By Linda S. Kauffman (NHC Fellow, 1983–84) Kauffman looks at a neglected genre–the love letter written by literary heroines. Tracing the development of the genre from Ovid to the twentieth-century novel, she explores the important implications of these amatory discourses for an understanding of fictive representation in general.
By Jean H. Hagstrum (NHC Fellow, 1985–86; 1986–87) A magisterial book by one of our most distinguished literary historians, Esteem Enlivened by Desire illuminates (and celebrates) the ideal of lasting love from antiquity to the high Renaissance. Love that leads to marriage is a relatively recent "invention," or so critics and historians often say. But in this … Continued
By Andrew Cayton (NHC Fellow, 2012–13) In 1798, English essayist and novelist William Godwin ignited a transatlantic scandal with Memoirs of the Author of "A Vindication of the Rights of Woman." Most controversial were the details of the romantic liaisons of Godwin's wife, Mary Wollstonecraft, with both American Gilbert Imlay and Godwin himself. Wollstonecraft's life and writings … Continued
By David M. Halperin (NHC Fellow, 1985–86) Halperin's subject is the erotics of male culture in ancient Greece. Arguing that the modern concept of "homosexuality" is an inadequate tool for the interpretation of these features of sexual life in antiquity, Halperin offers an alternative account that accords greater prominence to the indigenous terms in which … Continued
Edited by James H. Lesher (NHC Fellow, 2004–05), Debra Nails, and Frisbee C. C. Sheffield In his Symposium, Plato crafted a set of speeches in praise of love that has influenced writers and artists from antiquity to the present. Early Christian writers read the dialogue’s “ascent passage” as a vision of the soul’s journey to heaven. … Continued
By Toril Moi (NHC Fellow, 1994–95)
Edited and translated by Martha Ann Selby (NHC Fellow, 2010–11) Dating from the early decades of the third century C.E., the Ainkurunuru is believed to be the world's earliest anthology of classical Tamil love poetry. Commissioned by a Cera-dynasty king and composed by five masterful poets, the anthology illustrates the five landscapes of reciprocal love: … Continued
Edited by Robert R. Edwards (NHC Fellow, 1985–86) and Stephen Spector (NHC Fellow, 1985–86) In this volume a variety of perspectives reevaluate the nature of friendship, desire, and the olde daunce of love in the Middle Ages. Challenging earlier scholarly notions about medieval marriage, this book suggests and explores the legitimacy of marital friendship, affection, and mutuality. … Continued
By Jean H. Hagstrum (NHC Fellow, 1985–86; 1986–87)
Edited by Susan Wolf (Trustee; NHC Fellow, 2012–13) and Christopher Grau