Contemplatio Mortis

Our modern narratives of science and technology can only go so far in teaching us about the death that we must all finally face. Can an act of the imagination, in the form of opera, take us the rest of the way? Might opera, an art form steeped in death, teach us how to die, as this provocative work suggests? In "Opera: The Art of Dying" a physician and a literary theorist bring together scientific and humanistic perspectives on the lessons on living and dying that this extravagant and seemingly artificial art imparts. Contrasting the experience of mortality in opera to that in tragedy, the Hutcheons find a more apt analogy in the medieval custom of "contemplatio mortis"--a dramatized exercise in imagining one's own death that prepared one for the inevitable end and helped one enjoy the life that remained. From the perspective of a contemporary audience, they explore concepts of mortality embodied in both the common and the more obscure operatic repertoire: the terror of death (in Poulenc's "Dialogues of the Carmelites"); the longing for death (in Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde"); preparation for the good death (in Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung"); and suicide (in Puccini's "Madama Butterfly"). In works by Janacek, Ullmann, Berg, and Britten, among others, the Hutcheons examine how death is made to feel logical and even right morally, psychologically, and artistically--how, in the art of opera, we rehearse death in order to give life meaning.

The opening chapter traces the history of the term 'problem plays' as applied to Shakespeare and defines it more clearly and precisely than has been done in the past. Julius Caesar, Measure for Measure, Antony and Cleopatra are then discussed in separate chapters, not only as problem plays but from various points of view: such matters as themes, structural pattern, character-problems, the play's relation to its sources as well as to other plays in the canon, are all touched upon.

In central Thailand, a flamboyantly turbaned gay medium for the Hindu god of the underworld posts Facebook selfies of himself hugging and kissing a young man. In Myanmar’s largest city Yangon, a one-time member of a gay NGO dons an elaborate wedding dress to be ritually married to a possessing female spirit; he believes she will offer more support for his gay lifestyle than the path of LGBTQ activism. The only son of a Chinese trading family in Bangkok finds acceptance for his homosexuality and crossdressing when he becomes the medium for a revered female Chinese deity. And in northern Thailand, female mediums smoke, drink, flaunt butch masculine poses and flirt with female followers when they are ritually possessed by male warrior deities. Across the Buddhist societies of mainland Southeast Asia, local queer cultures are at the center of a recent proliferation of professional spirit mediumship. Drawing on detailed ethnographies and extensive comparative research, Deities and Divas captures this variety and ferment. The first book to trace commonalities between queer and religious cultures in Southeast Asia and the West, it reveals how modern gay, trans and spirit medium communities all emerge from a shared formative matrix of capitalism and new media. With insights and analysis that transcend the modern opposition of religion vs secularity, it provides fascinating new perspectives in transnational cultural, religious and queer studies.

'The Open Access publishing costs of this volume were covered by the Dutch Research Council (NWO), Veni-project “Leaving a Lasting Impression. The Impact of Incunabula on Late Medieval Spirituality, Religious Practice and Visual Culture in the Low Countries” (grant number 275-30-036).' This volume explores various approaches to study vernacular books and reading practices across Europe in the 15th-16th centuries. Through a shared focus on the material book as an interface between producers and users, the contributors investigate how book producers conceived of their target audiences and how these vernacular books were designed and used. Three sections highlight connections between vernacularity and materiality from distinct perspectives: real and imagined readers, mobility of texts and images, and intermediality. The volume brings contributions on different regions, languages, and book types into dialogue. Contributors include Heather Bamford, Tillmann Taape, Stefan Matter, Suzan Folkerts, Karolina Mroziewicz, Martha W. Driver, Alexa Sand, Elisabeth de Bruijn, Katell Lavéant, Margriet Hoogvliet, and Walter S. Melion.