NewPhilosopherWhether you’re a philosopher or
a bookworm, there are plenty of
events to pique your interest – from
Houston to Oxford.What’s onHungry
Ghost Festival
Hong Kong, ChinaAccording to traditional Chinese
belief, the seventh month in the lu-
nar calendar is when restless spirits
roam the earth. Many Chinese people
make efforts to appease these transient
ghosts, while ‘feeding’ their own an-
cestors – particularly on the 15th day,
which is the Yu Lan or Hungry Ghost
Festival. While the festival’s origins are
not unlike those of Halloween in Eu-
rope, it is also intrinsically linked to the
Chinese practice of ancestor worship.
discoverhongkong.com/au/see-do/events-
festivals/chinese-festivals/the-hungry-
ghost-festival.jspAugust 15,
2019The Death
of Socrates
The Met, New York, USAThe Athenian courts executed the
Greek philosopher Socrates (469–
399 BCE) for the crime of impiety:
his behaviour towards the gods was
judged to have been irreverent, and
he had exerted a corrupting influence
on his young male followers. SocratesAll yearThe Museum
of Death
LA, USA
The Museum of Death was
founded in 1995 when JD Healy and
Cathee Shultz decided to fill the void
in death education in the US and
made death their life’s work. Evolv-
ing from the controversial Rita Dean
art gallery, the Museum of Death was
originally located in San Diego’s first
mortuary – the building itself was
once owned by Wyatt Earp. The mu-
seum houses the world’s largest col-
lection of serial killer artwork, antique
All yearfuneral ephemera, mortician and coro-
ners’ instruments, pet death taxidermy,
and crime scene photographs.
museumofdeath.netdeclined to renounce his beliefs and
died willingly, discoursing on the im-
mortality of the soul before drinking
from a cup of poisonous hemlock. In
a prison of unrelieved severity, David
depicted a frieze of carefully articu-
lated figures in antique costume act-
ing out in the language of gesture the
last moments of the moral philoso-
pher’s life.
metmuseum.org/art/collection/
search/436105