# Books/Movies Whose Main Characters are Dead **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 21, 2006, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449 "2006-02-21T06:23:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/21 "2006-02-22T01:05:30Z")
> [@The Chao Goes Mu](#): > > _American Beauty_ since someone beat me to _An Occurance at Owl Creek_ _Bridge_ Yeah, someone beat you to American Beauty too (see OP). How about _Frankenstein_? The monster’s not the narrator but he’s certainly a main character. Also _Wicked_. We know she’s gonna be dead before we even start reading. ---
**Author:** ![TwistyLamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7ba0ec/32.png) [@TwistyLamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistyLamp)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/22 "2006-02-22T01:58:03Z")
The Last Battle (last book of chronicals of narnia) ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/23 "2006-02-22T02:54:47Z")
> [@tiltypig](#): > > “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” [Nope](http://eserver.org/fiction/occurrence-at-owl-creek.html). Farquhar is alive until the last line of the story; though what he sees is a fantasy, it is what is going through his mind. ---
**Author:** ![Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@Speaker\_for\_the\_Dead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speaker_for_the_Dead)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/24 "2006-02-22T02:58:51Z")
A book I just got, _My Name is Red_ is a murder story with the victim (as a ghost, of sorts) as one of the narrators. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/25 "2006-02-22T04:24:06Z")
**Grave of the Fireflies** – The two main characters, brother and younger sister, Seita and Setsuko, are both dead at the start of the movie, Setsuko having died some time earlier, and Seita just having died in the street while carrying her ashes in a tin. Of course, the movie then goes back in time to show why they died. ---
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/26 "2006-02-22T04:31:41Z")
I can’t remember if it’s revealed early on or not, but Kurt Vonnegut’s _Galapagos_ is narrated by a ghost. ---
**Author:** ![MackoUr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eada6e/32.png) [@MackoUr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MackoUr)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/27 "2006-02-22T04:36:42Z")
Does “Carnival of Souls” count? ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/28 "2006-02-22T04:39:51Z")
12 Monkeys and Things to do in Denver When You Are Dead. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/29 "2006-02-22T13:11:38Z")
[QUOTE=Otto] Yeah, someone beat you to American Beauty too (see OP).QUOTE] Well, damn. ---
**Author:** ![rackensack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rackensack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rackensack)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/30 "2006-02-22T13:27:24Z")
A couple of [Jim Thompson’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Thompson_%28writer%29) books have a narrator who dies by the end, meaning that at least implicitly they’ve been dead since beginning the narration. Telling you which ones would be spoiling it, however. On the more high-brow side, the narrator of Brazilian novelist [Machado de Assis’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machado_de_Assis) masterwork _[Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Posthumous_Memoirs_of_Bras_Cubas)_, which has been translated into English as _Epitaph of a Small Winner_ and _Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas_, is dead from the beginning, and explicitly refers to this throughout. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/31 "2006-02-22T14:31:17Z")
The film my wife was named for, [Laura](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037008/) (1944). ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/32 "2006-02-22T14:59:40Z")
It occurs to me that **dracula** and **Frankenstein** don’t fit the bill. Dracula is “undead”, but he’s not actually dead – he never actually died. Dracula didn’t get his vampire status by being killed by some other vampuire. He was essentially enrolled in a School for Ebvil Magic at which the price was the soul of one of the students, and he lost. (“Enroll today. Odds are that you won’t lose your soul!”) The monster in Frankenstein (who was called “Frankenstein” in stage presentations even before the James Whale film, by the way) was, as Colin Clive correctly puts it, “never alive” before Frankenstein animated it. In fact, in the book the monster isn’t even stated to be made from put=together parts from corpses. The Creature is supposed to be a brand=spankin’-new creation, and therefore not dead. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/33 "2006-02-22T15:28:00Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > The film my wife was named for, [Laura](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037008/) (1944). Nope. I’d explain, but the spoiler tags aren’t working. Watch the movie. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/34 "2006-02-22T16:23:10Z")
Am I the first one to mention _Desperate Housewives_? ---
**Author:** ![tremorviolet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e47774/32.png) [@tremorviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tremorviolet)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/35 "2006-02-22T16:26:18Z")
_Who Framed Roger Rabbit?_ was actually based on a book called [Who Censored Roger Rabbit?](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345303253/qid=1140625487/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/104-7985591-8599930?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) and the main plot is that Roger Rabbit is dead but is back as a short lived copy of himself. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2006, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/36 "2006-02-22T16:32:01Z")
[Siesta](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093969/). ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2006, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/37 "2006-02-25T00:53:35Z")
> [@CapnPitt](#): > > I can’t remember if it’s revealed early on or not, but Kurt Vonnegut’s _Galapagos_ is narrated by a ghost. Speaking of Vonnegut, _Happy Birthday, Wanda June_, has a section being told by a dead little girl. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2006, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/38 "2006-02-25T04:13:13Z")
I guess _Reversal of Fortune_ would be close, but no cigar. I just checked, and apparently Sunny von Bulow is [still alive.](http://www.deadoraliveinfo.com/dead.nsf/vnames-nf/von+Bulow+Sunny) ::shudder:: ---
**Author:** ![BraheSilver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@BraheSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BraheSilver)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2006, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449/39 "2006-02-25T07:59:00Z")
Terry Pratchett’s _Reaper Man_ is half about a wizard who dies at the ripe old age of 140, then comes back because Death never showed up to show him the way out… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-movies-whose-main-characters-are-dead/345449.md?page=1)