The Lost Art of Dying: Reviving Forgotten Wisdom

Far too many of us die poorly, argues Columbia University physician and professor and author L. S. Dugdale. This book is about how US culture has overly medicalized death, making it institutional and sterile, prolonged by unnecessary resuscitations and other intrusive interventions. Our lives do not have to end this way.

While researching end-of-life issues, Dugdale stumbled upon a popular medieval text on how the living were to prepare for a good death. Written during the late Middle Ages, the Ars Moriendi—art of dying—made clear that to die well, one first had to live well. Inspired by its holistic approach to the final stage combined with what she gleaned from her medical career, Dugdale set out to write an Ars Moriendi or the twenty-first century.

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