Chelsea Green scoops pioneering undertaker's book on life and death

Chelsea Green has acquired What Remains? Life, Death and the Human Art of Undertaking by funeral director Ru Callender.

World rights were acquired by commissioning editor Jonathan Rae from the author, who is unagented. The book is slated for publication on 15th September.

“Driven by raw emotion and unresolved grief, combined with the deep kinship he discovered in rave culture and ritual magic, Ru Callender brings an outsider DIY ethos to the business of death,” the synopsis explains.

“Challenging the traditional, stilted forms of the funeral industry, he set up the Green Funeral Company in 2000 and has strived to allow people to participate emotionally and physically in the process—offering alternatives to the faux Victoriana of coffin bearers, meaningless euphemisms and the chemical horror of embalming. Instead, What Remains? celebrates everyday humanity and our capacity to face death with courage and compassion.”

Turning modern occult rituals into performance art, the Green Funeral Company has co-partnered with Phillips, Cauty & Drummond Undertakers alongside The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, also known as the band KLF, to build the People’s Pyramid in Liverpool, an installation in Toxteth containing the remains of cremated bodies.

Head of editorial Muna Reyal said: “What Remains? is a book with a question for us all. How do we want to say goodbye to those we love and to think about our own death? Ru is a unique man with a raw, honest and unflinching voice. He has written a book about life, death, rave culture, ritual magic, establishment politics and stilted tradition that has touched everyone who has read it. Ru is a true radical and pioneer—you might be surprised, provoked, laugh or cry, but you won’t forget it. We are all excited about getting this book out into the world.”

Callender added: “It has been an honouring experience to be held so safely by Chelsea Green as I wrote this book, as it reopened some painful and some deeply moving memories. It reminded me of two things: no matter how fresh a path we think we are cutting through the wilderness of life, we are always walking in the footsteps of our brothers and sisters, and this should be welcomed and acknowledged. Secondly, our own personalities are of little use to us really—it is from others that we get our light and strength and they in turn are warmed by what we cannot see in ourselves.”