Sudhir Kakar and John Munder Ross
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198072560
- eISBN:
- 9780199082124
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198072560.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
First published in 1986, this ground-breaking work addresses two complex and very human emotions—love and erotic passion—as these appear in the great love stories of the world. Starting with the ...
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First published in 1986, this ground-breaking work addresses two complex and very human emotions—love and erotic passion—as these appear in the great love stories of the world. Starting with the story of Romeo and Juliet and its roots in European Christianity, the authors uncover hidden depths of cultural and universal significance in famous romantic tales of the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent—‘Layla and Majnun’, ‘Heer and Ranjha’, ‘Sohni and Mahinwal’, ‘Vis and Ramin’, and ‘Radha and Krishna’. Moving westward again, the authors look at the Greek myth of Oedipus, the Celtic saga of Tristan and Isolde, the tragic drama of Hamlet, the legend of Phaedra and Hippolytus, and a contemporary handling of the love theme in the writings of Vladimir Nabokov. With each love story including within its gambit all of love’s paradoxical associations and radii—from conquest and possession to surrender, sensuality and sensuousness, time held still in a poised nostalgia, and the loss of visual, distal perceptions in another mode of knowing—this book elaborates on the phenomenology and what it calls the ontogeny of love, sex, and danger. In this second edition, the authors revisit their earlier assertions about romantic and erotic love in the light of contemporary psychoanalysis and literary theory.Less
First published in 1986, this ground-breaking work addresses two complex and very human emotions—love and erotic passion—as these appear in the great love stories of the world. Starting with the story of Romeo and Juliet and its roots in European Christianity, the authors uncover hidden depths of cultural and universal significance in famous romantic tales of the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent—‘Layla and Majnun’, ‘Heer and Ranjha’, ‘Sohni and Mahinwal’, ‘Vis and Ramin’, and ‘Radha and Krishna’. Moving westward again, the authors look at the Greek myth of Oedipus, the Celtic saga of Tristan and Isolde, the tragic drama of Hamlet, the legend of Phaedra and Hippolytus, and a contemporary handling of the love theme in the writings of Vladimir Nabokov. With each love story including within its gambit all of love’s paradoxical associations and radii—from conquest and possession to surrender, sensuality and sensuousness, time held still in a poised nostalgia, and the loss of visual, distal perceptions in another mode of knowing—this book elaborates on the phenomenology and what it calls the ontogeny of love, sex, and danger. In this second edition, the authors revisit their earlier assertions about romantic and erotic love in the light of contemporary psychoanalysis and literary theory.
Roger Scruton
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195166910
- eISBN:
- 9780199863938
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195166910.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Opera
A tale of forbidden love and inevitable death, the medieval legend of Tristan und Isolde recounts the story of two lovers unknowingly drinking a magic potion and ultimately dying in one another's ...
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A tale of forbidden love and inevitable death, the medieval legend of Tristan und Isolde recounts the story of two lovers unknowingly drinking a magic potion and ultimately dying in one another's arms. While critics have lauded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde for the originality and subtlety of the music, they have denounced the drama as a “mere trifle”—a rendering of Wagner's forbidden love for Matilde Wesendonck, the wife of a banker who supported him during his exile in Switzerland. The book explodes this established interpretation, proving the drama to be more than just a sublimation of the composer's love for Wesendonck or a wistful romantic dream. It attests that Tristan and Isolde has profound religious meaning and remains as relevant today as it was to Wagner's contemporaries, offering also a keen insight into the nature of erotic love, the sacred qualities of human passion, and the peculiar place of the erotic in our culture. It is an argument which touches on the nature of tragedy, the significance of ritual sacrifice, and the meaning of redemption, providing a fresh interpretation of Wagner's masterpiece. This account of Wagner's music drama blends philosophy, criticism, and musicology in order to show the work's importance in the 21st century.Less
A tale of forbidden love and inevitable death, the medieval legend of Tristan und Isolde recounts the story of two lovers unknowingly drinking a magic potion and ultimately dying in one another's arms. While critics have lauded Wagner's Tristan und Isolde for the originality and subtlety of the music, they have denounced the drama as a “mere trifle”—a rendering of Wagner's forbidden love for Matilde Wesendonck, the wife of a banker who supported him during his exile in Switzerland. The book explodes this established interpretation, proving the drama to be more than just a sublimation of the composer's love for Wesendonck or a wistful romantic dream. It attests that Tristan and Isolde has profound religious meaning and remains as relevant today as it was to Wagner's contemporaries, offering also a keen insight into the nature of erotic love, the sacred qualities of human passion, and the peculiar place of the erotic in our culture. It is an argument which touches on the nature of tragedy, the significance of ritual sacrifice, and the meaning of redemption, providing a fresh interpretation of Wagner's masterpiece. This account of Wagner's music drama blends philosophy, criticism, and musicology in order to show the work's importance in the 21st century.
Robert C. Solomon
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195134674
- eISBN:
- 9780199833733
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195134672.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion
For most of my life, I have been dismissive of both spirituality and religion. I say this to make clear the perspective and the starting point of this book, this search. No doubt, many of my readers ...
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For most of my life, I have been dismissive of both spirituality and religion. I say this to make clear the perspective and the starting point of this book, this search. No doubt, many of my readers will think of me as simpleminded, trying to recover what I should have learned had I been rightly raised in the matrix of religion, ritual, and belief. Others, my friends from the field of science and most of my political friends, will think that I am benighted, or perhaps something of a sell out, for giving up my lifelong down‐to‐earth scientific, and admittedly hyperrational way of thinking about things. But if the very idea of spirituality seemed to me to be contaminated by sectarian religion and by uncritical and antiscientific thinking, my view of life, which manifested in my becoming a philosopher (it did not come from philosophy) pointed to something else. Spirituality is not just organized religion. Nor is it antiscience, unnatural or supernatural. There is a naturalized spirituality that I have always had a glimpse of, and this is what I want to pursue in this book.Less
For most of my life, I have been dismissive of both spirituality and religion. I say this to make clear the perspective and the starting point of this book, this search. No doubt, many of my readers will think of me as simpleminded, trying to recover what I should have learned had I been rightly raised in the matrix of religion, ritual, and belief. Others, my friends from the field of science and most of my political friends, will think that I am benighted, or perhaps something of a sell out, for giving up my lifelong down‐to‐earth scientific, and admittedly hyperrational way of thinking about things. But if the very idea of spirituality seemed to me to be contaminated by sectarian religion and by uncritical and antiscientific thinking, my view of life, which manifested in my becoming a philosopher (it did not come from philosophy) pointed to something else. Spirituality is not just organized religion. Nor is it antiscience, unnatural or supernatural. There is a naturalized spirituality that I have always had a glimpse of, and this is what I want to pursue in this book.
Paul Dundas
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195306316
- eISBN:
- 9780199867721
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195306316.003.0010
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
Celibacy was integral to the Jain ascetic because it protected the soul from the harm associated with passion connected to sexual activity, and it was directly connected to the practice of ...
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Celibacy was integral to the Jain ascetic because it protected the soul from the harm associated with passion connected to sexual activity, and it was directly connected to the practice of nonviolence. Women as sources of temptation and the connection between food and erotic desire are also considered as threats to the soul.Less
Celibacy was integral to the Jain ascetic because it protected the soul from the harm associated with passion connected to sexual activity, and it was directly connected to the practice of nonviolence. Women as sources of temptation and the connection between food and erotic desire are also considered as threats to the soul.
Fatemeh Keshavarz
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780748696925
- eISBN:
- 9781474408608
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748696925.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
Lyrics of Life: Sa’di on Love, Cosmopolitanism, and care of the Self is an accessible study of the lyrical, humorous, and social and education aspects of classical Persian poetry through the ghazals ...
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Lyrics of Life: Sa’di on Love, Cosmopolitanism, and care of the Self is an accessible study of the lyrical, humorous, and social and education aspects of classical Persian poetry through the ghazals of Sa’di of Shiraz (d.1291) the poet, traveller, and ethicist. In six chapters and on epilogue, the author focuses on Sa’di’s worldly wisdom, his cosmopolitan perspectives, his sense of humour, his ethical legacy, and the lyrical quality that has made his work immune to the ravishes of time. The study provides hundreds of verses in English translation in order to enable the reader to experience Sa’di’s poetic art first hand. The discussions emphasize the relation between this poetry and lived experience, the central communicative role of poetry in the medieval Muslim world and the elegance of the poetic language as a social tool for ethical and political education. At the same time, it describes, in fine details, the lyrical strategies that the poet used in order to keep his poetry fresh, lyrical, humorous and entertaining.Less
Lyrics of Life: Sa’di on Love, Cosmopolitanism, and care of the Self is an accessible study of the lyrical, humorous, and social and education aspects of classical Persian poetry through the ghazals of Sa’di of Shiraz (d.1291) the poet, traveller, and ethicist. In six chapters and on epilogue, the author focuses on Sa’di’s worldly wisdom, his cosmopolitan perspectives, his sense of humour, his ethical legacy, and the lyrical quality that has made his work immune to the ravishes of time. The study provides hundreds of verses in English translation in order to enable the reader to experience Sa’di’s poetic art first hand. The discussions emphasize the relation between this poetry and lived experience, the central communicative role of poetry in the medieval Muslim world and the elegance of the poetic language as a social tool for ethical and political education. At the same time, it describes, in fine details, the lyrical strategies that the poet used in order to keep his poetry fresh, lyrical, humorous and entertaining.
Richard Sorabji
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- May 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199256600
- eISBN:
- 9780191712609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199256600.003.0019
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
In ancient philosophy, sex, being in love (erôs), marriage, and rearing children each got advocated in separation from the others. Moreover, a good form of erôs got distinguished from one or two bad ...
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In ancient philosophy, sex, being in love (erôs), marriage, and rearing children each got advocated in separation from the others. Moreover, a good form of erôs got distinguished from one or two bad forms, most influentially by Plato's Socrates. The Stoics agree and so are able to advocate a good form of erôs as not emotional, namely being led by beauty to make friends in order to inculcate virtue. The Epicureans are against erôs and in most circumstances against marriage. Sex would be alright as a palliative, if it did not lead to illusion, harm, and pain, so casual sex is better. Among the Neoplatonists, Porphyry wants the philosopher to avoid anything that might even arouse sexual desire, but Iamblichus rebukes him: erotic rituals for ordinary people provide Aristotelian catharsis.Less
In ancient philosophy, sex, being in love (erôs), marriage, and rearing children each got advocated in separation from the others. Moreover, a good form of erôs got distinguished from one or two bad forms, most influentially by Plato's Socrates. The Stoics agree and so are able to advocate a good form of erôs as not emotional, namely being led by beauty to make friends in order to inculcate virtue. The Epicureans are against erôs and in most circumstances against marriage. Sex would be alright as a palliative, if it did not lead to illusion, harm, and pain, so casual sex is better. Among the Neoplatonists, Porphyry wants the philosopher to avoid anything that might even arouse sexual desire, but Iamblichus rebukes him: erotic rituals for ordinary people provide Aristotelian catharsis.
Derek B. Scott
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195151961
- eISBN:
- 9780199870394
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195151961.003.0002
- Subject:
- Music, Theory, Analysis, Composition
This chapter examines some of the conventions involved in representing the erotic in music, and reveals the ideological character of these conventions. The disparity and mutability uncovered by a ...
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This chapter examines some of the conventions involved in representing the erotic in music, and reveals the ideological character of these conventions. The disparity and mutability uncovered by a comparison of representations of sexual desire in three differing musical styles (Baroque opera, the Victorian drawing-room ballad, and Tin Pan Alley in the 1920s and 1930s) show that a genealogy of sexuality in music needs to address disjunctions rather than developments, historical contingencies rather than evolutionary questions. There is certainly no progress to be discovered in the way eroticism has been depicted in music: representations of eroticism in contemporary music are not more real now than they were in the 17th century. The fact that the latter can seem cool or alien to us today points to the way sexuality has been constructed in relation to particular stylistic codes in particular historical contexts, and is therefore cultural rather than natural.Less
This chapter examines some of the conventions involved in representing the erotic in music, and reveals the ideological character of these conventions. The disparity and mutability uncovered by a comparison of representations of sexual desire in three differing musical styles (Baroque opera, the Victorian drawing-room ballad, and Tin Pan Alley in the 1920s and 1930s) show that a genealogy of sexuality in music needs to address disjunctions rather than developments, historical contingencies rather than evolutionary questions. There is certainly no progress to be discovered in the way eroticism has been depicted in music: representations of eroticism in contemporary music are not more real now than they were in the 17th century. The fact that the latter can seem cool or alien to us today points to the way sexuality has been constructed in relation to particular stylistic codes in particular historical contexts, and is therefore cultural rather than natural.
John Casey
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195092950
- eISBN:
- 9780199869732
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195092950.003.0016
- Subject:
- Religion, World Religions
Swedenborg aims vividly to describe his encounters with angels in the various “heavens” he claims to have visited. His heavens and hells might be called “real,” in that they correspond to ...
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Swedenborg aims vividly to describe his encounters with angels in the various “heavens” he claims to have visited. His heavens and hells might be called “real,” in that they correspond to psychological states. Swedenborg has been called the inventor of the modern heaven. The human soul contains powers and possibilities that accord with the Romantic doctrine of man as microcosm of the universe. There is an affinity of mystics such as Blake with Swedenborg. Heaven is not a reward for goodness, or hell a punishment for evil. In so far as we are good and filled with love, we are in heaven. Swedenborg's heaven is not God‐centered. There is no place for original sin in his philosophy, or for the ascetic. His is an optimistic vision, thoroughly Pelagian. Marriage and the erotic—even in heaven—is at the center of his thought, with an emphasis on “conjugial” love.Less
Swedenborg aims vividly to describe his encounters with angels in the various “heavens” he claims to have visited. His heavens and hells might be called “real,” in that they correspond to psychological states. Swedenborg has been called the inventor of the modern heaven. The human soul contains powers and possibilities that accord with the Romantic doctrine of man as microcosm of the universe. There is an affinity of mystics such as Blake with Swedenborg. Heaven is not a reward for goodness, or hell a punishment for evil. In so far as we are good and filled with love, we are in heaven. Swedenborg's heaven is not God‐centered. There is no place for original sin in his philosophy, or for the ascetic. His is an optimistic vision, thoroughly Pelagian. Marriage and the erotic—even in heaven—is at the center of his thought, with an emphasis on “conjugial” love.
Frida Beckman (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748642618
- eISBN:
- 9780748671755
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748642618.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Political Philosophy
For Deleuze, sexuality is a force that can capture as well as liberate life. Its flows tend to be repressed and contained in specific forms while at the same time they retain revolutionary potential. ...
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For Deleuze, sexuality is a force that can capture as well as liberate life. Its flows tend to be repressed and contained in specific forms while at the same time they retain revolutionary potential. There is immense power in the thousand sexes of desiring-machines, and sexuality is seen as a source of becoming. This book gathers prominent Deleuze scholars to explore the restricting and liberating forces of sexuality in relation to a spread of central themes in Deleuze's philosophy, including politics, psychoanalysis and friendship as well as specific topics such as the body-machine, disability, feminism and erotics.Less
For Deleuze, sexuality is a force that can capture as well as liberate life. Its flows tend to be repressed and contained in specific forms while at the same time they retain revolutionary potential. There is immense power in the thousand sexes of desiring-machines, and sexuality is seen as a source of becoming. This book gathers prominent Deleuze scholars to explore the restricting and liberating forces of sexuality in relation to a spread of central themes in Deleuze's philosophy, including politics, psychoanalysis and friendship as well as specific topics such as the body-machine, disability, feminism and erotics.
Diane Mason
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719077142
- eISBN:
- 9781781701089
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719077142.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
This book provides a reading of both fictional and medical writings concerned with auto-erotic sexuality in the long nineteenth century. It examines the discourse on masturbation in medical works by ...
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This book provides a reading of both fictional and medical writings concerned with auto-erotic sexuality in the long nineteenth century. It examines the discourse on masturbation in medical works by influential English, Continental and American practitioners such as J. H. Kellogg, E. B. Foote, Havelock Ellis, Krafft-Ebing and R. V. Pierce, as well as a number of anonymously authored texts popular in the period. The book demonstrates the influence and impact of these writings, not only on the underworld literatures of Victorian pornography but also in the creation of well-known characters by authors now regarded as canonical including Dean Farrar, J. S. Le Fanu, Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde and Bram Stoker. It is not merely a consideration of the male masturbator however: it presents a study of the largely overlooked literature on female masturbation in both clinical and popular medical works aimed at the female reader, as well as in fiction. The book concludes with a consideration of the way the distinctly Victorian discourse on masturbation has persisted into the late-twentieth and twenty-first centuries with particular reference to Willy Russell's tragic-comic novel, The Wrong Boy (2000) and to the construction of ‘Victorian Dad’, a character featured in the adult comic, Viz.Less
This book provides a reading of both fictional and medical writings concerned with auto-erotic sexuality in the long nineteenth century. It examines the discourse on masturbation in medical works by influential English, Continental and American practitioners such as J. H. Kellogg, E. B. Foote, Havelock Ellis, Krafft-Ebing and R. V. Pierce, as well as a number of anonymously authored texts popular in the period. The book demonstrates the influence and impact of these writings, not only on the underworld literatures of Victorian pornography but also in the creation of well-known characters by authors now regarded as canonical including Dean Farrar, J. S. Le Fanu, Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde and Bram Stoker. It is not merely a consideration of the male masturbator however: it presents a study of the largely overlooked literature on female masturbation in both clinical and popular medical works aimed at the female reader, as well as in fiction. The book concludes with a consideration of the way the distinctly Victorian discourse on masturbation has persisted into the late-twentieth and twenty-first centuries with particular reference to Willy Russell's tragic-comic novel, The Wrong Boy (2000) and to the construction of ‘Victorian Dad’, a character featured in the adult comic, Viz.
Anna Powell
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748632824
- eISBN:
- 9780748651139
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748632824.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book offers a typology of altered states, defining dream, hallucination, memory, trance and ecstasy in their cinematic expression, and presenting altered states films as significant ...
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This book offers a typology of altered states, defining dream, hallucination, memory, trance and ecstasy in their cinematic expression, and presenting altered states films as significant neurological, psychological and philosophical experiences. Chapters engage with films that simultaneously present and induce altered consciousness, and consider dream states and the popularisation of alterity in drugs films. The altered bodies of erotic arousal and trance states are explored, using haptics and synaesthesia. Cinematic distortions of space and time, as well as new digital and fractal directions, are opened up. The text's distinctive re-mapping of the film experience as altered state uses a Deleuzian approach to explore how cinema alters us by ‘affective contamination’. Arguing that specific cinematic techniques derange the senses and the mind, the author makes an assemblage of philosophy and art, counter-cultural writers and filmmakers to provide insights into the cinematic event as intoxication. The book applies Deleuze, alone and with Guattari, to mainstream films such as Donnie Darko, as well as arthouse and experimental cinema. Offering innovative readings of ‘classic’ altered states movies such as 2001, Performance and Easy Rider, it includes ‘avant-garde’ and ‘underground’ work. The book asserts the Deleuzian approach as itself a kind of altered state that explodes habitual ways of thinking and feeling.Less
This book offers a typology of altered states, defining dream, hallucination, memory, trance and ecstasy in their cinematic expression, and presenting altered states films as significant neurological, psychological and philosophical experiences. Chapters engage with films that simultaneously present and induce altered consciousness, and consider dream states and the popularisation of alterity in drugs films. The altered bodies of erotic arousal and trance states are explored, using haptics and synaesthesia. Cinematic distortions of space and time, as well as new digital and fractal directions, are opened up. The text's distinctive re-mapping of the film experience as altered state uses a Deleuzian approach to explore how cinema alters us by ‘affective contamination’. Arguing that specific cinematic techniques derange the senses and the mind, the author makes an assemblage of philosophy and art, counter-cultural writers and filmmakers to provide insights into the cinematic event as intoxication. The book applies Deleuze, alone and with Guattari, to mainstream films such as Donnie Darko, as well as arthouse and experimental cinema. Offering innovative readings of ‘classic’ altered states movies such as 2001, Performance and Easy Rider, it includes ‘avant-garde’ and ‘underground’ work. The book asserts the Deleuzian approach as itself a kind of altered state that explodes habitual ways of thinking and feeling.
M. Jamie Ferreira
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195130256
- eISBN:
- 9780199834181
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195130251.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
The sharp distinction between preferential love (erotic love and friendship) and love of one's neighbor (agape) is mitigated by the claim that neighbor‐love should be preserved in erotic love and ...
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The sharp distinction between preferential love (erotic love and friendship) and love of one's neighbor (agape) is mitigated by the claim that neighbor‐love should be preserved in erotic love and friendship. Neighbor‐love is a commitment to equality, which involves a kind of moral blindness, and is best understood, in comparison with the ethics of Emmanuel Levinas, as responsibility to others.Less
The sharp distinction between preferential love (erotic love and friendship) and love of one's neighbor (agape) is mitigated by the claim that neighbor‐love should be preserved in erotic love and friendship. Neighbor‐love is a commitment to equality, which involves a kind of moral blindness, and is best understood, in comparison with the ethics of Emmanuel Levinas, as responsibility to others.
Sanjay K. Gautam
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780226348308
- eISBN:
- 9780226348582
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226348582.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
This book is an historical exploration into the origins of the the Kāmasūtra, a treatise on sexual-erotic pleasure, and the Nātyaśāstra, a treatise on theater, music, dance, and aesthetic pleasure in ...
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This book is an historical exploration into the origins of the the Kāmasūtra, a treatise on sexual-erotic pleasure, and the Nātyaśāstra, a treatise on theater, music, dance, and aesthetic pleasure in classical India in engagement with Michel Foucault. It argues that the courtesan together with her two closest male companions, her patron the dandy consort, and her teacher and advisor the dandy guru were at the very origins of these texts universally recognized as two of the mainsprings of culture in classical India. The courtesan, more than her two male associates, embodied in her singular persona the highest and grandest symbols of both erotic and aesthetic pleasure. She holds the historical key to the secrets of how erotics and aesthetics came to be so deeply and abidingly intertwined in classical India. The book takes its start form the contrast between ars erotica or erotic arts and scientia sexualis or the science of sexuality that Foucault placed at the center of his first volume of the History of Sexuality. The Kāmasūtra and its twin, the Natyasastra, are located within the intellectual horizon opened up by this contrast. The book argues that contrary to the common assumption that the discourse erotic-aesthetic pleasure (Kāma) failed to give birth to a larger vision of society, in the Kāmasūtra there is embedded a vision of the city based on art and aesthetic pleasure grounded in love as the necessary historical condition for the possibility of a discourse of erotics.Less
This book is an historical exploration into the origins of the the Kāmasūtra, a treatise on sexual-erotic pleasure, and the Nātyaśāstra, a treatise on theater, music, dance, and aesthetic pleasure in classical India in engagement with Michel Foucault. It argues that the courtesan together with her two closest male companions, her patron the dandy consort, and her teacher and advisor the dandy guru were at the very origins of these texts universally recognized as two of the mainsprings of culture in classical India. The courtesan, more than her two male associates, embodied in her singular persona the highest and grandest symbols of both erotic and aesthetic pleasure. She holds the historical key to the secrets of how erotics and aesthetics came to be so deeply and abidingly intertwined in classical India. The book takes its start form the contrast between ars erotica or erotic arts and scientia sexualis or the science of sexuality that Foucault placed at the center of his first volume of the History of Sexuality. The Kāmasūtra and its twin, the Natyasastra, are located within the intellectual horizon opened up by this contrast. The book argues that contrary to the common assumption that the discourse erotic-aesthetic pleasure (Kāma) failed to give birth to a larger vision of society, in the Kāmasūtra there is embedded a vision of the city based on art and aesthetic pleasure grounded in love as the necessary historical condition for the possibility of a discourse of erotics.
Steven Paul Hopkins
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195127355
- eISBN:
- 9780199834327
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195127358.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
Chapter Five considers an example of Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit style by way of his dhyåna‐stotra modelled after the Tamil poem of the Untouchable saint‐poet Tiruppåïåôvår. It focuses on a particular ...
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Chapter Five considers an example of Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit style by way of his dhyåna‐stotra modelled after the Tamil poem of the Untouchable saint‐poet Tiruppåïåôvår. It focuses on a particular type of poetic writing in Tamil and in Sanskrit, the pådådikeóa anubhava or “limb‐by‐limb” “enjoyment” of the body of God, with related examples from Kålidåsa, the gadyas of Råmånuja and Tantra texts. This focus on the anubhava reveals another facet of Deóika's devotional poetics, from the Sanskrit side, and shows more concretely how his poetic voice compares with that of an Çôvår. The anubhava also reveals the cultic context of so many of Vedåntadeóika's poems: here you have a supreme example of the temple icon viewed devotionally as the living “body of god,” and the successive descriptive form of the poem as a kind of “icon of an icon.” Along with an analysis of these poems, exploration of the themes of bhakti as kåma (desire, passion) and the erotics of “double‐entendre” (óleóålaõkåra), the chapter takes a close look at some commentarial texts, both on Vedåntadeóika and by Vedåntadeóika himself on Tiruppåï's poem.Less
Chapter Five considers an example of Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit style by way of his dhyåna‐stotra modelled after the Tamil poem of the Untouchable saint‐poet Tiruppåïåôvår. It focuses on a particular type of poetic writing in Tamil and in Sanskrit, the pådådikeóa anubhava or “limb‐by‐limb” “enjoyment” of the body of God, with related examples from Kålidåsa, the gadyas of Råmånuja and Tantra texts. This focus on the anubhava reveals another facet of Deóika's devotional poetics, from the Sanskrit side, and shows more concretely how his poetic voice compares with that of an Çôvår. The anubhava also reveals the cultic context of so many of Vedåntadeóika's poems: here you have a supreme example of the temple icon viewed devotionally as the living “body of god,” and the successive descriptive form of the poem as a kind of “icon of an icon.” Along with an analysis of these poems, exploration of the themes of bhakti as kåma (desire, passion) and the erotics of “double‐entendre” (óleóålaõkåra), the chapter takes a close look at some commentarial texts, both on Vedåntadeóika and by Vedåntadeóika himself on Tiruppåï's poem.
Steven Paul Hopkins
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195127355
- eISBN:
- 9780199834327
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195127358.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
After recalling themes of “emotional” bhakti in the Tamil poems for Devanåyaka at Tiruvahândrapuram, Chapter Seven is a close reading of selected passages from Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit and Måhåråóìrâ ...
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After recalling themes of “emotional” bhakti in the Tamil poems for Devanåyaka at Tiruvahândrapuram, Chapter Seven is a close reading of selected passages from Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit and Måhåråóìrâ Pråkrit poems to Devanåyaka, the Devanåyakapañcåóat and the Acyutaóatakam, respectively. We see in these Sanskrit and Pråkrit poems for Devanåyaka what we saw in his Tamil poems for the same god: how creatively Deóika transforms the resources of a secular poetics of love — in this case, the many valences of óãígåra rasa, or the aesthetic experience of the erotic — into hymns praising the beautiful body of god. This chapter's close reading also provides a recapitulation of the main themes of the book, including the theology of place and the “real presence” of Vishnu in the shrine and icon, the anubhava as “verbal icon” of the body of the god, the erotics of bathing, surrender (prapatti) and “worthlessness” (akiñcanatvam), salvific beauty, and the linking of the “emotional” and “intellectual” in Vedåntadeóika's bhakti poetics.Less
After recalling themes of “emotional” bhakti in the Tamil poems for Devanåyaka at Tiruvahândrapuram, Chapter Seven is a close reading of selected passages from Vedåntadeóika's Sanskrit and Måhåråóìrâ Pråkrit poems to Devanåyaka, the Devanåyakapañcåóat and the Acyutaóatakam, respectively. We see in these Sanskrit and Pråkrit poems for Devanåyaka what we saw in his Tamil poems for the same god: how creatively Deóika transforms the resources of a secular poetics of love — in this case, the many valences of óãígåra rasa, or the aesthetic experience of the erotic — into hymns praising the beautiful body of god. This chapter's close reading also provides a recapitulation of the main themes of the book, including the theology of place and the “real presence” of Vishnu in the shrine and icon, the anubhava as “verbal icon” of the body of the god, the erotics of bathing, surrender (prapatti) and “worthlessness” (akiñcanatvam), salvific beauty, and the linking of the “emotional” and “intellectual” in Vedåntadeóika's bhakti poetics.
Frank Graziano
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195136401
- eISBN:
- 9780199835164
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195136403.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
The practices of and circumstances conducive to mysticism are considered in their relation to psychopathology. The discussion begins with consideration of the relation between Rose and her mother, ...
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The practices of and circumstances conducive to mysticism are considered in their relation to psychopathology. The discussion begins with consideration of the relation between Rose and her mother, and how this dynamic of absolute submission later characterized Rose’s relation to Christ. A section on traumatic reliving then reveals how the illnesses, accidents, painful cures, and punishments of Rose of Lima’s childhood were later mastered and symbolically repeated as her saintly submission to pain, now self-inflicted, assumed new meanings. Love as suffering and the erotics of mortification are considered in depth, as are religious delusions and the absence of mysticism’s love object, Christ the Bridegroom. Throughout the discussion mysticism is compared to a range of modern disorders, including masochism, anorexia nervosa, depression, self-injurious behavior, conversion disorders (hysteria), and schizophrenia.Less
The practices of and circumstances conducive to mysticism are considered in their relation to psychopathology. The discussion begins with consideration of the relation between Rose and her mother, and how this dynamic of absolute submission later characterized Rose’s relation to Christ. A section on traumatic reliving then reveals how the illnesses, accidents, painful cures, and punishments of Rose of Lima’s childhood were later mastered and symbolically repeated as her saintly submission to pain, now self-inflicted, assumed new meanings. Love as suffering and the erotics of mortification are considered in depth, as are religious delusions and the absence of mysticism’s love object, Christ the Bridegroom. Throughout the discussion mysticism is compared to a range of modern disorders, including masochism, anorexia nervosa, depression, self-injurious behavior, conversion disorders (hysteria), and schizophrenia.
Bernard Cooke
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195174519
- eISBN:
- 9780199835119
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195174518.003.0014
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
Unjustified limitation of eros to sexual attraction; actually, it deals with the interdependent relationship of all created realities. Desire as basic to human experience and an instance of cosmic ...
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Unjustified limitation of eros to sexual attraction; actually, it deals with the interdependent relationship of all created realities. Desire as basic to human experience and an instance of cosmic drive towards fulfillment. Intertwining in humans of erotic attraction with love. Mysterious application of ‘desire’ to divine creativity and intrinsic teleology of the universe. Erotic attraction not evil; instead it has functioned as positive element in Jewish and Christian spirituality.Less
Unjustified limitation of eros to sexual attraction; actually, it deals with the interdependent relationship of all created realities. Desire as basic to human experience and an instance of cosmic drive towards fulfillment. Intertwining in humans of erotic attraction with love. Mysterious application of ‘desire’ to divine creativity and intrinsic teleology of the universe. Erotic attraction not evil; instead it has functioned as positive element in Jewish and Christian spirituality.
Bernard Cooke
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195174519
- eISBN:
- 9780199835119
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195174518.003.0015
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
Both scripture and Christian tradition identify the Spirit of God with divine love. While seldom linking love and friendship with power, humans have long thought of authentic love as a supreme good ...
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Both scripture and Christian tradition identify the Spirit of God with divine love. While seldom linking love and friendship with power, humans have long thought of authentic love as a supreme good in human experience. However, ‘love’ has had quite different resonance in various contexts. Agapic love often joined to erotic attraction and revelatory of divine love and kenotic aspect of creation. Biblical link of Spirit/love/power with power of the divine word. Christian stress on fundamental role of love, on knowledge of the heart, in morality and spirituality. Love, human and divine, as ultimate power.Less
Both scripture and Christian tradition identify the Spirit of God with divine love. While seldom linking love and friendship with power, humans have long thought of authentic love as a supreme good in human experience. However, ‘love’ has had quite different resonance in various contexts. Agapic love often joined to erotic attraction and revelatory of divine love and kenotic aspect of creation. Biblical link of Spirit/love/power with power of the divine word. Christian stress on fundamental role of love, on knowledge of the heart, in morality and spirituality. Love, human and divine, as ultimate power.
Douglas M. MacDowell
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199287192
- eISBN:
- 9780191713552
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199287192.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Prose and Writers: Classical, Early, and Medieval
Concentrating on Demosthenes' texts rather than his politics, this book describes and assesses all his speeches, including those for the lawcourts as well as the addresses to the Ekklesia. Besides ...
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Concentrating on Demosthenes' texts rather than his politics, this book describes and assesses all his speeches, including those for the lawcourts as well as the addresses to the Ekklesia. Besides the genuine speeches, it also covers those which probably are wrongly ascribed to Demosthenes, such as those written for delivery by Apollodoros. It considers the Epistles, the Prooimia, and the Erotic Speech. The arguments of each speech are analysed. The question whether the texts reproduce accurately what was actually spoken is approached cautiously. There is a short survey of Demosthenes' prose style, with examples quoted in Greek. In the rest of the book quotations are given in the author's own translations, with the Greek words added in footnotes where appropriate.Less
Concentrating on Demosthenes' texts rather than his politics, this book describes and assesses all his speeches, including those for the lawcourts as well as the addresses to the Ekklesia. Besides the genuine speeches, it also covers those which probably are wrongly ascribed to Demosthenes, such as those written for delivery by Apollodoros. It considers the Epistles, the Prooimia, and the Erotic Speech. The arguments of each speech are analysed. The question whether the texts reproduce accurately what was actually spoken is approached cautiously. There is a short survey of Demosthenes' prose style, with examples quoted in Greek. In the rest of the book quotations are given in the author's own translations, with the Greek words added in footnotes where appropriate.
Marco Fantuzzi
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199603626
- eISBN:
- 9780191746321
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199603626.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
The Iliad is a poem whose events revolve around the “anger” of Achilles, and his personal fierceness and pursuit of glory remain, despite different and more complex nuances, the prevailing features ...
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The Iliad is a poem whose events revolve around the “anger” of Achilles, and his personal fierceness and pursuit of glory remain, despite different and more complex nuances, the prevailing features of his characterization. This book proposes to investigate how different literary authors and visual artists at different periods responded to Achilles' “erotic life”, an aspect about which the Iliadwas almost completely silent. Achilles' loves expose a crack in the usually self-assured attitude of the hero, demonstrating the limits of epic heroism and the epic vision of the world. As such, these moments of erotic “weakness” became perfect manifestos for reuse in other genres, such as tragedy and the various forms of love poetry, in which themes of love and passion were more customary than in heroic epic.Less
The Iliad is a poem whose events revolve around the “anger” of Achilles, and his personal fierceness and pursuit of glory remain, despite different and more complex nuances, the prevailing features of his characterization. This book proposes to investigate how different literary authors and visual artists at different periods responded to Achilles' “erotic life”, an aspect about which the Iliadwas almost completely silent. Achilles' loves expose a crack in the usually self-assured attitude of the hero, demonstrating the limits of epic heroism and the epic vision of the world. As such, these moments of erotic “weakness” became perfect manifestos for reuse in other genres, such as tragedy and the various forms of love poetry, in which themes of love and passion were more customary than in heroic epic.
