Death cleaning is the translation of a Swedish term, döstädning, describing a kind of de-cluttering later in life, when you downsize to make things easier for the next generation. It’s being popularized by The Gentle Art of Death Cleaning by Margareta Mangusson. This is part of a complete episode.
Leave a comment
1 comment
More from this show
Susie Dent’s murder mystery Guilty by Definition (Bookshop|Amazon) follows a lexicographer in Oxford who becomes a sleuth of a different kind, seeking the culprit in a long-unsolved killing. A lexicographer herself, Dent includes lots of obscure and...
Mona from Riverview, Florida, grew up understanding that the word schmooze, which comes from Yiddish, meant simply “to mingle and chat” at parties, but when she fondly referred to her friend as a schmoozer, the friend was insulted, assuming that a...
Thanks for the book tip!!
Dö (die/dead/death) städning (cleaning or tidying).
Swedish is a more agglutinative language than English, so something that requires as many as 3 or 4 words in English can be expressed with a single, long word in Swedish. e.g. “yrkeskompetensbevis” (certification of professional competency), or “lastbilsförare” (truck driver).