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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"LOVE IS THE GREAT INTANGIBLE.......", May 10, 2005
This review is from: A Natural History Of Love (Paperback)
Lorenz Hart wrote, "I wish I were in love again." "Let's do it, let's fall in love," advised Cole Porter. No other subject has inspired as many songs, poems, books or plays as ever appealing, sometimes elusive love. And here is Diane Ackerman to tell us all about it.
"Love is the great intangible" is the way this volume begins, and it is equally unfathomable after we finish reading, but there's much information and great good fun in between. Beginning with the history of love in ancient Egypt through Rome, the Middle Ages and up to the present, the author explores the historical, cultural and biological roots of that which makes the world go round.
Rich with insights into traditions and little known facts, "Love's Customs" may well be one of the most fascinating chapters. For instance, it was the medieval Italians who favored diamond rings because "of their superstition that diamonds were created from the flames of love." Soldiers of ancient Sparta hosted the first stag parties. The white wedding dress was first won by Anne of Brittany in 1499 when she married Louis XII of France. Both bride and groom wore a blue band around the bottom of their wedding garments in biblical times, which is where the idea of the bride's "something blue" originated.
"A Natural History of Love" is a rare literary work in that it is both a well researched scholarly text, terrific reading, and offers an insight that probably applies to each one of us.
- Gail Cooke
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Counting the ways of the heart., November 7, 2003
"We have the great fortune to live on a planet abounding with humans, plants, and animals," poet Diane Ackerman (A NATURAL HISTORY OF THE SENSES, 1990), writes in her Introduction to this book; "and I often marvel at the strange tasks evolution sets them. Of all the errands life seems to be running, of all the mysteries that enchant us, love is my favorite" (p. xxiii). Once again demonstrating her talent for blending the disciplines of history, anthropology, psychology, literature and natural science, Ackerman turns her attention here to the subject of love, "the great intangible" (p. xvii). In counting the ways of the heart, she reveals through a historical survey of Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Middle Ages, and Modern times that our attitudes about love are truly as old as the pyramids, and she also examines the evolution, psychology, and chemistry of love, the differences between men and women when it comes to love, monogamy and adultery, love-thwarted attachments, and aphrodisiacs and eroticism. While it may not live up to the standard Ackerman set in A NATURAL HISTORY OF THE SENSES, in addressing what it means to love from a variety of different perspectives, this book is nevertheless quite fascinating. G. Merritt
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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A true treasure & a staple of your library, April 8, 2002
This review is from: A Natural History Of Love (Paperback)
This book is amazing. If you haven't read Ackerman before, I suggest starting with _A Natural History of the Senses_. Then read this book. Ackerman is a very talented writer. Even if the subject isn't entirely interesting, her words and their rhythms are. This subject, however, is very interesting. Ackerman muses on myths (such as Dido) and history (such as Napoleon and Josephine), but also explores instincts and preferences (why women love horses and the influence of pheromones). This book is romantic, historical, sexual, poetic, challenging, and completely beautiful.
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