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#7019 09/27/2000 5:26 AM
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I have tried all afternoon to LIU without success - is there single word to describe a (pardon the pun) morbid fascination with death? All the sources I come across point to necrophilia or similar, but these words all imply a sexual obsession that is not what I am looking for. It's more the sort of fascination with, and being entertained by, all things morbid that I am trying to describe. Is there a word for it?


#7020 09/27/2000 8:46 AM
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Reading just the strap of your post, I would have picked morbidity, but presumably you are looking for something else?


#7021 09/27/2000 9:16 AM
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"Mortaphilia"?


#7022 09/27/2000 9:41 AM
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Mortaphilia?

And I thought that's what the barman asked, just before you slide off the stool


#7023 09/27/2000 10:32 AM
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> morbidity

I would have gone for this too. I that the expression "morbid fascination with death" gets countless hits on a google search, so must be a popular phrase.

I suppose the problem with morbidity is that it is also a medical term to do with incidence of disease and is used increasingly by the press as we all become hooked on that other modern preocupation "morbid fascination with healthcare".


#7024 09/27/2000 2:13 PM
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morbid fascinations? man, have you ever come to the right place...

taphophile - one who loves cemetaries and funerals (see Harold, in "Harold and Maude")
thanatopsis - a meditation upon death

oh, and lest I forget...
witzelsucht - a morbid tendency to pun, make poor jokes, and tell pointless stories (hi teD!!)




#7025 09/27/2000 2:28 PM
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thanatomania



TEd
#7026 09/27/2000 2:29 PM
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> Mortaphilia?

>And I thought that's what the barman asked, just before you slide off the stool

I wish I'd said that!!



TEd
#7027 09/27/2000 2:34 PM
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Wish it was being said to me right now.

I could reply, "Hearse to you"


#7028 09/27/2000 3:33 PM
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>I could reply, "Hearse to you"

Just don't cry in my bier! Such a grave development that would be.

Ted goes away, coffin in his windingsheet



TEd
#7029 09/27/2000 7:14 PM
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A big "thank you" for all your reponses, especially TEd for thanatomania, and maverick for your mortaphilia joke. That was an excellent way to lighten the morbid tone before the thread became moribund. The humorous end to the thread also suggested a new depth of meaning behind the age old cry of the failed stand-up comic: "I'm dyin' out here"


#7030 09/27/2000 7:50 PM
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Are we now saying that this thread is dead?


#7031 09/28/2000 3:46 PM
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>Ted goes away, coffin in his windingsheet<

AS my grandmother always said,
It wasn't the cough that carried 'im off.
But the coffin they carried 'im off in.

Now what was that about sentences ending in prepositions???




#7032 09/28/2000 11:04 PM
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we've danced all around it:

thanatophilia - an undue fascination with death [OED]


#7033 09/29/2000 9:12 AM
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In reply to:

one who loves cemetaries and funerals (see Harold, in "Harold and Maude")


Another fan? At last. Let me herald this great day by getting all maudlin over the fact that I haven't seen this work of cinemtographic genius in years.


Bingley



Bingley
#7034 09/29/2000 9:21 AM
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Thanks for bringing this film to my attention. I must have missed it during my "tryingtobeafilmbuff" years.

It looks like lots of other people like it too. It gets an average of ***** at eopinions.com

http://www.epinions.com/ep?temp=allrev&res=mvie_mu-1009241&rt=mr



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