Mortician and Author
Caitlin Doughty is an American mortician, author, and YouTuber dedicated to transforming Western attitudes towards death. She founded The Order of the Good Death and created the popular Ask a Mortician series, and her books include Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?
by Caitlin Doughty
Mortician Caitlin Doughty recounts her years at a San Francisco crematory to argue that the industrialized, sanitized American death-care system alienates us from mortality in ways that damage both the living and the dead. She calls for a revival of hands-on, family-centreed death practices as a form of psychological and cultural repair.
The books Caitlin Doughty references, cites, and recommends most frequently.
by Ernest Becker
Becker argues that the terror of death drives much of human behaviour, from heroism to war. Culture, religion, and self-esteem are elaborate defences against the awareness of our mortality.
by Viktor Frankl
Frankl survived Auschwitz and concluded that meaning, not pleasure or power, sustains us through suffering. His logotherapy argues we can find purpose in any circumstance.
by Albert Camus
Camus confronts the fundamental question: if life is absurd, why not end it? His answer, to revolt, to create, to live fully without false hope, defines absurdism.
Who Caitlin draws from, and who draws from Caitlin — aggregated across every book in this collection. Counts show the number of citation links, not the depth of each one.