Jessica Mitford

Here is a biography of Mitford that will get you started with your Internet research.

This page has a bio and some info about Mitford's musical interests, as well as some links. What, if anything, do the lyrics of the songs tell you about her?

This is the homepage of the Jessica Mitford Memorial Site, where you'll find articles, reviews, photographs, and her last request. Read the latter. What do you make of it? Can you tie it in to her writing?

Here is an excerpt from The American Way of Death Revisited. What comparison can you make of this to "Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain"? Are you able to find some significant differences?

This page has some interesting quotations by Mitford.

Here is an interview with Mitford from the San Francisco Chronicle. The heading mentions that she was "digging up new dirt." Explain the pun. What conclusions can you draw about her based on your textbook reading and on this interview?

Here is a photo collection featuring Mitford. What can you tell about her from it? What kind of use is such information in, say, writing about Mitford's life and work? What are the limitations of such information?

Here is the homepage of Mortuary Management magazine (something you probably don't peruse very often). Read through some issues until you get an idea of the objectives of this magazine's writers. How can you compare these objectives to Mitford's?

Would you like to put Mitford's work into a broader social context? This is an article about prison reform, another issue she was very concerned about, from Theology Today.

Mitford was often described as a "muckraker." For some background on this term, check out this page at Muckraker.org.