Failure™ Magazine

Book Of The Dead

“Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers”

Written by Jason Zasky   Filed under Science & Technology

In your estimation, which is more unpleasant for a dead body to endure, decay or cremation?
Cremation appeals to me because it’s cleaner and quicker. The thing about decomposition is that it’s so drawn out and each week it’s a new set of ghastly things that are happening to you [laughs]. Even though burning up for the 10 minutes or so that it takes is horrific, at least it’s over with quickly and there’s no mess.

Are there any foods that you can’t eat anymore because of what you’ve seen?
Campbell’s chicken soup—that kind of yellow soup with the bits of meat and oil floating on top. It’s because of that comment that [scientist and professor] Arpad Vass made [regarding what decomposed tissue looks like]. “It becomes like soup . . . chicken soup,” he said. So that yellow soup would always bring to mind my trip to the Body Farm. I don’t eat Campbell’s chicken soup much but if I were presented with it, I think I’d have a problem.

Has anyone who has heard about or read your book been offended by it?
My first cousin, Claire, lives in England and is quite upper class and doesn’t get her hands dirty very much. I was talking with her son who said, [adopts English accent], “Yeah, my mum told me you wrote a book. She said, ‘Mary’s written a book. It’s disgusting.’” But offended? No one has expressed that to me yet.

Do you plan to donate your body to science?
I have a bit in the end of the book about that. My husband is very squeamish. He won’t wear contacts because he’d have to touch his eyeballs. He has a thing about death, too. I was talking to him about the Harvard Brain Bank [Harvard Brain Tissue Research Center]. I kind of like the idea of having a wallet card that says, “I’m going to Harvard”—the Harvard Brain Bank, but it still sounds kind of appealing. I was describing how they get the brain out to them and he said, “No, I’m not doing it. I don’t care what you say. If you die before me I’m not giving you to the Harvard Brain Bank.” It was a really hard couple years for Ed while I was writing this book.

In the end, I didn’t want to put him through having to imagine me being used in research because it would absolutely freak him out. But if he dies first I would donate my body to science. It’s so much more interesting than being cremated.

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