Jeanne Safer has been a psychoanalyst for 40 years. She’s counseled hundreds of clients over those years. What struck her was that many of the problems that plagued her clients centered around love and friendship. In a fascinating series of essay, Jeanne Safer shows how the quest for love by both male and female clients led to disaster and/or happiness. Safer discusses how relationships go wrong and what can be done (in many cases, you have to just walk away). Why we do the crazy things we do when we’re in love start to make sense with Safer’s analysis. If you’re interested in relationships and how they work (and don’t work), I recommend The Golden Condom. GRADE: B+
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
INTRODUCTION 1
PART I: HOPELESS LOVE
1. Leaving Unloving Lovers and Unfriendly Friends 7
2. Of Human Bondage: Obsessive Love 13
3. Vengeance Is Mine: The Dark Side of Rejected Love 57
4. Betrayal 74
5. Unrequited Love: My Golden One 89
PART II: DIFFICULT LVOE
6. The Man Who Could Not Love 125
7. The Tantalizing Mentor & the Passionate Protege 147
8. Traumatic Friendship 184
PART III: FULFILLED LOVE
9. Late First Marriage: The Triumph of Hope Over
Resignation 213
10. Love Is Tronger Than the Grave 241
11. Love Him, Hate His Politics: How a Liberal
and a Conservative Stay Married 257
12 Recovering the Good form a Love Gone Bad 266
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 271
Now that’s an eye-grabbing title and cover. “Lifestyle” books seem to be growing in popularity. I see them displayed prominently in Indian bookstores.
Prashant, I found Jeanne Safer’s stories of love and friendship compelling. You would, too!
Never know what I will find here.
Patti, variety is the spice of Life!
A somewhat related incident from our house yesterday: our oldest daughter (24) was channel-surfing and stopped on Monty Python’s Meaning of Life. There’s a scene where John Cleese plays the teacher at a “typical” British all-boys school. He’s teaching sex-ed and he and his wife are “modeling” all the sexual behavior while Cleese narrates and the bored boys read history books and talk amongst themselves. After watching the scene, my daughter’s comment was, “That was quite educational; sex ed never got into that level of detail when I was in school!”
Deb, I have always found MONTY PYTHON to be extremely educational. There’s a lot to be learned about sex in MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL, too!
We’re so old (“How old are you?”) that there was no sex ed when we were in school.
Don’t know if the title was necessary to catch readers, but it could be interesting. My library has it – even a ebook – but I just downloaded two other books (the new Connie Willis was one), so I better not.
Jeff, THE GOLDEN CONDOM is a quick read. The stories are fascinating. Love is complicated.
Wow!
Can a book like this even be sold in States like Texas?
Or would it be on the list of banned books?
I remeber reading about “Banned Books Week” -here it is:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banned_Books_Week
Seems it doesn’t take much for a book to be banned in some US institutions …
Wolf, everyone orders (or downloads) books on the Internet here. Bookstores are becoming a vanishing breed.
Really, George, sometimes I wonder about you. With all the wonderful books there are too Read, why waste precious reading time on things like this? Absolutely not interested.
Sorry, didn’t mean to overstate. I’m sure you enjoyed it.
Rick, some of the stories in THE GOLDEN CONDOM are priceless!
Rick, Love makes the world go ’round!
different strokes, this wouldn’t be on the top of my list. Sadly, I have so little time to read, I have to concentrate on books to review. BTW, this year’s Shakespeare festival at the Old Globe are Richard II & Hamlet
Maggie, I would definitely go see HAMLET if I was in San Diego!
Pass!
Bob, maybe tomorrow’s book will intrigue you!