Death: Not Proud but Damned Interesting
 

Donne reminded us that none of us is an island (disputable!) and that "Death be not proud." He also made other phrases that became book titles.

Biathanatos, published in 1647, is about suicide. Readable by Adobe but dumb me, I found it impossible to select and copy text: If you want a quotation, you gotta' retype it! Roughly 110 pages of introduction by Rudick & Battin and 288 pages of Donne. Reproduced 2 pages per frame, 400 real pages fill 200 pages of Adobe.
Donne noticed that the Crucifixion was a suicide. (And most of us would also recognize it as an act of inclusive fitness!)

Depressed, obsessed, and gifted, Donne gave us a library of reasons why suicide has many relatives, not all of them sinners, and many of them actors who are remembered in classical texts and scriptures. There is not only suicide but group executions such as the 20,000 infants sacrificed by Spaniards each month during the early 1600s. The Spanish also converted many Indians to Christianity and promised to commit suicide in order to follow any of them to Hell who committed suicide in order to avoid conversion. Donne's a very long prequel to Dorothy Parker's bottom line, "You might as well live," and well worth the eyestrain, even if you don't want to off yourself.

And for the frugal: A real-life copy of Biathantos now lists for about $5,500.

JimB

Reference:

Donne, John (1647) Biathanatos. Stephen Orgel (Ed.) (1982) NY: Garland Publishing. Available also at http://www.philosophy.utah.edu/onlin...mpleteText.pdf.