Do you feel like your days fly by? Or, that a month disappears into another month? How does a lifetime get swallowed up? Why do we live with regret? Aren’t we just living like all the other people? Why do we take risks with our health and with our financial resources? What is it all about?

After reading this book, the sheer madness of the 20th and 21st century seems apparent-- no longer mysterious. If you think you are living on a rollercoaster-- hate how you've been strapped onto the monster's back... this book will make sense of your secret fears.

We live in a world designed for speed, afraid of our own mortality, in a world where the dying get tucked away from our eyes. If we understood that there is only one life to live... that there are no promises as to the length of our lives…would we squander time? Would we make ourselves ill with petty jealousy? Would we spend a lifetime trying to scramble to the top of the economic food chain? Would we allow our real-selves to be designated to weekends, or that one-day a month vacation from the overwhelming pressures that demand a certain ideal for success? Or would we cut the straps that tie us to the monster's back? Would we learn to live in the moment, aware of our every exhalation, and begin to live for ourselves and for the ones we love?

Un libro un tanto difícil de calificar y que me ha dejado muy confundido, porque el inicio de la obra es espectacular en relación a lo que te plantea el título, es alucinante, pero conforme avanza el libro, todo se vuelve más complicado y se aleja mucho del tema de la muerte, se vuelve una apología hacia el psicoanálisis y en defensa del libro, está muy bien explicado, he aprendido más en estas páginas sobre el psicoanálisis que en toda mi licenciatura en psicología, ese es el gran mérito del libro, que aunque me decepciono un poco no encontrar todo lo que quería sobre la muerte y su negación, me llevo muy buenos conceptos del psicoanálisis, que es lo que es este libro, un completa apología a esta rama psicoterapéutica, es mi única observación, un libro algo difícil de leer que recomiendo tener un poco de interés hacia el tema del psicoanálisis para que sea más llevadero. Y de manera personal podría decir que lo que aprendí de este libro es que “todas nuestras conductas que desarrollamos a lo largo de nuestra vida no son más que nuestra manera de manifestar nuestro miedo a la muerte, muchas de ellas de manera inconsciente”.

Is there a 'couldn't bring myself to finish' rating? I feel like I'm cheating by putting this one on my "read" shelf...

Here's the thing... I'm fairly well read, I've taken philosophy classes, I've powered through some pretty dry books. But apparently I CANNOT bring myself to power through a dry book about PSYCHOANALYSIS.

Being a modern psych major, and a fairly well-read one at that, AND one who has dealt with mental issues personally... I can't bring myself to believe a god damned WORD that Freud said. I find psychoanalytic theory to be utter and complete crap, and that seems to be not just the foundation of this book, but pretty much the whole thing. Perhaps this "Otto Rank" mentioned CONSTANTLY is a more brilliant guy than Freud, but I find it difficult to take anyone who took Freud seriously with anything less than an enormous cup of salt.

I made it through the foreword and 50 pages of the actual book and had to stop. I don't know what the last book was that I could not only not finish, but couldn't even bring myself to put it back on the to-read at a later date shelf. This book is utterly dead to me.

I'm so embarassed, I really thought I could be all intellectual and learn something here. Even reading these 5 star reviews, I expected something pretty thought-provoking, and was really hoping I'd be able to choke through it with a good end result. But I think with my personal distaste for Freud I am just doomed. I tried to hop around a bit, but I don't even see where Becker's argument about death would tie in.

This is a classic for a reason. It's a brilliant book, in which Becker discusses Otto Rank's writings in a highly accessible way, that is absolutely relevant to 21st century society. The knowledge that we will die defines our lives, and the ways humans choose to deal with this knowledge (consciously or subconsciously) are what creates culture - all culture; from BDSM to Quakerism.

The downside is that the book was first published in 1973, and therefore contains some highly offensive writing.

It's a big ask, but please overlook the bit about Greenacre and Boss's (1968) explanation of why women don't have kinks; because they are 100% passive, and naturally submissive. The male has to "perform the sexual act" so it is natural for him to develop fetishes. However women don't have to get aroused, or channel their desires (just lie there, I guess), so they don't have kinks. Ever (p. 243). Ugh.

Also, please ignore everything Becker says on homosexuality (i.e. the whole chapter on mental illness - as it was labelled in the DSM until 1973): namely that homosexuality is the "perversion" of weak men because of their sense of powerlessness, a lack of a father-figure, and a terror of the difference of women.** Also, the awful parts on "transvitites", who "believe they can transform animal reality by dressing it in cultural clothing" (p. 238).

And also can you please overlook all the gendered language, and the way women don't count as actual people to Becker?

Aside from all that this is a wonderful book, and everyone should read it. And luckily for me Greg already explained why, in detail, so go read his review.

**This is Becker's opinion, not Rank's. Rank actually linked homosexuality to creativity and freedom from society, which pisses Becker off: "Rank was so intent on accenting the positive, the ideal side of perversion, that he almost obscured the overall picture . . . [homosexual acts are] protests of weakness rather than strength . . . the bankruptcy of talent." Double ugh.

P.S. Weirdly, Becker repeats as fact (p. 249) that Hitler engaged in coprophilia, by getting a young girl (allegedly his neice) to crap on his head. There's no actual evidence for this. It's part of the attempt to frame Hitler as a monstrous being, rather than as a man who carried out monstrous acts. Over the years people have also attempted to frame Hitler as gay for the same reason.

The winner of the 1974 Pulitzer Prize and the culmination of a career, The Denial of Death is a brilliant work.

Becker argues, convincingly, that evolution has brought individuals to a point where we are trapped between our “creatureliness” and “symbolic self.” Consciousness has made us aware of our own powers, but also of our miserable creatureliness and destiny to die.

This insight allows Becker to explain and re-interpret human nature and history in a new, and fruitful, light.

Some choice quotes:

“those who speculate that a full apprehension of man’s condition would drive him insane are right, quite literally right.”
“To grow up at all is to conceal the mass of internal scar tissue that throbs in our dreams.”
“early men who were most afraid were those who were most realistic about their situation in nature, and they passed on to their offspring a realism that had a high survival value. The result was the emergence of man as we know him: a hyper-anxious animal who constantly invents reasons for anxiety even where there are none.”

When I read this book I was all like "OFtCOURSE." The thesis is as follows: As humans we are the only creatures to understand abstract concepts and thus the only creatures to understand our mortality. This knowledge is so terrifying that our psyches build up defenses to repress the true horror of our impending demise.. An example is our tendancy to believe that some ideas are greater than life or death. Thus heroism and the ideologies that lead to war are manifistations of this death repression. Far out!

The Denial of Death [1973] – ★★★★

This non-fiction is both: a cry of a soul on the human condition, and a penetrating essay that demystifies the man and his actions.

“It is fateful and ironic how the lie we need in order to live dooms us to a life that is never really ours” [Becker, 1973: 56].

Ernest Becker (1924 – 1974) was a cultural anthropologist whose book The Denial of Death won the 1974 Pulitzer Prize. It deals with the topic that few people want to consider or talk about – their own mortality and death. The paradox is that, although this topic is considered to be a societal taboo, everyone on this earth will have to confront it sooner or later. In fact, Becker argues, everyone is confronting and dealing with it from the moment that they are born – they just do it subconsciously or unconsciously. The Denial of Death delves into the works of Sigmund Freud, Otto Rank and Søren Kierkegaard, as Becker puts his thesis forward that all humans have a natural fear (or terror) of death and their own mortality, and, thus, throughout their lives, employ certain mechanisms (including repression) and create illusions to deal with this fear and live. Though the book relies heavily on works by other authors, it is also a very deep and insightful read.

In his book, Becker has recourse to psychology, psychiatry, philosophy and anthropology, and begins his book by pointing out that, from birth, we feel the need to be “heroic” and cannot really comprehend our own death – the fact that we will die one day is too terrible a thought to live with and, thus, men [sic] never think about their own deaths seriously. People become attracted to a certain “hero” system in society and are conditioned from birth to admire people who face death courageously. This desire stems from a human being both a mortal and insignificant creature in the grand scheme of things and the universe (a simple body), and, at the same time, a human capable of self-awareness, consciousness, creativity, dreams, aspirations, desires, feelings and high intelligence (soul/self). It is very difficult (in fact, impossible) to reconcile these two elements and come to terms with the fact that this human being who has so much potential and awareness can just “bite the dust” and do so as easily as some insect flying next to him/her.

Relying on the work of Sigmund Freud, Becker speculates on child psychology, and goes to detail many mechanisms that human beings employ to escape the paradox outlined above, the condition of the perpetual fear of death, as well as the fact that life and death are so closely interlinked that one cannot live without “being awakened to life through death” [Becker, 1973: 66]. These mechanisms are the creations of various illusions, such as the “character” defence, as well as such activities as drinking and shopping to forget mortality, and various other activities, from writing books to having babies, to prolong one’s immortality. It is precisely the implicit denial of death and decay by everyone in society that makes sexuality such a taboo topic (because it exposes humans’ propensity to be mere creatures that procreate). Thus, death or bodily functions are best deemed forgotten, and, instead, humans set their minds on cultural things to get closer to the idea of being immortal. Love is explained by Becker as the desire to experience immortality through the lover or the love for another person, and one idolises that person to which one is attached to and, in this, way, seeks immortality (“the love partner becomes the divine idol within which to fulfil one’s life” [1973: 160]).

Becker goes to explain artistic creativity, masochism, group sadism, neuroses and mental illness in general through his idea of the terror of death. According to the author, neurosis is natural since everyone holds back from life at some point and to some extent, and Becker also points out that the happier and more well-adjusted a person appears to be, the more successful he is in creating illusions around him and fooling everyone close to him. In fact, it is neurotic personalities out there, those who are generally fearful and socially-handicapped, who really see the true picture and refuse to believe in the illusionary world created by others. Others are merely indulging in their “hellish” jobs to escape their innate feelings of insignificance and dread – men are protected from reality and truth through jobs and their routine – “the hellish [jobs that men toil at] is a repeated vaccination against the madness of the asylum” [1973: 160].

Becker then turns to Kierkegaard and says that religion previously provided an answer for the man to resolve this paradox of death and life, and it is through religion the man could previously finally accept that he would die. There is an urge in every human being from childhood to attach himself or herself to a high power figure (“expand by merging with the powerful” [1973: 149]), and religion provided the means of attachment to be able to transcend a being while remaining a being. Religion provided a comfortable answer to death, while enabling people to develop and realise themselves. However, now, the modern man cannot have recourse to that religion because it lost its conviction and he [sic] no longer believes in the mysterious. The modern man is stranded and lost, trying to reach his immortality by other means, sometimes through very undesirable means. The solution that Kierkegaard proposes is the “knight of faith”, who accepts everything in life and has faith – “the man must reach out for support to a dream, a metaphysic of hope that sustains him and makes his life worthwhile” [1973: 275].

The downside of Becker’s book is that it relies too heavily on what others have said before Becker, including Sigmund Freud, Otto Rank and Søren Kierkegaard, and there is this feeling that the whole book is merely a summary of other authors’ positions, including those of William James and Alfred Adler. It becomes difficult to distinguish Becker’s views from those he quotes so extensively, praises and criticises. Becker’s account is also very individualistic, with his thesis stemming from the premise that a human being is a very selfish being who primarily desires to make his own voice heard. In that vein, the author pays little attention to more collectivist and altruistic aspects of the human nature, and barely mentions such elements as self-sacrifice, suicide or Buddhism – though they are all very relevant to his topic. This is coupled with the endless repetitions by Becker, as well as his tendency to over-simplify human behaviour, reducing it to just a single driving force.

⚰️ Though hardly ground-breaking, The Denial of Death is, nevertheless, an essay of great insights which puts other people’s ideas intelligently together to become an almost essential read since the ideas put forward can really open one’s eyes on many things in life, and on how and why the man does what he does in life.

Así como Kierkegaard creía que nada tenía sentido y el único propósito podía ser Jesucristo, Freud que el libido y el amor por nuestra madre impulsaba todo nuestro actuar, Becker plantea que el único móvil del hombre es el heroicismo. Pero sorpresivamente no ahonda demasiado sino que cita ejemplos de filósofos/psicólogos anteriores y su vision de la muerte.

Evidentemente tengo que madurar como lector porque no es el primer ganador de un Pulitzer que me deja con gusto amargo.

Lectura muy pesada y sin demasiado sentido.

You know that scene in Annie Hall where Woody Allen summons Marshall McLuhan out of the shrubbery to shout down the movie queue bloviator? "You know nothing of my work!"
Becker sounded like that guy.

Maybe that was harsh. After all, Becker has a lot of useful tips for living properly, and for realizing how the death phobia infects our day-to-day interactions.

That being said, I had some skepticism from the beginning, and that kept growing... a few too many denunciations of orthodox Freudianism followed by relying on such fusty, unempirical notions as the castration complex and the "primal scene," before peaking in the mental illness sections. Turns out gays are just narcissists, fetishists are basically gays, depressives are just lazy, and schizophrenia is just an incorrect set of metaphors. And yes that phallus is the center of everything, especially if you're a woman!

Fuck that.

Another modernist trashchute who can't help but repeat the word MAN every second line, against the ANIMAL, a seemingly made up concept, utterly detached from the ecological world, which has shown on multiple occasions how much more complex and interesting animals are to (at least this) MAN's banal musings on finitude.

What I can't stand about modernism is its obsession with reifying MAN, as if MAN has ever accomplished anything worthwhile (let's face it, anything worthwhile is recuperated by the bourgeoisie and sold back to us as a dead commodity).

What Becker doesn't seem to see is that he is merely projecting his own conceptualised death into a boring, patriarchal, anthropocentric worldview, that he himself considers absolutely at the core of human existence.

WHY IS THE CHILD NOT MANLY.
WHY IS THE CHILD NOT MANLY.
WHY IS THE CHILD NOT MANLY.

I do not reject the absurdity of the world, only Becker's colonisation of the term to mean merely impotency. In doing this, he makes absurdity itself impotent to anything other than the castrated MAN of Freudian psychoanalysis.

One need only look at the aesthetics of failure or the politics of alienation to see that absurdity can be utilised into a productive, radical project. An affirmation of death and decay (without falling into fascist militarism) that overcomes Becker's petty worries.

Tim Keller referenced this book in a sermon I listened to a couple of years ago, and it’s been on my radar since.

It was super fascinating, kinda rocked my world. The more psychologically dense sections forced me to slow down and I’m sure a lot of it went over my head, but it was really fascinating to dwell on how we all go through life ignoring its brutal realities.

All in all a super lighthearted and casual read!

Quintessentially 1970s, this mish-mash of Freudian analysis and biological determinism starts out by exploring the principles of Sociobiology and making a lot of grandiose statements about human narcissism as an inborn trait resultant from "countless ages of evolution" (2). Blithely dismissing religious tradition and appealing to ideas of childhood imprinting and unconscious suppression as the primary drivers of adult thought and behavior, Becker's main thesis is that if only we could realize our deep-seated need for the heroic, if only we could know with certainty that our actions serve a purpose and will be recalled in time to come, then we wouldn't be so unsure or frightened in the face of death.

This book is mentally stimulating but ultimately, I think, unfounded. A friend likened much of philosophy to "mental masturbation" and that's what I'd classify this one as. I'm really curious as to why this was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1974, but can't find the reasoning or announcement online. Maybe the hullabaloo of Gravity's Rainbow being denied an award that same year stole all the headlines.

3 stars out of 5. While the style is fun—flowery academic flourishes abound!—the notion that people want to be the hero of their own life story is presented more cleanly and positively in Frankl's logotherapy classic Man's Search for Meaning, and the biodeterminism angle is better argued in primatology's staple, The Naked Ape. Read Denial of Death in your college days, mull it over some, have a few good late-night dorm room conversations, but don't base your whole life on it.