1999 S431495

Thy Son Liveth
Paranormal responses to death prove especially true in times of war. This 1918 book by children’s author Grace Dufe Boylan (first published anonymously) tells the story of Boylan’s son returning from death to communicate via Morse code and automatic writing. Boylan’s son died on a battleeld in France during World War I.

Boylan, Grace Duffie. Thy Son Liveth: Messages from a Soldier to his Mother (Boston : Little, Brown, and company, 1919), Utah State University, Merrill Cazier Library, Special Collections and Archives, Call Number BOOK COLL 10 L2-61