Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Losing your head

I'm a bit behind the game on this one, but Fallen Sparrow has an interesting post about severed heads and their bodies which touches on science fiction, Catholic theology, zombie movies and many other things:

Dualism, Zombies, and Persistently Conscious Heads

I was particularly struck by the fifteenth-century painting of St. Denis holding his severed head, because as Fallow Sparrow points out, both the head and the bloody stump of his neck have haloes around them!!

The Robert Olen Butler book he discusses sounds very interesting indeed. And I was reminded of Land of the Headless.

Via Eve Tushnet

PS: Sorry about the title. Couldn't resist.

2 comments:

Mercurius Aulicus said...

Sir,

I was wondering whether you had seen this http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/offbeat-news/how-russian-scientists-kept-a-dogs-severed-head-alive/1315

Elliot said...

Dear sir,
No, I had not! Thank you for pointing out that discomfiting news.