The Amorous Heart: An Unconventional History of Love

By Colleen Collins, Pamela Morsi, Karen Kendall, et al.

Book Overview

An eminent scholar unearths the captivating history of the two-lobed heart symbol from scripture and tapestry to T-shirts and text messages, shedding light on how we have expressed love since antiquity The symmetrical, exuberant heart is everywhere: it gives shape to candy, pendants, the frothy milk on top of a cappuccino, and much else. How can we explain the ubiquity of what might be the most recognizable symbol in the world? In The Amorous Heart , Marilyn Yalom tracks the heart metaphor and heart iconography across two thousand years, through Christian theology, pagan love poetry, medieval painting, Shakespearean drama, Enlightenment science, and into the present. She argues that the symbol reveals a tension between love as romantic and sexual on the one hand, and as religious and spiritual on the other. Ultimately, the heart symbol is a guide to the astonishing variety of human affections, from the erotic to the chaste and from the unrequited to the conjugal.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0373837283
• ISBN13: 9780373837281
• Release Date: October 2006
• Publisher: Harlequin Anthologies
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 4.2" x 6.6"