The Bourgeois Experience: Tender Passion v. 2 (The Bourgeois Experience: Victoria to Freud) - Softcover

Gay, Peter

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0195051831 ISBN 13: 9780195051834

Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc, 1996

Synopsis

Education of the Senses, the first volume of Peter Gay's The Bourgeois Experience, was hailed as "a subtle, elegant, profound and prodigiously researched book" (Washington Post Book World), "the most learned, as well as the wittiest, survey of human sexuality ever to be published" (The New York Times). In this, the second volume, Gay continues his eloquent, psychoanalytically informed exploration of the lives of the Victorian middle classes. Whereas Education of the Senses focused on Victorians' sexual behavior and attitudes, The Tender Passion concentrates on their notions of love. Gay argues that, contrary to popular belief, Victorians were able to know love in its most exalted sense. "Freud was only summing up the current wisdom," he writes, "when he observed that 'a completely normal attitude in love' requires the uniting of 'two currents,' the 'tender and sensual.'"
Beginning with the stories of two young men, one English and one German, Gay proceeds to a wide-ranging inquiry into the ideal and real meaning of love for the Victorians. Based on a vast amount of material--including philosophical treatises, medical texts, letters, diaries, works of fiction, and art--the book explores such topics as homosexual love, class differences in the perception of love, and the diversion of love in music and religion. There are also fascinating insights into the lives of eminent 19th-century figures, including Dickens, Stendhal, Balzac, Wagner, and Beatrice Webb. A work of remarkable erudition and analytical sophistication, The Tender Passion is an impressive addition to "one of the major historical enterprises of the decade" (The New York Review of Books).

About this title

Review:

One of the major historical enterprises of the decade...an enterprise requiring a daring and breadth of knowledge possessed by few other contemporary historians, and one which [Gay] has carried to its term with inexhaustible energy and patience and an exuberance of spirit. -- New York Review of Books

Synopsis:

"The Tender Passion" continues Peter Gay's eloquent study of the Victorian middle classes. His first volume, "Education of the Senses" dealt with sexual attitudes: this new volume concentrates on notions of love. Gay argues that the Victorians were able not only to enjoy their sexuality, but to know love in its most exalted sense. He begins with a compelling analysis of the separate love stories of two young men, one English, one German, and proceeds from there to a wide-ranging enquiry into what love meant to the Victorians. He supports his argument with references to a vast body of material, from philosophical treatises to medical texts, from letters and diaries to works of fiction. The book abounds with fascinating insights into the lives and writings of individual Victorians: Dickens, Stendhal, Balzac, Wagner, Oscar Wilde, Beatrice Potter, and Sidney Webb among them.

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0195051831
• ISBN 13: 9780195051834
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 528