The Fool's Progress

On the surface, death begins with stomach cancer. On a deeper level, Edward Abbey argues that death begins at birth, and there is nothing to be done about it. We are all dying right now. The difference between people is the rate at which they die. Edward Abbey is dying faster than most over the course of his book, but this is not a bad thing, as Abbey postulates that the more one lives, the faster one dies. He lived a lot, and died young. But this isn't a bad thing, because he lived more first. Death is an eminent and natural end, and therefore never begins nor ends.