The writer agrees with the view that current attitudes to death, both conscious and unconscious, condition the life patterns of peoples and of individuals. Her enquiry covers the years 1931 and 1961, and she chose Psychological Abstracts as a source to work where informed people in the fields of psychoanalysis, psychiatry, sociology and parapsychology might be expected to express their points of view. There were surprisingly few contributions on the subject, even when it was extended to include murder and suicide, and this in a period that covered the war years and during a time when there is a heavy increase in the ageing population. Death, it seems, remained a relatively taboo subject in our Western culture. The author analyses the contributions that did appear and also relevant ones in the years between. She does this in a stimulating way and her own conclusions are packed with perceptive and searching suggestions. This paper is rich reading for those interested in the question.