Best movies or books about death or dying?

MarkD

MarkD

Keeper of the Hounds & Garden
Location
San Francisco Bay Area
What a strange topic, right? But my stepson is excited about a book he listened to called Die Wise: A Manifesto For Sanity and Soul by Stephen Jenkinson so I have a hold on it.

The best book I've read on the subject in the past was Atul Gwande's On Being Mortal.

Since those books weren't immediately available I searched for some more and picked up Paul Kalanithi's When Breath Becomes Air about the experience of a surgeon who treats terminal cases when he contracts it himself. This one I have in large print so I'll start here.

The last one I'm looking forward to is A Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion about the year following the death of her husband and near death of her adult child.

I think I may be bracing myself for losing my own spouse. Though there is no specific reason for alarm currently Lia does turn 83 this year and has just gone through total knee replacement. Seeing her so weak is probably what had me thinking about it. Death is coming for us all. As I talk about with my pen friend in Germany, it is like all the leaves in the tree of life which were born around my time are coloring up and poised to fall
 

Gemma said:
Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom.

The main message of Tuesdays with Morrie is that love, relationships, and finding purpose are what give life meaning, and that accepting mortality can lead to a more meaningful existence.
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Makes sense to me. I'll check back here when I get caught up with the books I have checked out.

Read this about the book:

Mitch Albom had that second chance. He rediscovered Morrie in the last months of the older man’s life. Knowing he was dying, Morrie visited with Mitch in his study every Tuesday, just as they used to back in college. Their rekindled relationship turned into one final “class”: lessons in how to live. “The truth is, Mitch,” he said, “once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.”
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MarkD said:
As I talk about with my pen friend in Germany, it is like all the leaves in the tree of life which were born around my time are coloring up and poised to fall
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You as many other people may have noticed how gently these leaves fall down when their time comes.

The Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote this wonderful poem "Herbst" (Fall) in 1902:
Rainer Maria Rilke - Herbst (English translation #3)
 
The book I'm reading now reads like an autobiography with insertions where he shares some way in which that part of his life is effecting his anticipation of an early death. From p.60 in the large print hard copy of “When Breath Becomes air” by Paul Kalanithi

I wasn’t quite sure where my life was headed. My thesis - “Whitman and the Medicalizaiton of Personality” - was well received, but it was unorthodox, including as much history of psychiatry and neuroscience, as literary criticism. It didn’t quite fit in an English department. I didn’t quite fit in an English department.

Some of my closest friends from college headed to New York to pursue a life in the arts - some in comedy, others in journalism and television - and I briefly considered joining them and starting anew. But I couldn’t quite let go of the question: Where did biology, morality, literature, and philosophy intersect?
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From Wiki:

Paul Sudhir Arul Kalanithi (April 1, 1977 – March 9, 2015) was an American neurosurgeon and writer. His book When Breath Becomes Air is a memoir about his life and illness with stage IV metastatic lung cancer. It was posthumously published by Random House in January 2016.[1] It was on The New York Times Non-Fiction Best Seller list for multiple weeks.[2]
 
Until a few months ago I think I was suffering from a severe sodium deficiency. A doctor had told me to limit my salt intake and i followed orders.
He did not take into account that I am on a diuretic and need to replenish electrolites. I was miserable and often felt I might not make it through the night or even the day. I almost looked forward to the end. My brain seemed to be affected as well.

Now I am somewhat better but with serious issues. It is more difficult to prepare for death. It could be a heart attack tomorrow or I could go on for months or even years. The uncertainty is mystifying. I will try to live each day as best I can.
 
Babs2u said:
Until a few months ago I think I was suffering from a severe sodium deficiency. A doctor had told me to limit my salt intake and i followed orders.
He did not take into account that I am on a diuretic and need to replenish electrolites. I was miserable and often felt I might not make it through the night or even the day. I almost looked forward to the end. My brain seemed to be affected as well.

Now I am somewhat better but with serious issues. It is more difficult to prepare for death. It could be a heart attack tomorrow or I could go on for months or even years. The uncertainty is mystifying. I will try to live each day as best I can.
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That seems like a good plan and really all any of us can do ultimately. With any luck we'll marry someone who is a good planner and caretaker as I seem to have done. ;)
 
The ancient Roman Seneca wrote about death . It's a famous classic of wisdom. Positive thinking of Stoic philosophy. I read it several times, heavy but easy reading. Not Christian probably online now. Consolations... He also gives advice for living well
 
Not a book nor a film, just listen to 'Time' by Pink Floyd.....

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
Fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your hometown
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain
And you are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then, one day, you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older
Shorter of breath, and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say

Home, home again
I like to be here when I can
And when I come home, cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones beside the fire

Far away, across the field
The tolling of the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly-spoken magic spells
 
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