The death of somebody one loves is unbearable not only because of its devastating impact on one's life, but also because it is excruciatingly difficult for one to accept the victim's own loss of everything he or she had. If one feels lacerated and burnt, this partly reflects the primitive agony of seeing the victim's incomparable tragedy. The 'self-regarding' element in one's grief at the death of a loved person is thus supplemented by an 'other-regarding' element concerning that loved person, even though the two elements may be extremely hard to disentangle.

LRB 3 July 1986 | PDF Download