Megan Rosenbloom

Megan Rosenbloom is a librarian at the University of Southern California specializing in the history of medicine. She is also a founder of Death Salon. Her debut book on the subject of books bound in human skin is forthcoming from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

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Stayin’ Alive

By Megan Rosenbloom

Prior to and alongside mouth-to-mouth, a bevy of resuscitation methods had been foisted upon the apparent dead. Bodies were rolled over barrels or dragged by their feet, feathers were inserted into throats, tobacco smoke was blown into rectums, and victims were forced to swallow various concoctions of spirits, vinegar, and urine. More