READING DIARY: MARCH 2022- TT SESSION 15: Ars Moriendi Readings 1 & 2
MAR22-READING 1. Ono, Yoko and John Lennon. "[Excerpt]." Grapefruit: A Book of Instructions + Drawings, Simon & Schuster, 2000, pp. [1-32].
It begins,
Hi, My name is John Lennon
I'd like you to meet Yoko Ono.
1 MUSIC
LET'S PIECE I
500 Noses are more beautiful than
one nose. Even a telephone no. is more
beautiful if 200 people think of
the same number at the same time.
a) let 500 people think of the same
telephone number at once for a
minute at a set time.
b) let everybody in the city think
of the word "yes" at the same time
for 30 seconds. Do it often.
c) make it the whole world thinking
all the time.
1960 spring
on about the 19th or so page, it continues...
DRINKING PIECE FOR ORCHESTRA
Imagine letting a goldfish swim across
the sky.
Let it swim from the West to the East.
Drink a liter of water.
Imagine letting a goldfish swim across
the sky.
Let it swim from the East to the West.
1963 spring
And this is one of the final poems of Lennon and Ono's book, Chapter 1:
ECHO TELEPHONE PIECE
Get a telephone that only echoes back your voice.
Call every day and talk about many things.
1964 spring
It is a really enjoyable collection of conceptual po~ems, and consistent with Lennon and Ono's oeuvres. It is also very visual, and somewhat reminiscent of John Cage's work. I see the through line from the "DuChamp-Cage Aesthetic" (dadaism or chance) --> Fluxes --> Pop art --> Pop music
MAR22-READING 2. Ars Moriendi: Coping with death in the Late Middle Ages FERNANDO ESPI FORCE, M.D., AND CARLOS ESPI FORCE, PH.D.
This piece is about memento mori (reminder of death), Ars Moriendi (The Art of Dying), and Opusculum Tri-partitum (Three Part Treatise), by Jean de Gerson (1363 – 1429).
In it, F & C Espi Force outline their research objective, methods, results, and conclusion... read excerpts:
OBJECTIVE
The aim of our study was to perform a review of the literature concerning the Ars Moriendi in the medical field, to study the psychological mechanisms for coping with death anxiety in the Ars Moriendi; and, Death and epidemics in the Late Middle Ages finally, to explore its parallels with contemporary literature about death and dying.
METHODS
We first performed a systematic review of the literature according to the PRISMA guidelines. We have used the Pubmed, EMBASE, JSTOR, and Project MUSE databases in search of articles concerning the medical and psychological aspects of the Ars Moriendi. All articles, no matter the language in which they were written, were considered. The search “Ars Moriendi” led to a total of 21 articles in Pubmed and 28 articles in EMBASE. The titles and available abstracts were reviewed. Some 17 articles were selected for full-length review. Of these, six were chosen and quoted because they fell within the scope of our study. The search “Ars Moriendi” in JSTOR allowed a maximum of 1,000 titles. All were reviewed, but none met the criteria for inclusion in our review. The entry “Ars Moriendi” in Project MUSE produced 10 articles, among them 1 that dealt with the topic. In total, seven articles were included and are discussed in the Results section.
RESULTS
Though we have not found any articles that directly analyze the text within the manual Ars Moriendi, we have selected seven articles that comment on the importance of the Ars Moriendi in the medical field. Bertman wrote an article on the way that a good death has been depicted in different cultures over the centuries... Leget points out the necessity of retrieving the strategies of the Ars Moriendi in modern society to help patients cope with death anxiety (Leget, 2007). After a brief summary of the content of the Ars Moriendi, Thornton and Phillips explore parallels between the medieval attitudes in Ars Moriendi and contemporary attitudes about a good death. In both, it is important to die surrounded by family members...
Ballnus examines and proposes the idea that the creation of hospices for the terminally ill and dying patients was first introduced in the textbook of the Ars Moriendi (Ballnus, 1995)... An article written by Feros Ruys explores how experience and emotion were strategies used in the late medieval and early modern traditions of the Ars Moriendi to help people prepare to die. She stresses the fact that fear could be used to guide Christians to acceptance of dogmas (Feros Ruys, 2014).
The Ars Moriendi was written in the context of a society coping with the devastation that followed the Black Death. It quotes two of the most influential pagan philosophers of the Late Middle Ages, Aristotle and Seneca. In the case of the Roman, his presence in the text serves the purpose of introducing the stoic concept of comfortable acceptance of the inevitable...
Today, even with dying patients, it is certainly difficult to talk directly about death. Even if psychiatrists and other professionals involved in palliative care must propose therapies congruent with the values of secular society, the strategies for coping with death anxiety in the Ars Moriendi could still be helpful for spiritual leaders in assisting the terminally ill.
Nevertheless, dignity therapy and meaning-centered psychotherapy are valid therapies in our secular society. Dignity therapy proposes the creation of a narrative of the patient’s life and values known as the “generativity document” (Chochinov, 2012). The second was developed by William Breitbart, inspired by Viktor Frankl’s experiences and coping skills after surviving a Nazi concentration camp. Meaning-centered psychotherapy proposes strategies directed at finding meaning despite terminal illness. Good examples are finding a new identity, exploring one’s legacy, and developing a sense of transcendence (Breitbart & Poppito, Frankl, 1959).
CONCLUSION
In summary, the Ars Moriendi was a helpful manual for friars of the mendicant orders in the Late Middle Ages to help moribunds and their families cope with death anxiety. It provided relief and hope for everyone, even for those who had committed terrible sins. The manual also offered a chance for salvation to those deprived of cognitive abilities due to their afflictions. The strategies proposed in the Ars Moriendi can also be analyzed from a modern psychological perspective and in the modern context.
