A natural history of love /
Diane Ackerman.
- First Vintage Books edition.
- xxiii, 358 pages ; 21 cm
Originally published: New York : Random House, c1994.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 338-344) and index.
Introduction: Love's Vocabulary -- A Long Desire: The History of Love -- Egypt -- History's Paramour, the Serpent Queen -- Art in Ancient Egypt -- The Hieroglyphic Love Poems -- My Sister, My Bride -- A Long Desire -- Greece -- The World of the Citizen King -- The Woman's World -- Men Loving Men -- The Family -- Orpheus and Eurydice -- Rome -- The Nightmare of Girls -- Dido and Aeneas -- The Family -- Oh, Victoria! -- Ovid and the Art of Love -- Decorating Leisure Time -- The Middle Ages -- The Birth of Chivalry -- Books of Love -- Troubadours -- The Heart's Rebellion -- The Origins of Courtly Love -- Abelard and Heloise -- Modern Days -- The Angel and the Witch -- Romeo and Juliet -- Bridled Hearts -- A Waking Swoon -- A Return to Courtly Love -- Domestic Paradise -- Modern Love -- The Heart is a Lonely Hunter: Ideas About Love -- Plato: The Perfect Union -- Stendhal Meets the Deep South -- Denis de Rougemont: Love and Magic -- Marcel Proust and the Erotics of Waiting -- Freud: The Origins of Desire -- Attachment Theory -- All Fires the Fire: The Nature of Love -- The Loving Impaired -- Disabling Love -- The Horror of the Ik -- Brain-Stem Sonata: The Neurophysiology of Love -- The Evolution of Love -- The Plastic Brain -- New-Age Sensitive Guys -- Adultery -- The Battle of the Sexes -- The Chemistry of Love -- Mother Love, Father Love -- The Cuddle Chemical -- The Infatuation Chemical -- The Attachment Chemical -- The Chemistry of Divorce -- Aphrodisiacs -- A Necessary Passion: The Erotics of Love -- Fire from the Flesh: Why Sex Evolved -- The Spice of Life -- The Face -- The Evolution of the Face -- Survival of the Cutest -- Facing Our Biases -- The Hair -- Women and Horses -- Men and Cars -- The Indy 500 -- The Lightest Longing: Sex and Flying -- Wings over Africa -- Men and Mermaids -- Sexual Chic: Perversion as Fashion -- Kissing -- On the Sensuality of Looking -- Passing Strange and Wonderful: Love's Customs -- Patterns in Nature -- The Courtship -- Flesh of My Flesh: The Marriage -- Of Cocks and Cunts -- Love on the Edge: Adultery, Extravagant Gestures, and Crimes of Passion -- Points for a Compass Rose: Varieties of Love -- Altruism -- For the Love of Children: Interplast -- For the Love of Strangers: Life and Death in the South Seas -- On Religious Love -- On Transference Love -- On the Love of Pets -- Postscript: The Museum -- Selected Bibliography -- Index.
"The bestselling author of A Natural History of the Senses now explores the allure of adultery, the appeal of aphrodisiacs, and the cult of the kiss. Enchantingly written and stunningly informed, this "audaciously brilliant romp through the world of romantic love" (Washington Post Book World) is the next best thing to love itself."--Publisher description.