> >I am not being intentionally irreverant, but the movie Bill and
> >Ted's Bogus Journey is just the sort of thing your talking about.
> >Is there another example about someone dying and going on a quest
> >through the underworld? Any classics students out there?
Light Castle:
> Can't you make an argument for Dante's Inferno? Or, if not that, that
> Sci Fi version that came out in the 60s or 70s where a Sci Fi author
> goes to hell after he dies?
Dante hadn't died. The Divine Comedy starts 'Midway on this life we're bound upon' and there are several references in the story to the fact that his living body acts differently to the spirits he meets. IIRC the same is true of the Niven and Pournelle story.
The nearest classical story I can think of is that of Orpheus and Eurydice, where a living man has a chance to bring a spirit back from the underworld and blows it.
The nearest I can think of in modern SF is 'Passage' by Connie Willis, where a character dies and a chunk of the story is the character's experiences after death - but not in any known afterworld.
Or in fantasy, several of Terry Pratchett's books contain short passages about characters after their deaths. Very occasionally a powerful witch can get back to the world of the living, but otherwise the dead have no further effect in the world they've left except for occasional hauntings. The characters that pay extended visits to Death's home (including his apprentice) are again living beings.
Andrew
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