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BROWN, RON M.: : The Art of Suicide

LONDON.REAKTION BOOKS LTD.,2001.

ISBN 1861891059.

UK,slim 8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.NMINT/FINE-. No owner inscrptn and no price-clip to dw/dj - unread,apart from my own collation.Bright,crisp,clean,matt monochrome illustrated front of dw/dj (Gustav Dore,'Glad to Death's Mystery: Swift to be hurt',1850,watercolour and india ink.V & A Museum,London) with white lettering; with negligible shelf-wear,no nicks or tears present.Internally,a residual fluid stain to bottom edge of dw/dj,extending from foot of spine/backstrip - just past its rear fold/crease,along to just past the folded crease of front,inner flap but without affecting the boards beneath and only visible inside and without any wrinkling. Top+fore-edges bright and clean - without blemish; contents bright,tight,clean and pristine - no dog-ear reading creases to any pages' corners - unread other than my collation.Unblemished,sharp-cornered, publisher's original plain,undecorated black cloth boards with bright,crisp, blocked silver gilt lettering to spine, and immaculate plain,very pale grey endpapers.UK,slim 8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn,7- 253pp [paginated] includes author's 13pp introduction with an Andy Warhol art illustration photograph,6 chapters and a Postscript,profuse contemporary,historical illustration reproductions (116,17 in colour,in total) interspersed throughout the text and the book,references,a 2pp select bibliography,acknowledgements, photographic acknowledgements and an index; plus [unpaginated] half-title,title page with b/w painting reproduction (John Flaxman's 'Chatterton taking the Bowl of Poison from the Spirit of Despair,c.1780, pen and ink and wash.British Museum, London.),a contents list/table,and 2pp blank at the rear of the book. 'The Art of Suicide' is a history of the visual representation of suicide or self- murder,from the ancient world with Greek scenes of the hero Ajax impaling himself on his sword,to its decriminalization in the twentieth century.After looking at instances of voluntary death in ancient Greece,Ron Brown discusses the contrast between the extraordinary absence of such events in early Christianity and the proliferation of images of biblical suicides in the late medieval Middle Ages era.He emphasizes how differing attitudes to suicide in the early modern world slowly merged,and pays particular attention to the one-time chasm between so-called heroic suicide and self-destruction as a 'crying crime'.Brown tracks the changes surrounding the perception of suicide into the pivotal Romantic era,with its notions of the 'man of feeling',ready to hurl himself into the abyss over a woman or an unfinishable poem.It is possible to see how,after the First World War,the meaning of death and attitudes towards suicide changed radically,and in time this led to its decriminalization.The 20th century in fact witnessed a growing ambivalence towards suicidal acts,which today are widely regarded either as expressions of a death-wish or as cries for help.Brown concludes with Warhol's picture of Marilyn Monroe and the videos taken by the notorious Dr Kevorkian. Brown's sensitive study reminds us that the history of self-murder and of its delineation is neither simple nor straightforward. Please contact seller,because of the lighter weight and the value of this item for correct,insured shipping/P+p quotes - particularly ALL overseas customers - BEFORE ordering through the order page! ** N.B. US customers please be aware: US standard AIR postage from UK to US can now cost more than the price of the book! If speed is not of the essence,then Economy rate is recommended - at approx. 1/2 to 2/3rds of standard US AIR quote/rate - sometimes arriving long before the quoted 42 days - but not always.

UK,slim 8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.
Not SIGNED.

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