And why post-pandemic culture can help us understand the Late Medieval period
Last November when I went to visit my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew in Dallas, TX, I noticed right away that there was a 12 foot skeleton in their next door neighbor’s yard. My sister-in-law, Portia, explained that the neighbor had left the skeleton up after Halloween specifically because my nephew Dario liked it so much! 18-month-old Dario was referring to it as “Skelly” and talking to the skeleton with whatever babbling baby talk he could muster for communication. At this point, the very tall skeletons had been a home decorating trend for a few years.
I’ve seen several 12 foot skeletons around Sioux Falls, some of which are up year round. Some 12 foot skeleton owners even make the effort to put seasonal attire on their year-round skeleton decor. There’s even groups on social media for Skelly owners to share photos of their year-round skeleton decor, complete with outfit changes. If neighbors complain (which very rarely happens), the skeleton owners turn it into a big joke.
I don’t have a back yard and therefore don’t have a space to put a 12 foot skeleton, but I’ve done a miniature riff on the idea that’s appropriately sized for an apartment complex:
This is Fledermaus, and he has different accessories to stay relevant year-round!
My neighbors have done something similar, leaving up a mini skeleton door decoration year-round. This kind of decor did not used to be so widespread and would have been seen as odd as recently as 2019.
When Wednesday premiered on Netflix in 2022, it immediately became one of the most popular and successful original shows ever to be released on the platform, reaching 1 billion views by the end of the year. The dance from Wednesday became a viral sensation on TikTok, and the goth rock featured in the show experienced a revival in popularity.
In my view, the timing of both the 12 foot skeleton decor becoming so successful that it sold out before it was even October in 2020 and the release of Wednesday in 2022 played a role in the success of both things– there’s a reason why both were met by a culture hungry for gothic vibes.
When the 12 foot skeleton hit stores in late 2020, it felt like a throwback to “Danse Macabre” imagery of the Late Medieval period. Medieval “Danse Macabre” art became popular specifically after one of the most dramatic pandemics in all of human history: the Black Death. When I first read the article “We Take the Dead from Morning Till Night” in the New York Times in early 2020, it reminded me of the opening passages of The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio:
The streets of Bergamo are empty. As in all of Italy, people can leave their homes only for food and medicines and work. The factories and shops and schools are closed. There is no more chatting on the corners or in the coffee bars.
But what won’t stop are the sirens.
—The New York Times, February 2020
In Florence, despite all that human wisdom and forethought could devise to avert it, as the cleansing of the city from many impurities by officials appointed for the purpose, the refusal of entrance to all sick folk, and the adoption of many precautions for the preservation of health; despite also humble supplications addressed to God, and often repeated both in public procession and otherwise, by the devout; towards the beginning of the spring of the said year the doleful effects of the pestilence began to be horribly apparent by symptoms that shewed as if miraculous.
–Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron, circa 1353
History doesn’t exactly repeat, but it does rhyme.
Although it seems counter-intuitive for a population experiencing anxiety and grief from a pandemic to lean into dark, chaotic, and macabre imagery, doing so can give people a sense of catharsis and even be a relief in times of stress. The reaction to the 12 foot skeletons in 2020 wasn’t horror or offense– it was joy and laughter! The images and memes about 12 foot skeleton decor on social media was considered a much-welcome reprieve from the truly depressing content most people had been exposed to daily for several months by that point. It was whimsical!
In Late Medieval “Danse Macabre” art, the images of skeletons and ghouls dancing with the living from all walks of life symbolized the idea of “Memento Mori”– a reminder of one’s mortality, and by extension a reminder to live a meaningful, ethical, and joyful life until then, because it won’t last forever. The message was that if one could die at any time, every moment of life must count.
In late 2022, I had the privilege of meeting with David Bell, who is a former medical officer and scientist at the World Health Organization. He has spent much of his career working to cure malaria in Africa, and his background gave him profound insight into the psychological effects of the coronavirus pandemic. He explained to me that, “one in fifteen children die before reaching adulthood in Sub-Saharan Africa. As a result, people there are used to death. In the West, people are unfamiliar with death. The West also has a decline in the belief in an afterlife. That lack of familiarity with death and lack of belief in an afterlife heightened the fear of death.”
If unfamiliarity with death increases the anxiety around it, it’s not hard to see how having some strange visual reminders of death– like a giant skeleton outside of one’s house year-round– could be strangely comforting and humorous during a difficult time in history.
It’s also worth noting that gothic themes never go out of style entirely– Memento Mori is a timeless idea, and death will always be a part of life. 1990s America was probably the easiest time and place in all of human history to be alive, and The Addams Family films were still a huge hit. Goth clubs were very popular among a certain subset of the population, and many goth clubs that are around now are actually a remnant of the late 20th century. It doesn’t take a major pandemic or other disruption for Gothic art, music, and fashion to resonate with people. However, the 2020s are an absolutely perfect opportunity for anyone who is interested in exploring the Memento Mori idea to lean into that and find an audience for content with that theme.