Mitford's "Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain": A Critical Analysis
This paper offers a critical analysis of Jessica Mitford's essay "Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain," in which Mitford argues that American embalming and funeral practices are commercially driven rituals rooted in cultural denial of death. The paper examines Mitford's rhetorical strategies, including her use of dark humor, selective quotation, and an outsider's perspective, to build a persuasive case against the funeral industry. It also notes the essay's key limitation — its failure to acknowledge opposing viewpoints — while ultimately affirming Mitford's central claim that American funeral customs reflect a deep-seated fear of mortality rather than genuine expressions of grief or love.
- Overview of Mitford's Argument: Mitford's central claims about American funeral customs
- The Practice of Embalming: Analysis of Mitford's critique of embalming
- The Open Casket and the Mortician's Art: Viewing rituals and the mortician as artist
- The Burial Ritual: Mechanized, sanitized burial ceremony described
- Rhetorical Strengths and Limitations: Persuasive techniques and missing counterarguments
- Death, Culture, and the Fear of Dying: Funeral customs as expression of mortality fear
✍️ How to write this paper — guide, tools & examples ▾
What makes this paper effective
- The paper closely tracks Mitford's argumentative structure, moving from embalming to viewing to burial in logical sequence, which allows for an organized and coherent analysis.
- Direct quotation is used purposefully throughout, anchoring the analysis in the source text and letting Mitford's own language illustrate the rhetorical effects being discussed.
- The paper demonstrates critical distance by acknowledging a meaningful weakness in Mitford's essay — her failure to engage with opposing views — rather than simply summarizing her claims.
Key academic technique demonstrated
This paper models how to perform a rhetorical analysis of a persuasive essay: it identifies the author's argumentative purpose, evaluates specific techniques (rhetorical questions, irony, selective evidence, outside perspective), and assesses both the strengths and limitations of those techniques. This approach goes beyond summary to offer evaluative commentary on how an argument is constructed.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a thesis-level overview of Mitford's central claims, then examines each stage of the funeral process she critiques — embalming, the open-casket viewing, and the burial ceremony. It transitions to a brief rhetorical evaluation before closing with a thematic reflection on American culture's relationship with death and mortality. The structure mirrors the source essay's own progression, which keeps the analysis grounded and easy to follow.
Overview of Mitford's Argument
Jessica Mitford's "Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain" paints a picture of an antiseptic departure to the netherworld. Mitford argues that the traditional viewing of the body is strictly an American aberration, concocted by morticians in order to display their morbid artistic talents and to profit at the expense of the bereaved. Furthermore, the author implies that American culture promotes denial in the face of death.
The Practice of Embalming
Mitford begins by asking a rhetorical question: "Is all this legal?" That, in and of itself, signals her bias to the reader. She notes that laws exist governing the processes to which a dead body may be subjected. The signature of the next of kin is required before an autopsy, a cremation, or before the body is turned over to a medical school for research purposes. However, "…no law requires embalming, no religious doctrine commends it, nor is it dictated by considerations of health, sanitation, or even of personal daintiness. In no part of the world but in Northern America is it widely used. The purpose of embalming is to make the corpse presentable for viewing in a suitably costly container." Handing a body over to a funeral home implies consent to embalm. Mitford's initial argument is clearly slanted to persuade the reader that the practice of embalming is a sham.
Mitford goes on to marvel at the "docility of Americans who each year pay hundreds of millions of dollars for its [embalming] perpetuation, blissfully ignorant of what it is all about, what is done, how it is done." The procedure is carried out by an embalmer-restorative artist — a practitioner with a nine- or twelve-month course of training — who subjects the body to a variety of tools and chemical preparations in order to restore it to a semblance of a natural state.
The Open Casket and the Mortician's Art
All of this is done to provide the family with an "open casket" viewing of the deceased. Mitford notes that people from other countries are often astonished by the practice. A woman from England living in San Francisco could not comprehend why mourners would care to look at "poor old Oscar lying there in his brown tweed suit, wearing a suntan makeup and just the wrong shade of lipstick. If I had not been extremely fond of the old boy, I have a horrible feeling that I might have giggled."
Mitford's strategy is to minimize the significance of the viewing and to highlight the absurdity of the funeral home industry. This works to advance her argument that the entire death experience, as it now unfolds, is not based on the genuine needs of the family but on their perception of what is customary. The corpse becomes a sort of canvas upon which the mortician practices his craft and creates the illusion of the living dead. The secrecy surrounding the entire procedure is necessary; otherwise the funeral industry would eventually go out of business. No one would knowingly subject a loved one — even a dead loved one — to some of the measures she so graphically describes.
Works Cited
Mitford, Jessica. "Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain." The Norton Reader, 12th ed., edited by Linda H. Peterson and John C. Brereton, W.W. Norton & Company, 2007, pp. 310–316.
Create your account
Always verify citation format against your institution’s current style guide requirements.