Customer Reviews

Married Love (Oxford World's Classics)

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Stopes declared that "Every heart desires a mate" and then goes at length to write an account of the problems of love in marriage, the institution intended to be the public icon of committed love. Yet she shows just how marriage can in fact be an obstacle to love. She feared that marriage, though an important part of a woman's desire, might just be the thing that ends a woman's intellectualism as soon as she is enslaved in it. It was a book written when society had barely cast off the chains of Victorian prudishness, and when people were still coy about discussing sex. It is an interesting book from a psycholical point of view. It was a personal account, in many ways, of a woman ahead of her times; but this account may no longer be of interest in modern times where sex is more common than love - which may not really represent a change from Stopes' days except that people now are more openly relaxed when talking about sex and the disappointment of love.

Initially I purchased this vintage marriage manual just for a hoot. As it turns out, this is the most honest and insightful examination of the relations between the sexes that I have ever read. The language is somewhat ornate, but Dr. Marie Stopes had it pretty well figured out way back in 1918. I don't know how such valuable wisdom has become lost.