On the Many Deaths of Amanda Palmer

by Rohan Kriwaczek,

  In the case of Ezra Pound this was an opportunistic event. Shortly after his arrival in Paris in April 1920 he was walking with his friend, Dadaist artist Marcel Duchamp, through the grand cemetery of Père Lachaise when they noticed that the grave of Oscar Wilde had been partially dug open to lay the foundations for the monument by Jacob Epstein that had been commissioned by Wilde’s friend Robert Ross. Such an opportunity could not be missed and so they returned later that evening with a veritable coterie of Parisian artists and writers to perform what can only be described as a modernist satire of the pre-war mock-funeral. Gertrude Stein described the scene in a letter to her brother7:

  . . . having been wrapped in a pink flowered bedspread, and very much playing the part of a cadaver, Ezra was placed in an old pine wardrobe, for a coffin had been impossible to acquire at short notice, and was carried from the gates to Wilde’s grave, where the box was placed in the shallow hole at something of an angle, for it did not quite fit. There Marcel took the role of the priest with great gusto, declaring hellfire and damnation upon the assembled crowd before turning toward the grave itself and reciting an improvised and somewhat comical eulogy to the Romantic arts concluding with the words: “and so we lay to rest all that was decadent and corrupted, overblown and weighted down with unnecessary emotion that now might rise the pure essence of Art, unencumbered by the drivel and bile that held it down for so very long . . .” or words to that effect. At this the wardrobe door creaked open and up popped Ezra, grinning inanely, only to disappear inside the wardrobe and reappear repeatedly, each time wearing a differently coloured wig or false beard, and on each occasion drawing great cheers from the assembled crowd. Then suddenly the cemetery authorities arrived and there ensued a most comical chase amongst the tombs with the wardrobe being carried aloft, and Ezra, still sat within, heaping grandiloquent curses upon the guards for having the udacity to disturb such a sacred event . . .8

  By contrast Crowley’s mock-funeral, conducted on December 1st, 1937, appropriately ten years to the day before his actual death, was by all accounts a most serious and earnest event, however it is impossible to know exactly what took place as each of the six surviving accounts differ considerably, and unravelling the many possibilities would demand a book in itself. Certainly it was a vividly occult affair, with ritual robes and recitations; and one thing we can be fairly sure of is that some form of animal sacrifice was involved, although whether it was three chickens, a goat or a marmoset depends upon which account, if any, you choose to believe.

  All of the above examples, whether satirical or in earnest, share a concern with aesthetic and artistic ideologies in the place of grief. The 1960s saw the rise of a new kind of mock-funeral; one that focussed instead upon political ideologies, in which the notionally deceased was a non-participant, or even, by the later 1960s, an idea. The first known example of this new form of funerary expression came about during the nomination process of the 1960 US presidential campaign. John F. Kennedy was initially challenged for the democratic nomination by Hubert Humphrey, who was to later become Vice President under Lyndon B. Johnson. As if to emphasize the age of his opponent, followers of the (relatively) young Senator Kennedy began regularly staging the mock-funeral of Senator Humphrey, culminating in a mass mock-funeral in West Virginia with over ten thousand participants and, unusually, over twenty coffins, each emblazoned with Humphrey RIP in vivid red paint upon the side. Some commentators consider this to have been a major contribution towards Kennedy’s victory. Following the success of this campaign the mock-funeral became a staple of the various protest movements that characterised the latter half of the sixties, with the notionally deceased representing variously democracy, freedom, black rights, capitalism, and animal welfare among other ideologies. However, as the various political assassinations of that decade began to pile up the mock-funeral took on a sense of threat that soon attracted the attention of government legislators. This situation came to a head when right wing white activists staged a mock-funeral for Martin Luther King Jr. on January 8th, 1968, one week before his actual assassination. As a result mass political mock-funerals were banned in the US in a bill passed later that year.9 This led to a somewhat surreal campaign in which mock-funerals were held where the notionally deceased was the mock-funeral itself.

  Certainly this political use of the mock-funeral is an interesting chapter in its history, however, in the opinion of the author they deviate so far from the true essence of the form that they should be more properly referred to as quasi-mock-funerals. These are expressions of mass political movements and a symptom of a mass society that sacrifices individuality upon the alter of political intent, thereby actively turning its back upon the true nature of the tradition as established by Featherstone. The true mock-funeral, like its real counterpart should be an expression of individuality, even more so than the real funeral as there is no need to contain grief within comforting bland formalities.

  The second great wave of aesthetically motivated mock-funerals dates back to the early 1970s. Interestingly the first wave had been developed and performed largely among poets whereas this second wave seems to have been taken up almost exclusively amongst popular musicians. It has been suggested by some that this handover represents further evidence of the increasing bastardisation of contemporary artistic culture, however, others (misguidedly in the opinion of the author) claim that “pop stars” are today’s poets and therefore the link is self evident.

  This second wave began in April 1971 with Jim Morrison. Morrison had moved to Paris in March of that year and was in the habit of taking long walks through Père Lachaise cemetery. Very much a literarily minded character he had read of Pound’s performance at Wilde’s grave and is known to have always kept an eye out for a similarly unfilled grave on his strollings. On April 2nd he found just such a hole and immediately gathered up a number of friends, and indeed a wardrobe, this time made of mahogany, to restage the event. According to Wally Eiselworth10 (a close friend of Pamela Courson, Morrison’s long term lover) who was present at the event, everything went to plan until Morrison attempted to climb into the wardrobe. It seems that he was suffering from a distinct excess of alcohol at the time, and, having put on a considerable amount of weight in the previous six months, he became stuck in the wardrobe door at which point a cemetery guard arrived. His friends attempted to lift the wardrobe with the intention of making a quick getaway but the immense weight of the mahogany plus Morrison’s own not inconsiderable girth meant that they only managed around five yards before the wardrobe was dropped, unfortunately trapping the flared trouser leg of Alain Ronay. The others ran and hid amongst the cemetery furniture and thus it was in this unfortunate position, (Morrison trapped in a broken wardrobe and Ronay urgently attempting to remove his pinioned trousers), that Morrison and Ronay were arrested, although ultimately no charges were pressed.

  This abortive attempt at conducting a mock-funeral may seem to have made no contribution to the tradition itself, and indeed it would not have done had Jonah Roe not been among the notional mourners. Although not a musician himself, Roe was part of “the scene” and by all accounts was a charming young man who was “adopted” by a series of notable pop stars and other artists throughout the seventies and eighties due in large part to his exceptional ability to memorise almost everything he read. According to Ian Hunter, lead singer of the band Mott the Hoople, he was “a veritable font of the quirky and bizarre”11 and became a much sought after companion and dinner guest amongst the great, the good and the eminently artistically fashionable. Distantly descended from a family of Neapolitan princes he was easily recognised by the fine waxed false moustache he always wore, apparently due to the fact that every second generation of his family was unable to grow a real moustache (he was of that second generation, and this was his rebellion). It was Roe who initially introduced Morrison to the story of Pound’s mock-funeral, and a decade later he would do the same for David Bowie, adding, much to the amusement of his dining companion
s, a vigorously demonstrated portrayal of Morrison’s re-enactment. It seems likely that it was this evening’s story-telling that inspired Bowie’s own mock-funeral in January 1983.

  A true mock-funeral in every sense, Bowie’s intention was to bury his previous more psychedelic, experimental and drug-fuelled stage and recording personae, and to thus draw a line under his years contracted to RCA. Conducted in the grounds of his Swiss home, the Château de Mésanges in Upper Lausanne, the ritual was performed before an invited audience which included many figures of note from the artier end of the popular music scene, such as Iggy Pop, Brian Eno, Elton John, Roger Daltry, and Lou Reed, among others. Since the funeral was not for Bowie himself, but for a number of invented personae, the coffin was filled with various stage costumes, demo tapes and an electric guitar which had been used on the “Ziggy Stardust” tour. Bowie himself played the role of priest, dressed in a costume extravagantly based upon Tintoretto’s painting of Pope Alexander IV. Not wishing to be out-done Elton John dressed as the Angel of Death (by all accounts more flamboyant angel than death) and Iggy Pop dressed as Jesus on the cross, although he abandoned the cross itself halfway through the procession. Always a canny businessman Bowie had invited photographer Justin de Villeneuve (real name Nigel Davies) to photograph the event and the pictures were sold for a substantial sum to Pose! magazine. The Château was sold in 1992 and in recent years the current owners have dug up considerable portions of the grounds in the hope of finding the coffin and its contents, so far with no success.

  On June 12th, 1994 Elton John was to take up the baton in what was, at the time, the most publicised (and indeed the most extravagant) mock-funeral ever to have been conducted. The ritual itself was intended to celebrate John’s “coming out” as an openly gay man, and to finally bury his many years of pretence and inhibition. It was therefore, by necessity, an extraordinarily camp affair culminating in the now iconic moment when six white swans took to the air lifting the lid of the casket and John arose from within, reborn, wearing nothing but a gold plated loin cloth, which some journalists unfairly described as a “gilded nappy”. Many commentators credit this event with inspiring the current fashion for mock-funerals, and given the wide media coverage and host of celebrities present this does seem to be a likely analysis. Among those attending were numerous film stars, pop stars, fashion designers, super-models, and a vast array of funerary professionals performing the roles of undertakers and mutes (official mourners) to lead the not so sombre procession. The proceedings were filmed by MTV and the photographs appeared in numerous gossip and glamour magazines. The video footage remains to this day among the top 100 most watched clips on the website YouTube.

  Following this most theatrical of events it seems the mould was set and, despite the essential ritual meaning behind Mr. John’s “memorial to past unnecessary restraints” it was sadly (though in retrospect perhaps inevitably, given society’s current obsessions) the fashion and celebrity spectacle elements that took root. What started with a slow and steady drip during the late 1990s, with mock-funerals being conducted for public display every six months or so by “B-list” celebrities keen for magazine exposure (Gaby Roslin, Cilla Black, Richard Madeley, Jonathan Ross, Jordan, and Paris Hilton among others), has now grown to a steady stream. Rarely does a week pass without some gossip-rag or other boasting exclusive picture rights, and all notions of meaning and purpose have been discarded in favour of celebrity glamour. Even the ritual itself has been largely sidelined with the host’s be-coffined arrival upon a horse-drawn hearse often being the only nod to what was once a powerful statement of transition and rebirth.

  Of course, no discussion of mock-funerals would be complete without mentioning the tragic case of Amanda Palmer. As a songstress who rose to the celebrity “C-lists” during the early 2000s she attended a number of such events and by all accounts was increasingly disturbed by what she viewed as the dumbing down of a great and venerable institution. In a letter to the New York Times in March 2002 she wrote:

  . . . It seems that today even the most private and personal of moments are being reduced to their potential for publicity amongst the exhibitionist classes and the ravenous public that feeds upon them... I, alas, like so many in my profession, am guilty on both sides...12

  The following June she decided to stage a mock-funeral herself as a protest against her own participation in what she referred to as “the ever-growing Amanda Palmer circus”.13 In a phone call that morning to a friend, who has asked to remain anonymous, she explained that she would be doing it alone, with no media, no fans, no costumes, not even any friends present as the very notion of an audience would betray her intentions. It was to be a private ritual, to cleanse herself of the taint of hypocrisy and superficiality that she had recently been railing against at every much publicised opportunity. She made no mention of the location for fear of word getting out to the very people she was ritually attempting to free herself from. Four days later her body was found in a field near Bellmans Creek off the New Jersey Turnpike. It seems that she had propped the coffin against the side of partially dug makeshift grave and then climbed inside. At some point the coffin had toppled over, lid downwards, leaving her unable to escape and she had suffocated. The coroner recorded a verdict of death by misadventure, stating specifically that there was no evidence that suggested any indication of foul play or intention of suicide. At the head of the grave was a wooden board with the words “Here lies the vanity of youth compounded by the hypocrisy of age” burnt into it with a soldering iron.

  This remains to this day the only known example of a fatality caused directly through the enacting of a mock-funeral.

  1 Featherstone is first known to have used this term in a letter to his friend, Emily Watson, dated January 21st 1891. The original letter now resides in the collection of St. Ambrose College, Exeter.

  2 Featherstone’s journal number 16, page 161.

  3 The Totness Times, February 29th, 1894.

  4 Journal number 16, page 156.

  5 These letters were found in a small box stowed in the attic of his family home at 21 Westland Row, Dublin, in 1996, and remain in the possession of his family.

  6 Brighton Evening Argus, November 17th, 1916, page 4.

  7 This letter, now lost, was published in an article entitled “The influence of the death of Oscar Wilde upon the evolution of the Dadaist movement” by the eminent art historian Dietricht Hossbaum, Archipelago magazine, Spring 1961.

  8 Translated from the original French.

  9 This bill was finally overturned in January 2007 in time for the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People to hold a much publicised mock-funeral for the word “nigger”, the only known example of such an event being held for a word, and, ironically, an event which led to a considerable upsurge in the use of the “N” word in reports of that same event, and thereafter, as the reports themselves seemed to have somehow legitimised the use of the word by people who had hitherto deemed it politically incorrect and indeed offensive.

  10 From an interview in the television programme “The Death of Jim Morrison”, ABC Television, 1997.

  11 Ibid.

  12 New York Times, March 22nd 2002.

  13 Ibid.

  A Personal Extroduction from Text Number Six

  By XXX XXXXXXX

  Well this certainly isn’t a true palmeresque, or really any kind of palmeresque, but having read over eight hundred of the damn things, most of them very similar, derivative and frankly pretty poor, this positively leapt from the page at me, screaming “at last, something different, with a bit of imagination!” I was immediately taken with the format: that of an academic essay complete with footnotes and yet describing something obviously invented and largely absurd—not an approach I have come across before, and delivered with considerable confidence and some occasional flair.

  Overall it is a highly original, and at best, wonderfully comic piece, although at times the academic tone is in danger of beco
ming a touch arch. As a literary venture it is ambitious, setting itself up, as it does, as a pastiche of celebrity that functions both as homage and critique of the genre, but largely succeeds in juggling these two functions without dropping either ball. The piece is often wildly inventive and very amusing, the formality of its tone and the faux references only adding to its sense of veracity—the reader is never quite fooled but occasionally he/she does start to think “Well, yes, this could have happened” (the use of real names is partly responsible for this, and the author’s evident knowledge of the different cultural movements that have dominated the last hundred years also helps create authenticity).

  The piece explores, indeed is obsessed with, ideas of authorship, invention and imitation; the purity of artistic invention and its subsequent debasement through ever more ignorant derivations. The writing style itself is very confident and draws together influences from the Romantic tradition, the Gothic, HP Lovecraft, Poe, Blake, Baudelaire, the macabre, and the supernatural. Despite the essay format, the tease at the top combined with the historic chronological pattern creates an overall strong narrative drive.

  But most of all it is the subject itself that attracted me: the notion of the ritualised staging of one’s own mock funeral replete with artistic intentions, bells and smells. I am certainly tempted. And it would be the perfect opportunity for me to wear that papal robe I had made last year. Hmmm . . .

  TEXT NUMBER SEVEN

  On the Unreported Death of Amanda Palmer

  Like so many other twelve-year-old girls Amanda Palmer dreamt of fame, celebrity and fashionable parties. However, unlike so many other twelve-year-old girls, by the age of seventeen she had it all; and unlike so many others who had it all, it really did seem to be everything she had ever dreamt of. But seeming isn’t being, and youth is a dangerous thing for it knows no endings. To the young Amanda this was just the beginning; to the cruel hand of Fate her ride was soon to be over. Had she been older and wiser she would have noticed the signs, she would have been watching for them. As it was she bathed each day in the adoration of her fans and read her soul in celebrity magazines. The world had become her magic mirror, and she truly was the fairest of them all.