Staying Alive explores the desire to live forever, which manifests itself in many forms and forums. Many throughout history have measured their self worth by the metric of how they will stay alive: one wants fame, another needs children. One wants to leave behind a personalized legacy, another wants to leave behind the world and enjoy the bliss of heaven. The author's self-expressed "aim has been, simply, to write a readable book that will afford the reader an increased sensitivity to the many ways the desire for immortality has shaped history, philosophy, art, and literature." The thought that this analysis of human longing and culture provokes transcends any one way of approaching these disciplines. It searches for, and connects, deeply personal pursuits with greater collective trends.