Abstract
Whether viewing a property or looking at a city-centre map, the culture and language of death are a bridge between the Victorian era and the modern world, the focus of this chapter.2 Yet what was it like to be underneath society, to fail at life in the past, and experience bereavement in dire financial straits? To really understand the reception of the Anatomy Act, it is necessary to examine death and dying for those living in the worst deprivation in Victorian Britain.3 Now when a person lives and dies in poverty their lonely passing can be profoundly disturbing to the general public.4 Many local authorities pay for basic funerals from council taxes to distance the poorest from a Victorian experience. This is not simply done on public health grounds. There is an agreed consensus that taxes in a civilised society should pay to bury the dead ‘decently’.5 Yet in a credit crunch how far have we progressed? In February 2009 this question motivated a reporter for the Guardian newspaper to highlight that ‘State-funded burials and cremations’ had increased ‘by up to 46% as more people die alone these days’.6 There had been a ‘sharp rise in the number of older and younger people dying without funds’ for their burial in Great Britain. Up in Scotland, Edinburgh saw a ‘46% rise’ while in Glasgow there has been a ‘10% increase’ in the last 12 months.
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Notes
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© 2012 Elizabeth T. Hurren
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Hurren, E.T. (2012). Restoring the Face of the Corpse: Victorian Death and Dying. In: Dying for Victorian Medicine. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230355651_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230355651_2
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