Things Women In Literature Have Died From

by Mallory Ortberg · June 11, 2015

death2

  • Cold hands
  • Beautiful face
  • Missing slippers
  • Wrist fevers
  • Night brain
  • Going outside at night in Italy
  • Shawl insufficiency
  • Too many pillows
  • Garden troubles
  • Someone said “No” very loudly while they were in the room
  • Letter-reading fits
  • Drawing-room anguish
  • Not enough pillows
  • Haven’t seen the sea in a long time
  • Too many novels
  • Pony exhaustion
  • Strolling congestion
  • Sherry served too cold
  • Ship infidelity
  • Spent more than a month in London after growing up in Yorkshire
  • Clergyman’s dropsy
  • Flirting headaches
  • River unhappiness
  • General bummers
  • Knitting needles too heavy
  • Mmmf
  • Beautiful chestnut hair
  • Spinal degeneration as a result of pride
  • Parents too happy
  • The Unpleasantness

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254 Comments

        1. lizlabz +105

          Unpleasantness Awareness Month had unfortunate results that we really should have foreseen.

    3. Jami +12

      The Unpleasantness sounds like a villain from an even worse sequel to The Neverending Story than The Neverending Story 2 was.

          2. RuncibleSpoon +7

            for me it’s a toss up between Neville and Xerxes.
            Enough mice needed for a full devouring is an absurd number of mice.

            I see we both have Gorey gravatars 😀

          3. DoubtfulGuest +10

            Between that and your username, I quite like you!

            We had a Gashlycrumb Tinies party one time where everyone was invited to come as the Tiny of their choice. It was sparsely but enthusiastically attended.

    3. Allen K. +11

      Kate Beaton does a nice Edward Gorey. I was going to link to the Edward Gorey Star Trek, but it’s been taken down, alas.

  3. melodiousb +375

    I fully expected that when this page loaded, all it would say was “Childbirth.”

          1. Unreadaethel +95

            Tuberculosis kills people now. It presumably killed strong men and unattractive women in Literature Times, but all the beautiful women died from consumption. They’re similar conditions, but consumption presents much more artistically.

          2. foxinthe_snow +40

            Consumption requires a white linen handkerchief, trimmed with lace, to be clutched at the mouth at all times.

          3. Unreadaethel +24

            Alternately, a threadbare but well-made shawl, to be clutched around one’s fragile shoulders as one expires in a tenement.

    2. scritchproductions +27

      Beautifully fey blonds always died of consumption.
      The plain girls always nursed them (a little) but never caught it.

  4. ppyajunebug +282

    -Speaking to a Man
    -Thinking of a Man
    -Looking at a Man
    -Just Men in general

    1. oneclockworklemon +73

      I trained ponies in high school and college (I am 100% serious about this) and I very definitely remember having days and weeks and months where I’d get home at the end of the day questioning my entire life and my prioirities, believing fully in my heart that I was going to die from Pony Exhaustion

      1. Fare +10

        Please tell me everything you possibly can about pony training.

        Also! why would you stop???

      2. _ellison +42

        I grew up on those Marguerite Henry books, and promptly lost my shit when I finally saw a Chincoteague pony in person. Except I had to mostly keep it to myself, because absolutely no one else cared.

        1. lauramichet +23

          Thank you, it has been almost fifteen years since I even thought of Misty of Chincoteague and now I discover that I have an enormous number of highly specific memories concerning Misty, Sea Star, and Stormy

        3. dancingcrowdesigns +30

          I ALSO CARE

          Also I SAW Misty in person, because I am old. She was very very old at the time, and I was torn between OMG this is the pony of the book and sadness that all creatures age and die.

          2. dancingcrowdesigns +8

            oh very real!

            I am thinking over the Marguerite Henry books and I think she wrote about real horses and real people: Justin Morgan, Black Gold, the woman who worked for mustangs, the Godolphin Arab, Rosalind the trotting mare (and bonus Hambletonian story inside) …

            I can go look at my shelf of them, but I am pretty sure she wrote elaborate stories about real horses.

          3. NetWt4Lbs +4

            Yeap!!! Her body, last I knew was displayed in her museum, when I went though, she was out for repairs

        4. Es_Petal +6

          I would be massively excited about that. I have three ponies and they regularly threaten to kill me from exhaustion.

      3. californianinkansas +12

        Death by Pony Exhaustion is real, y’all.
        Signed,
        Serf belonging to Moonie the Mob Boss, aka, Moonie the Evil Mini.

        Ever tried to catch a miniature horse who didn’t want to be caught? Minis are much faster and more agile than you’d expect.

    1. Sarah +5

      I mean, if I just figured out my boyfriend killed my dad I might go kind of crazy. Also, it was probably “drowning” moreso than drowning.

    2. insearchofmornings +18

      I have long suspected that Gertrude bumped her off and then made up a story about it. I mean, if you’re spending so much time watching someone drown that you can spot all those little details, you’re deliberately refraining from helping them. Or, you know, holding them underwater.

  8. friendofdaja +135

    I was fully expecting to die of “Haven’t seen the sea in a long time” until I took preventative measures and moved back to the East Coast from the Midwest.

    I guess I’ll never be a woman in literature, but beach days are a good trade-off.

    1. cosetthetable +26

      I once spent a full summer on a college campus that was neither near the ocean nor had a body of water on the campus.

      This was a mistake I did not repeat.

    1. maccrocodile +12

      I’m almost afraid to ask if that’s short for what the internet would think it’s short for.

      1. honestlythor +9

        … I have no idea what that would be, to be honest. And now I’m frightened I’ve said something I didn’t mean to.

        1. maccrocodile +14

          Well it’s one more M than the internet usually bothers with, possibly because that’s fatal?

  10. oneclockworklemon +85

    Spending more than a month in London is a real and present threat to the integrity of people’s lungs

    1. bookwormV +40

      I just spent nearly a week in Manchester. On my return to London I immediately noticed the reappearance of the dreaded Black Snot, which hadn’t been present at all in Manchester. London, why is your air quality so awful?

      1. Angelan_ +25

        The Dreaded Black Snot is so wrong and terrible. Probably terror at the Black Snot is what’s killing those Yorkshire girls.

      2. Emily +42

        the worst is when you go to London for the first time and you get the Dreaded Black Snot No One Warned you About.

        1. Tikabelle +14

          I am really glad you mentioned this because I’m going to London in October and am now duly warned.

          THANK YOU.

          1. anninyn +24

            Also Tube Plague. Beware of Tube Plague. Every time I’ve had to travel on the Tube I have come down with some kind of awful mutant virus. I think the bug strains just live and breed down there, mutating happily on the ever-changing reservoirs of people.

        2. anninyn +16

          I’m a good country girl. I technically live in a city, but the air quality is wonderful. After a week in London I was coughing and sneezing black, and seriously considering a doctors visit.

          It would have been nice to be warned.

        3. tinypaperme +11

          Also Dreaded Black Face Grease. Although somehow, in my case I had the clearest skin ever when I lived in London despite peeling off a 1/4″ layer of sooty goo from my face every night. Or maybe because I peeled off 1/4″ layer of sooty goo every night?

          1. RuncibleSpoon +5

            New York is like this too. I have family there and used to visit every summer. Gah.
            Thin film of dirt on your face, building up all day long.

      3. Jennifer +8

        I first experienced the dreaded Black Snot in Athens. I was only nine, so it was actually kind of cool.

    2. foxinthe_snow +17

      I was born and bred here and my lungs are wholly dependent on London’s pollution-ridden air. The minute I go to the countryside I get a cold.

  11. Gwyneth Olofsson +94

    Unsuitable yearnings must have killed off at least a few unfortunate ladies.

    1. decembrian +43

      Joo-Joo Eyeball
      Toe Jam Football
      Monkey Finger
      Walrus Gumboot
      Ono Sideboard
      Spinal Cracker
      Mojo Filter

      1. DoubtfulGuest +11

        I thought it was “walrus gumbo” for YEARS and was so disappointed when I learned the actual words. (That was a while ago. I’m over it now. Mostly.)

        1. honestlythor +11

          … To be honest, I thought it was “Wallace Gumbel”, presumably Bryant and Greg’s brother.

    3. scritchproductions +8

      ooo I want to play!

      Buddy Holly,
      Ben-Hur,
      Space Monkey,
      Mafia
      Hula Hoops,
      Castro,
      Edsel is a no-go
      U-2,
      Syngman Rhee,
      payola and Kennedy
      Chubby Checker,
      Psycho,
      Belgians in the Congo

      1. tinypaperme +18

        I HATE when I get Belgians in my Congo. Very hard to get rid of, and itchy to boot.

  13. bighairnoheart +80

    Cold hands.

    Well, fuck. How am I still alive at this point? (and that’s not even taking into account my many novels, beautiful face, letter reading and happy parents)

  14. Frumiosa +192

    My personal favorite – finding out your husband died in a terrible accident and taking an hour to admit that what you’re feeling is euphoria and newfound freedom and then finding out oops sorry he’s alive. Whatta bitch.

    3. flowersforophelia +23

      The Story of An Hour is, y’know, so underrated, and I’m thrilled you brought it up.

      Kate Chopin had the best causes of death in her work, really:
      -swimming out into the sea and drowning because of your frustration with society in the patriarchy
      -wandering off into the swamps and bayou with a baby on your back because you’re mixed-race (hint hint: your husband is actually the mixed-race one)
      -“joy that kills”

  15. themegnapkin +98

    Almost died of:
    Studying too hard.

    Did anyone else read that part of Anne of the Island and conclude that you weren’t studying hard enough if your life wasn’t in actual jeopardy?

    1. sigaloenta +86

      What I learned form Anne of the Island was that you can actually die of Being Frivolous.

    3. missstirling +9

      Which part are you talking about? Because the person who almost dies of studying too hard is Gilbert, a man.

  16. sredni vashtar +107

    Reads 1 French novel –>disposition becomes more inclined to general flightiness and excitability –> thoughtlessly takes a walk outside after 5pm –> immediate brain fever and death.

    1. dakimel +9

      Why would you read any novels at all? Novels are well-known to cause instant (yet lingering) death.

    1. arlyndab +11

      I misread “pony exhaustion” as “porn exhaustion.” So apparently, that’s my way out of the world.

  18. Frumiosa +145

    Things Women in Plays Have Died From

    coughing in the first act and it’s the end of the second act

  19. emilyrosecole +104

    Also:

    – Failure to take the vapors
    – Fluttering ingenue syndrome
    – Wandering around a castle
    – Taking too many vapors
    – Embroidery paralysis

  20. littlehuntingcreek +82

    My Italian grandmother warned us that the Night Air was DANGEROUS. We could ‘catch a chill’.

    1. MissusSmith +8

      My German grandmother warned us of the same. Also about ever being barefoot. Ah

    3. tabwootwo +20

      How has “Catch a Chill” not been turned into a cool, positive marketing slogan for some stupid soda or product? We can all see those commercials now!

      1. gigi +47

        I would LOVE to see a Victorian young lady on holiday by the sea being warned against “catching a chill,” and then smiling mischievously to herself and rushing out to buy a Soda Chill and grabbing a surf board.

    4. moxycrimefighter +21

      Whenever I read a novel set in Scandinavia, there’s always a warning about getting a UTI from sitting on a cold bench. Several beautiful women must have died from that for it to be such a thing.

      1. neuromanticism +47

        It’s an absolute FACT known by everyone here and I’ve been confused about it my entire life. In my first school, we sat down in a circle every day, and you could use a pillow if you didn’t like sitting on the floor – except if you were a girl, because then it was a rule, girls HAD to use a pillow. Otherwise you will – WILL – get a UTI. It’s truly on the level of brushing your teeth to prevent cavities. It’s just How It Works.

        People complain when girls sit on boulders, when they sit on any other kind of hard surface that isn’t a proper chair, when they won’t change out of their wet bathing suits immediately, when they fail to use leggings with their skirts when it’s “cold” outside… I almost started believing it. I think I was tricked briefly when I learned that women actually do get UTI’s more often than men because the urethra is shorter, like maybe that had something to do with it. I mean, EVERYONE knows that you get UTI’s from having your vag chilled. EVERYONE. Your delicate flower wilts from the cold or something and that gives you a UTI, because of course it does.

        But some part of my mind still whispers “but… but germ theory?”

        1. moxycrimefighter +25

          I bring it up at every opportunity because I am OBSESSED with how weird it is! Do people claim that it’s happened to them or someone they know or someone who someone they know knows? I don’t mean to offend, but it sounds like a way of controlling what girls do by using body-horror to make them comply – especially given the area it focuses on which is somehow both delicate and disgusting?

          1. neuromanticism +16

            It’s not really a big deal, it’s just… there. Like “please wear a jacket/hat/scarf, you’ll catch a cold”? Keep your body generically healthy, i.e. warm, so that you won’t catch the most common and generic illnesses? It’s not a huge part of your day, it’s just there.

            And so is “please wear leggings/don’t sit on the cold surface, you’ll catch a UTI”. Keep your genitals generically healthy (=warm) to keep them from catching the most common and generic illness in that area. It feels logical, you just have to be used to grouping UTI’s together with colds and flus.

          3. Marie +8

            Yeah, I’m Swedish, and I know this is ENTIRELY unreasonable. I do not sit on cold surfaces, and I worry for the BAMFs who wear short skirts in winter.

            I guess northen europe is ridiculous?

      2. dakimel +24

        I sit here sipping my vile cranberry juice, casting my mind back, and I can’t remember a single cold bench upon which I’ve perched of late. (Of course it’s 95* out at midnight I think, so I’m not sure cold benches exist.)

        I really need to be more careful.

        1. Unreadaethel +8

          I got a bottle of cranberry pills for whenever I start feeling peculiar in my nethers, and they’re approximately 5000% better than cranberry juice.

        2. christinapaul +4

          Cranberry juice could actually aggravate a UTI because of the high sugar content (ask your ObGyn or Urologist, they will confirm this). However, the cranberry pills do not contain sugar (or minimal amounts), are not outrageously expensive, and since they are a pill, if you do not find cranberry juice palatable, there is no taste. Plus, it is much easier to take two pills a day than to drink a gallon of cranberry juice.

          If you go the pill route, keep them in the fridge, it extends their shelf life.

          1. dakimel +4

            I couldn’t choke down the stuff, but fortunately my doc picked up the infection when I was in for my annual & put me on drugs, so now the jug of cranberry juice will sit in the fridge until my husband gets around to finishing it. He likes the vile drink. But then, he also likes olives & tapioca pudding, and I try not to judge.

          2. christinapaul +1

            Funny, my husband likes those vile things as well. Perhaps they are long lost brothers separated at birth – LOL

            Glad you’re better and your are no longer being subjected to cranberry juice – straight it’s nasty, but mixed with raspberry, I find it quite tasty

      3. tinypaperme +11

        The librarian at my high school saw me sitting on the concrete one day at lunch and told me, “You’re going to get piles!”

    5. californianinkansas +9

      My Mexican grandmother did and does, too. I also grew up with the belief that sleeping with the windows open -no matter how hot it is at night- will give you a sore throat.

      1. mialro12 +13

        SAME. We were told not to go around in bare feet or sleep with wet hair or we’d catch a cold. My mom is a healthcare professional and still kind of believes this.

        1. Teka Lynn +7

          Oh, my grandmother was always warning me about the dangers of wet hair. Finally I said “That’s an old wives’ tale!” to her. She was taken aback, but never bothered me about it again.

    6. RuncibleSpoon +18

      My Polish grandmother warned us about Night Air and going out with Wet Hair. She also warned us about getting too close to empty light fixtures, since without a bulb in place the electricity might seep out into the room and get us.

      1. christinapaul +8

        My Slovak grandmother would always yell at me to tuck in my shirt when it was cold out so my kidneys wouldn’t get cold. I thought she was crazy, but complied to keep the peace. Now that I’m an old fart, I find when my shirt rides up in the cold weather, and my kidney area is exposed for any length of time, for hours and some times days afterward, I have back pain, sometimes severer. Perhaps my Baba wasn’t nuts after all.

    7. Nickmick1980

      I’ve found that young, small animals will sometimes catch a chill, and if you don’t physically warm their bodies, they do die!

      1. RuncibleSpoon +23

        I dunno. I was imagining the start of a crappy day, and then someone saying “General Bummers reporting for duty!” and now I’m smiling.

  23. Household_Opera +85

    – Excessive delicacy
    – “She never had a strong constitution”
    – Housework over-exertion

    By the way, I’ve always wondered what exactly “brain fever” meant. Heatstroke? Encephalitis? Some ordinary illness that we can now identify and treat but the Victorians didn’t understand?

    1. sredni vashtar +12

      Me too! Because it seems to describe widely varying illnesses. You can get it in the jungle and it sounds like somekind of actual fever-inducing tropical disease OR you could just be really upset about something one time and need to take to your bed in a weeks-long delirium.

      1. Household_Opera +19

        I just looked it up in the OED, which says it’s “inflammation of the brain or meninges” or “a disease (supposedly) characterized or accompanied by such inflammation.” So maybe people just threw the term around in a “who knows, maybe her brain is inflamed!!!” kind of way?

        (by the way, I love your username. Disturbing Saki story references for the win!)

        1. sredni vashtar +30

          I think you are completely right and would love to see some sort of study done on the different diseases that were classified as “brain fever.” Because based on my Victorian novel reading, I’m pretty sure it goes from ‘mild feelings of ennui’ all the way up to ‘spontaneous combustion of the human head.’

          (And thank you! That story is my favorite.)

          2. sredni vashtar +8

            You can reverse the effects by reading “The Lumber Room” which has kind of the same set up, but then becomes totally hilarious rather than deeply disturbing.

          3. tinypaperme +19

            Here’s a start for you:

            Brain fever in 19th century literature: Fact and fiction
            Authors: Peterson, Audrey C.
            Source: Victorian Studies 19, p. 445-464 1976

            (Putting my Ph.D. in history of science/medicine to good use, here.)

  25. betsymore +19

    “In trouble”
    ETA Though I guess that’s what a lot of women have died from IRL, so less funny here. :/

  26. lesliejroot +114

    I don’t remember what happens in War and Peace exactly, but I’m at the part where Prince Andrei has gone to war and deposited his wife with his sister and father on their estate and I’m 90% sure the poor woman is about to die of Being Sent To The Countryside. Either that or My Asshole Husband Needs Something To Regret, For Character Development.

    2. Mrs_Peel +24

      I’m 95% sure I would die from Being Sent to the Countryside, at least if I couldn’t get an occasional New York Times or a bagel.

  28. winterbymorning +64

    Either of my grandmothers as well as my father will gladly take time out of their day to explain to you the numerous dangers of Missing Slippers. If you walk barefoot on a cold surface, you’ll get ovarian cancer!

  30. Sabrina +38

    -Poor nerves
    -Dainty Ankle Disorder
    -Forgetting to inquire about another family’s health
    -Rich nerves

  31. sigaloenta +16

    • frozen brow
    • teacup pinkie
    * tippet deficiency (wtf is a tippet, anyway?)

      1. anninyn +14

        To be fair, primarily intended to be worn over an evening dress while going from the carriage to the theatre or dinner party. Anything else would imply you can’t afford a carriage!

  33. Kalopsia +56

    – Fainting in a room without a fainting couch
    – Chronic window gazing
    – A shiver in the trees

    1. bluegreen +4

      I knew it! I recently had a strange fit of being made very uncomfortable by the disconcerting movement of a sycamore outside the window on a close day. I felt like I might die but on this fortunate occasion I fell asleep for four hours instead. I suffer from Excessive Victorianism.

  34. Eringobraless +49

    BUT WHAT ABOUT DAISY MILLER

    Roman fever aka gettin’ that saucy Italian DICK

    I mean, taking the evening air at the Colliseum. Same diff.

    1. pureklass +7

      I clicked over for Daisy Miller, also. I think she is “Going outside at night in Italy.”

    1. RuncibleSpoon +13

      well, yeah, i mean, that’s The Death That Awaits Us All

      but, you know, we’re not really supposed to talk about it.

  38. jessim03 +28

    This list could also work incredibly well for operatic heroines. Just add consumption, men, and magical pyres.

      2. Mrs_Peel +24

        My musicologist boyfriend told me that there was a production of “Tosca” once where they put a trampoline at the bottom of the stage, to catch the soprano in the last act when she jumped. She ended up bouncing right back up again, in full view of the audience.

  39. amarme +36

    Having a silly, principled husband who moves you to a factory town.

    Honestly, women worked in the factories and managed survive. Well, except for that one…

    1. denisejhale +4

      Think reference is to North and South. Mrs Hale didn’t actually work in factory, death more a mixture of depression and colder weather. The factory girl who died had got cotton fluff into her lungs which caused a respiratory illness, the novelist was highlighting poor work conditions of the factories. Thornton had fans to help disperse these fibers and safe-guard his workers.

  40. Rob +56

    Pretty sure Lady Capulet died because Shakespeare put too many people in the scene, and he ran out of actors, so he just said, “Oh, her? Uh, she’s dead. No really. She totally died, you guys. Yeah.”

    2. Lenora +18

      It’s Lady Montague who gets explained away by her husband with the explanation that “grief of my son’s exile hath stopped her heart.” Lady Capulet is there, silently blaming the patriarchy.

  43. gigi +17

    I have a friend who would love this – except he has just been diagnosed with spinal degeneration (after his complaints of pain were previously dismissed as attention-seeking.) Spinal degeneration because of pride would hit him too hard right now.

  44. gigi +51

    I nearly died of Modesty when I tried to swim in mixed company wearing jeans. I think nowadays I might die of Modesty by wearing too many clothes in the hot sun. Historically that would probably be called Ineffective Parasol.

  45. mkpatter +47

    I feel like “Not Listening to a Man” should be on this list. Oh and of course we can’t forget the ever-present “nerves.”

  46. Megano!

    I feel like "Not Listening to a Man" should be on this list. Oh and of course we can't forget the ever-present "nerves."

  48. Unreadaethel +55

    -Mist on the Moors
    -Rain
    -Overdeveloped Selflessness
    -Melancholy
    -Ennui
    -Italians

    1. Mairead +31

      “Italians”

      However, you can also die of not being able to go to Italy when the doctor sends you abroad for your health. I guess the trick was to go to Italy but never to speak to an Italian?

      1. Unreadaethel +30

        I think Italians are safe so long as you encounter them in Italy, during the day, in public, with a chaperone present. But nighttime Italians, particularly ones encountered outside of Italy, are always to be suspected.

          1. Unreadaethel +24

            It’s actually their organ of veneration; it emits a miasma which dissolves harmlessly in the sunlight, but is utterly unchecked at night, and can prove deadly to the Englishwoman, who has no natural defenses against such invidious personal emanations.

          2. RuncibleSpoon +18

            Indeed, though we must not forget that the noble virtue with which such Englishwomen are imbued serves as the very catalyst for this deadly force.

            Women who are not English, and other such creatures of low character, may harmlessly pass many hours with Night Italians. For the virtuous Englishwoman this practice is invariably fatal.

          3. Unreadaethel +20

            The English constitution, preoccupied as it is with good manners, common sense, and appropriate garden layout, is entirely unequal to the unwholesome influences of the Mediterranean.

  49. mialro12 +41

    -love-related drowning
    -consumption
    -too pure for this world
    -childbed
    -doing something wrong
    -bad habit, like being spontaneous
    -men

  50. David +40

    Is there a list of all the novels indirectly referenced here? I’d like to chuckle and pretend I’ve read them all… but I just haven’t.

  51. RunGracieRun +26

    A man has returned the lock of hair you so obligingly bestowed upon him.

    Oh wait, that’s only nearly fatal.

  52. Allen K. +10

    The knights-and-derring-do novel Tirant Lo Blanc (that gets a glowing book review _within_ Don Quixote) features strapping young men, including our hero, swooning and/or dying left and right from strong emotion. Good news? Pass out. Anger? Choke on bile and die.

    1. sigaloenta +7

      right! And in the ancient novel, men die of things like Too Many Presents From your Lover and Surfeit of Daisy Chains. (Though both men and women are liable to die from Elopement.)

  53. Mairead +40

    Then there’s things women in poetry have died from:

    – looking out the window
    – calling the cattle home
    – envious angels
    – a warning shot
    – dwelling among untrodden ways
    – playing the harp
    – rash importuning
    – eloping across the stormy water
    – pride

    1. Household_Opera +12

      – wind blowing out of a cloud (oh wait, that’s “envious angels,” isn’t it? Never mind.)
      – pining over lover’s head buried in basil pot
      – being aweary, aweary
      – sleeping in fields where roses fade

  54. adriftinchina +16

    Frozen eggs. Sitting on cold concrete will freeze your eggs (Ukrainian theory)

  56. Maryaed +21

    My very most favorite: croquet-induced premature labor. (Well, technically tripping over a wicket to avoid the advances of your former lover, whom you abandoned to marry money and a title.)

  57. dracjr +26

    Dude, that needle heaviness that killed Beth March wasn’t EVEN from a knitting needle, I’m pretty sure it was just a regular needle.

  58. kelly thompson +17

    So good. I dream of this list being a theme for an art show. I would love to paint some of these , “things that women in literature died from.

    Bravo!

    Kelly Thompson, LA artist.

  61. Laney +37

    I always thought it was ridiculous in Turgenev’s “First Love” when everyone is terrified for Zinya because she self-destructively starts drinking ice water, which everyone knows will cause her to catch a terrible cold and die. Then I moved to Russia, and people really are super wary of ice water. Like when people get water from a water cooler, they put in a little water from the hot tap so it’s not too cold. I’ve had people watch me get cold water and drink it and be like, “How can you do that??” One woman told me when she drinks ice water she can immediately feel her throat closing up and she knows she’ll get sick within a day. So I guess what I’m saying is, I’m pretty sure the vaccine for shawl insufficiency hasn’t made it over here yet.

    1. scritchproductions +38

      I read this imagining you drinking ice water in a totally bad ass way, while leaning nonchalantly against a cooler, with one eye brow raised.
      Like the toughies smoking or doing drugs in old movies .
      it made me laugh 🙂

    2. tinypaperme +8

      I had a Chinese roommate once who was convinced I was going to catch a cold if I drank water that was any temperature other than “having just barely come down from a boil.” Which was interesting, because drinking any non-boiled (or non-bottled) water in China will produce something far worse than a respiratory infection. (Related: always make sure you carry tiny packets of Kleenex in China, because toilet paper is often an afterthought.)

    3. gigi +15

      Oh yeah, and air conditioning too! My British friends all insist that it’s evil and causes sickness. But maybe that’s because they have that delicate English ladylike constitution. Whereas I, a southern gal, will wilt away without it in summer. (How come nobody in literature dies of summer? I would.)

  62. kate +24

    Period screenplay version:
    – coughing once in front of your child/children
    – gratuitous handkerchief holding
    – megrims
    – wanting an oscar nomination but not wanting to look ugly

  63. missstirling +25

    –Husband’s depressing career decisions

    I think this is what Mrs. Hale in “North and South” dies of?

    1. RuncibleSpoon +25

      A little wuthering is probably fine, but wuthering, at its height, can actually be quite bad for you.

  66. dezziehicks +12

    Night Brain is still a very common ailment. I get it every time I’m marathoning a show at 3AM.

  69. margotayer +15

    I just finished a book (Fanny Burney’s The Wanderer) where a broken-hearted woman attempted public suicide (in front of the man she loved and her rival) multiple times (at a concert in drag, a summerhouse and by the side of a lane) and DIDN’T die, in spite of using a sharp dagger each time..

  70. Emmett +3

    I need for these to be true. I suspect they are because of Daisy Miller. Can we have links, maybe?

  71. margotayer +5

    Not women, but the romantic rival in a Wilkie Collins book dies because he exercises and runs a race (I think maybe a half-marathon — can’t remember…)

  73. corianne +18

    There’s also Tragic Backstory. Tragic Backstory is on of the leading causes of death amongst mothers and wives in the literary world.

  74. Kay S +5

    I agree with other comments. I’d love citations for each of these. I even put it out to several English teachers I know–ones who teach college lit classes, even–and no one can figure out a single source of any if these.

    2. cleoreads +4

      I think some are just humorous generalizations / exaggerations and some are references to specific books.

      Knitting needle too heavy = Beth March in Little Women (I remember it as a sewing needle, but it doesn’t really matter).

      ETA: Going outside at night in Italy = Daisy Miller

      River unhappiness might = Mill on the Floss

  76. English teacher +4

    What about “the vapors”? A few dozen literary heroines must have died of that!

  77. moonwritings +12

    Misplaced Doily Disphoria
    Embedded Chain Infections
    Thirst
    Stitching Elbow
    General Unhappiness, Unspecified
    Dropsy
    Decision-Making Quandries

  78. susanintoronto +18

    Jumping in front of an oncoming train. (Because of a man. Two men. Three if you include the author)

  79. Thea +6

    Romantic naïveté/dissatisfaction with gender roles/poison
    Spurnings
    Wheelchair suicide
    A broken, yet pure heart and a very pure bag of cocaine

  80. greenviolets +7

    I’d like to know the novels you got these from, and in particular ‘letter-writing fits’ as I have those very often, and nearly died from them, and want to feel less alone. Othello I imagine is too many pillows. I know it’s funnier this way, but I really do feel lonely, so help me out.

  85. Ginger +1

    Before modern plumbing was installed and horses stopped being the main mode of transportation, exposure to London when you hadn’t built up an immunity to the germs was a real threat.

  86. Anne-Sophie

    "Too many novels" is Madame Bovary and "beautiful chestnut hair" must be Les Misérables. That was my contribution as a French person, but other than that, I am clueless!

  87. Obcy

    All very good. The image, though, is from "The Death of Barbara Radziwiłł" by Józem Simmler (1860) Apparently the work of art was meant to celebrate the love of King Zygmunt II for his queen, Barbara, who he evidently married out of love – a very un-kingly thing to do. Maybe love should be on the list too.

  91. Mitzy +3

    Well, in my family, we say women on television shows die of “Cartwright Disease.” That’s any time the hero or a main character falls in love, but being married or having a wife or long running sweetie isn’t part of the ongoing storyline.

  92. starthebuck +2

    Not to forget loneliness (like Effi Briest by Theodor Fontane).
    Drowning by sweing stones into her own skirt (Ophelia in Hamlet)

  94. Auspex +10

    Marrying someone who refuses to make a wife for his monster; if your fiancé makes monsters, check how he treats them.
    Being a houseguest at an estate at the same time that a detective, amateur or professional, is a houseguest–a very dangerous activity; never, never attend a party if one of the other guests is named ‘Poirot” or “Marple.”
    Loving so much that winged seraphs covet your love and send killing chilling winds; I’m not sure if unwinged seraphs are equally dangerous, but it’s probably best not to provoke any of them.

  97. denisejhale +4

    I would have liked sources of novels where these deaths occurred. Beautiful chestnut hair is a bit worrying and I wonder what product she used to achieve, definitively not worth it!

  98. eleanorparkersapia +2

    My Puerto Rican grandmother warned of being exposed to ‘el sereno’, the night air or morning dew. Interesting list and more interesting ailments in the comments!