Introduction

The Christian assertion of the immortality of the soul and the ultimate resurrection of the body constitutes the most fundamental denial of death. But during the centuries when the hold of Christianity was strongest, and its association with secular institutions at its closest, the churches also asserted uncompromisingly the reality of suffering in and after death. The process by which death has supposedly been pushed to the margins of modern social experience has aroused considerable interest among sociologists and historians. The most important single stimulus has been provided by Geoffrey Gorer’s Death, Grief and Mourning in Contemporary Britain. J. Morley, in his Death, Heaven and the Victorians described the extravagant panoply of funerary and mourning display in a tone of horrified fascination. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.