Passing Shadows

Passing Shadows: a movie, death in Crete, songs of fate and other essays is a remarkable multimedia book focussed on a unique film of the traditional Cretan funeral of Pavlos Giparis, a hero of the Cretan resistance against the Germans in WWII.


Pavlos died in1979 and, as he predicted in 1968, Barrie was be there to record his burial. The book contains many poignant recordings from 1967-1968 of Pavlos singing Rizitik songs about death and his reflections about these songs.


There are other songs from other villagers. Of particular importance is a long and beautiful Moiroloy (word, song about fate) from the last professional dirge singer in Crete.


The book discusses death as a rite of passage and way the phases of ritual fit universal human responses to death and how religion and ritual combine to defeat the ravages time. The book is a paean of praise to a traditional Greek way of life. It will be of interest to anyone who loves Greece, to students of anthropology and colleges, which teach death studies.