Summary Of Whither Thou Goest

What truly identifies the “spirit” of an individual? Is it the way someone acts, their heart, their mind, or a more divine related explanation? Whither Thou Goest, by Richard Selzer, is a story about a woman named Hannah whose husband is killed and she decides to donate his organs. At the beginning of the story she believes that there is no issue with donating her husband’s organs because she is convinced that his body has no sentimental link to who he was. However, as the story goes on, she begins to rethink this and believes that the only way to move on with her life is to hear her husband’s heartbeat. An important underlying message that is hidden in this story is that one’s “spirit” is identified through the heart. One could disagree with this hidden message for multiple reasons.

In the story, Hannah begins to believe that even though her husband’s heart is inside of another person, it is still connected to her husband. Selzer shows that Hannah believes this when he states, ““That way your husband will not really have died” he had said. And that she had said to him, “Dead is dead,” but that now she was not sure” (p. 232). Scientifically speaking, this is irrational due to the fact of consciousness being housed in the brain of a human and not the heart. Therefore, making her claim to the heart being possibly connected to her husband after being removed from the body is