Biathanatos

Biathanatos (from Greek meaning "life and death") is a work by the English writer and clergyman John Donne. Written in 1608 and published after his death, it contains a heterodox defense of self-homicide (suicide), listing prominent Biblical examples including Jesus, Samson, Saul, and Judas Iscariot. Thomas De Quincey responds to the work in his Writings VIII, page 336, and Jorge Luis Borges responds in Biathanatos, in his collected non-fiction.

Sources

• Michael Rudick and M. Pabst Battin (eds.) Biathanatos (Garland English Texts 1982).