Burial is one of the universal institutions necessary for both an individual and an entire society to preserve the memory of the dead. Funeral rites, regulated in many cultural traditions, structure the emotions and behavior of not only the mourners, but also all those present. Olga Matic describes cemeteries not only as valuable sources of local history, but above all as art museums, exploring the architectural and sculptural features of individual monuments, funerary genres and their artistic specificity, reflecting the era: Baroque, neoclassicism, romanticism, modernism and so on. The book talks about the main Parisian cemeteries (Père Lachaise, Montparnasse, Montmartre and Passy), Moscow cemeteries (Donskoye, Novodevichye, Vvedenskoye and Vagankovskoye), as well as the emigrant cemetery of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois in the vicinity of Paris. Plots related to the cemetery as a social institution and an individual resting place are inserted by the author into the historical, cultural and political contexts of his time. Olga Matic is a literary and cultural critic, emeritus professor at the University of California at Berkeley.