Archive for the ‘spiritualism’ category

Wednesday, 25 January 2012

Publishing event of the year!

 

The Natural Death Handbook, Fifth Edition

A thoroughly updated and revised edition of the Natural Death Centre‘s celebrated handbook. Now presented alongside a new collection of essays on death, dying and funeral practices by doctors, historians, authors, poets, theologians and artists including Richard Barnett, David Jay Brown, Dr Sheila Cassidy, Charles Cowling, Bill Drummond, Stephen Grasso, Maggi Hambling, Graham Harvey, Gary Lachman, Nick Reynolds, and Dignity in Dying.

It’s out in May 2012!

Categories: Academia and death, alternative funerals, Art and death, ashes, Assisted suicide, Atheism, Attitudes to dead bodies, Attitudes to death, bereavement, Books, bureaucracy, burial, burial at sea, burial depth, Care homes, Carla, celebrants, cemeteries, ceremony, Children, Children and funerals, Co-op, Co-operative Funeralcare, coffins, cremation, crematoria, Cryomation, Dead people's rights, death and funerals, Death masks, Death; Good death, Dementia, Digital will, Dignity, direct cremation, Divorce, DIY funeral, Dress codes, dying, Embalming, End-of-life issues, eulogy, euthanasia, Exit, family funeral directors, Formality vs informality, funeral, funeral cost, funeral customs, funeral directors, Funeral flowers, funeral food, funeral music, funeral photography, funeral plans, funeral poetry, funeral pyres, funeral reformers, funeral trends, Funerals for the unborn, funerals in other cultures, Gangster funerals, Ghosts, Good death, green funeral, Grief, Hearses, home funerals, Humanists, Humour, Immortality, independent funeral directors, Jazz funeral, Legal rights, Living funerals, Lonely funerals, Longevity, medical interventions in dying, memento mori, Memorial service, memorialisation, Movies, multimedia, music, National Association of Funeral Directors, natural burial, no service by request, Nokanshi, obituary; epitaph, onlime memorial sites, open-air cremation, Organ donation, Ossuary, Paranormal deathbed experiences, Pauper funerals, perceptions of funeral directors, Personalisation, pet cemeteries; pet and owner burial, Plan your own funeral, Poetry, Post mortem photos, pre-need plans, previous partner, prisons, Probate, Processions, Reasons to go to a funeral, Religious funerals, Requiem Mass, resomation, Ritual, SAIF, scandals, Secular approaches to death, self-deliverance, sex and death, shroud, Social Fund Funeral Payment, spiritualism, suicide, Tahara, Taste, traditional funerals, Transitus, Transparency of ownership, tributes, viking funeral, Virtual funeral, What do we die of and when?, what does dying feel like?

Posted by charles at 19:01 Comments 3 comments

Sunday, 30 May 2010

That’s the spirit!


Interesting stuff here from the American Museum of Photography:

Moses A. Dow (1810-1886) founded Waverley Magazine in Boston in 1850. The magazine catered to amateur authors and reached a circulation of 50,000 copies before the Civil War. It continued to appear until 1908. Dow published the works of schoolgirls and other young writers; by one account he would print nearly anything that was offered to him free. The tactic made him wealthy, because the friends and relatives of contributors would all purchase copies.

Mabel Warren was a young protégé of Dow. She submitted her writing to him in 1862, when she was apparently fresh out of high school. He published her work and hired her as his assistant, a post she held until her death following a brief illness in July of 1870.

Dow was led into spiritualism by his housekeeper, who invited a medium to tea. Barely a week after Mabel’s death, Dow felt his deceased assistant was communicating with him. In séance after séance, Dow received messages written mysteriously on slates or in ink on paper. Ultimately, Mabel’s spirit directed Dow to Mumler’s studio where she promised to appear with a wreath of lilies on her head. Dow explains, “The picture was small, but with the aid of a microscope it was magnified to the natural size of the human face, and in that face I saw the perfect picture of my friend. I was both surprised and delighted and wrote to Mr. Mumler and told him I was perfectly satisfied, and gave him my true name.”

And in case you missed it when it was at its most viral, here’s the shade of Michael Jackson:

This blog has gone down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky, and will be away for a week. During this time it will post fitfully if at all. And may the sun smile on you all, too!!

Categories: spiritualism

Posted by charles at 11:15 Comments 1 comment