The Good Death Through Time
Caitlin Mahar
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As an MUP member you get 40% off the price of this book.
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Imprint
The Good Death Through Time
Caitlin Mahar
Can our forebears help us face complex questions of dying, now?
'I have quite a bit of understanding of white man's ways but it is difficult for me to understand this one'
A Senate committee investigation of Australia's Northern Territory Rights of the Terminally Ill Act 1995, the first legislation in the world which allowed doctors to actively assist patients to die, found that for the vast majority of Indigenous Territorians, the idea that a physician - or anyone else - should help end a dying, suffering person's life was so foreign that in some instances it proved almost impossible to translate.
This book explores how such a death became a thinkable - even desirable - way to die for so many others in Western cultures. Though 'euthanasia', meaning 'good death', derives from ancient Greece, for the Greeks this was a matter of Fate, or a gift the gods bestowed on the virtuous or simply lucky. Caring for the dying…
'I have quite a bit of understanding of white man's ways but it is difficult for me to understand this one'.
A Senate committee investigation of Australia's Northern Territory Rights of the Terminally Ill Act 1995, the first legislation in the world which allowed doctors to actively assist patients to die, found that for the vast majority of Indigenous Territorians, the idea that a physician - or anyone else - should help end a dying, suffering person's life was so foreign that in some instances it proved almost impossible to translate.
This book explores how such a death became a thinkable - even desirable - way to die for so many others in Western cultures. Though 'euthanasia', meaning 'good death', derives from ancient Greece, for the Greeks this was a matter of Fate, or a gift the gods bestowed on the virtuous or simply lucky. Caring for the dying was not part of the doctor's remit. For the Victorians, a good death meant one blessed by God and widespread belief in a divine design and the value of suffering created resistance to new forms of pain relief. And today, while most in the Western world cleave to the modern medical view that pain is an aberration, to be, where possible, eliminated, complex cultural, ethical and practical questions regarding what makes for a good death remain. As Caitlin Mahar memorably shows in The Good Death Through Time, understanding the radical historical shift in Western attitudes to managing dying and suffering helps us better grasp the stakes in today's contestations over what it means to die well.
“
This history provides welcome perspective on our current understanding of this fraught subject.”
The Age“
Mahar’s book fascinates because it is as much a treatise about social change and contested values as it is an exploration of the ethics of dying well. Perhaps its greatest virtue is the sense that Mahar is not pursuing her own agenda. Instead, she sympathetically explains the different views people have held historically and shows why those perspectives might have made sense, given the beliefs, values and experiences of the time. In so doing, Mahar allows the reader to grasp the kernels of wisdom housed within very different perspectives … Mahar’s history enriches our understanding as we confront these contemporary challenges, but admirably leaves us free to make up our own minds.”
The Conversation“
The Good Death Through Time is a lucid and well-documented guide to a challenging topic. Mahar provides a sympathetic but clear-eyed picture of euthanasia’s many protagonists and perspectives without forcing a single view onto the reader.”
Inside Story“
Mahar's unflinching research and writing is exactly what many nonfiction readers crave; in her book we come face-to-face with ourselves as a species.”
Books + Publishing“
In her scrupulously fair and richly informed contribution to 'the history of dying', Caitlin Mahar discloses the historically deep and culturally diverse sources of our disagreements about euthanasia. We argue about what to do, about the spirit in which to do it and even about what is at issue. The Good Death Through Time deepens our understanding of
these aspects of our current debates and therefore helps us to establish a critical distance from which to think about them.”
Raimond Gaita“
Beautifully written, this book deftly probes the cultural history of what it means to die well in the west. Its compelling insights into the evolution of euthanasia will see The Good Death Through Time take its place on bookshelves alongside studies of dying from the Victorian era to the present.”
Helen MacDonald, author, Human Remains and Possessing the DeadCaitlin Mahar
Caitlin Mahar lectures in history at Swinburne University of Technology. She completed a PhD in history at the University of Melbourne in 2016 and was awarded the Society for the Social History of Medicine Roy Porter Essay Prize, the Australian and New Zealand Society for the History of Medicine Ben Haneman Memorial Award and the University of Melbourne’s Dennis-Wettenhall Prize.
Paperback
Ships in 1–3 days
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As an MUP member you get 40% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 40% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 100% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 25% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 25% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 25% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 40% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 10% off the price of this book.
Member discount
As an MUP member you get 40% off the price of this book.
Other formats available
- Ebook$22.99 $22.99 $22.99 $22.99 $22.99
