Married Love or Love in Marriage (Mint Editions (Visibility for Disability, Health and Wellness)) - Softcover

Stopes, Marie

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1513223089 ISBN 13: 9781513223087

Publisher: Mint Editions, 2021

Synopsis

Married Love or Love in Marriage (1918) is a book on reproductive health by Marie Stopes. Banned in the US and scorned by the British establishment, Married Love or Love in Marriage was controversial for its openness regarding sex and the use of contraceptives between husbands and wives. While relatively conservative by today’s standards, the pioneering work was an essential, bestselling book that guided generations of men and woman on how to nurture happy, healthy sexual relationships without increasing the stresses of motherhood and everyday life. "More than ever to-day are happy homes needed. It is my hope that this book may serve the State by adding to their number. Its object is to increase the joys of marriage, and to show how much sorrow may be avoided." Working with this goal in mind, Marie Stopes set out to rewrite the rulebook on sexual relationships between married men and women. Published the same year that she opened the first birth control clinic in the United Kingdom, Married Love or Love in Marriage pursued the thesis that desire and happiness could be nurtured within the home between a husband and wife by educating men and women on the use of contraceptives. An immediate bestseller, Stopes’ work marked a seismic shift in discourse on women’s reproductive health, paving the way for many of the reforms and attitudes some take for granted today. Risking her reputation and leaving behind a successful career in paleobotany, Stopes dedicated herself to the rights of women in England and around the world, for whom the burden of motherhood often proved not only limiting, but detrimental to their physical and mental health. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Marie Stopes’ Married Love or Love in Marriage is a classic of British scientific literature reimagined for modern readers.

About this title

About the Author

Marie Stopes (1880-1958) was a British author, activist, eugenicist, and paleobotanist. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, Stopes was the daughter of Henry Stopes, a paleontologist, and Charlotte Carmichael Stopes, a women’s rights activist and Shakespearean scholar. Raised in London, she attended meetings of the British Association for the Advancement of Science from a young age, eventually enrolling at University College London to study botany and geology. In 1902, the year of her graduation, she began working with Dr. Francis Oliver as a research assistant. After participating in a groundbreaking discovery of fossil specimens containing intact fern fronds and seeds, Stopes completed her D. Sc., making her the youngest Briton in history to attain the degree. Her own research focused on Carboniferous coal balls from throughout different geological eras, but she eventually turned away from paleobotany to focus on the issue of birth control. In 1913, after meeting Margaret Sanger, and spurred on by her impending divorce, Stopes published Married Love or Love in Marriage, a guide for couples intended to promote birth control and foster healthy sexual relationships. Working with husband Humphrey Roe, Stopes founded the first birth control clinic in Britain in 1921, offering free services for married women in need of contraceptives and sexual education. Like many of her contemporaries, Stopes opposed abortion and was an ardent supporter of eugenics, even entrusting her clinic to the Eugenics Society after her death from breast cancer at the age of 77.

From the Back Cover

In the early twentieth century, the topic of contraception was barely discussed in an academic setting, let alone in the private homes of married couples. Into this relative void, Marie Stopes bravely offered her controversial Married Love or Love in Marriage, a guidebook promoting marital sex while advocating for the use of contraceptives in the home.

Edition details

• Publisher: Mint Editions
• Publication date: 2021
• ISBN 10: 1513223089
• ISBN 13: 9781513223087
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 104