Chapter 13: Love Review

                                      Chapter 13: Love

Painting of Cupid,Venus, and Adonis by Annibale Carracci -https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus,_Adonis_and_Cupid

"If love is often cruel or destructive, the reason lies not in love itself, but in the inequality between people."- Anton Chekhov

    There are many different ways of expressing love.One type of love derived by the Greeks is eros or "love as physical lust"  ( Janero & Altshuler , The Art of Being Human: The Humanities as a technique for living, 2011, p.410). Eros throughout a lot of early literature and myths were set up as a warning sign or as a tragedy. An example of eros is the myth on VeNus and Adonis. Venus is the god of love who fell in deep attraction to Adonis, a mortal, after being hit by her son Cupid's arrow. Adonis is eventually killed by a wild boar after disregarding Venus's advice to him and in despair Venus transforms his blood into an anemone that eventually loses all of it's petals to a gust of wind. There are different versions of this myth in forms of other arts such as poems. All these versions work to deepen the tragedy of lust in the myth and give new perspectives. Another note on eros is how it was disparaged in earlier society. During the medieval ages , christianity was prevelant  so chastity was often pedaled in adversion to lust as lust was considered sinful. Adultery was a form of eros not openly welcomed by earlier society ( especicially in women) but was pivoted greatly underground. The idea of adultry can be related to the quote above by Chekhov. Love can be destructive and hard but that's not the fault of the idea of love but the people that got it to that point and in this case, adultry can be the cause of a destructive love.

   In contrast to Eros was Agape. Agape refered to a more intellectual and platonic form of love. The difference between Eros and Agape was that while Eros mostly relied on lust and physical love in interpretation, Agape expressed more of a platonic view of love that didn't only rely on physical lust but also mutual feeling. Platonic love, as described by Plato, showed how someone can find something or someone appeasing for non physical motives. Examples of this is liking someone's thought process or ideas to liking how someone's presence can remind you of things. Platnic love can also extend to art in terms of paintings , sculptures, etc.  Being physically attractive to someone is natural and is apart of our evolutionary make up but even this can lead to platoic love in it's own way.

Poster of  Romeo and Juliet-https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romeo_and_Juliet

" Cynics believe the language of romance is all a facade and that lust is aways the reality" ( Janero & Altshuler , The Art of Being Human: The Humanities as a technique for living, 2011, p.425)

    One love that is overlooked and even taken for granted is family love. Family love is the love between familial members like with siblings, parents, cousins, etc. Media and the humanities has many examples of family love and the conflicts in it. Family portrayal in media and the humanities can often be twisted and loveless.  Some portrayals of family other than wholesome and abusive is in religin settings. Biblically, family is seen as important. Children are to follow their mothers and fathers and respect them and their decisions. It's a relationship that doesn't allow disobedience. Other than religious wise, a family can be set up in two different ways;matriarchy and patriarchy. Some families run under the head and support of their mother and others there fathers essentially.

      Although not really expressed in the traditional terms of love, friendship is a form of it. Aristotle was actually more of a supporter of friendship than love. He thought individuals that were able to form a friendship from common interests was a strong reationship and closely related to Plato's ideal of Platonic love.

 Romantic love is the typical love we see in media and the humanities. An example of this romantic love is Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet". This is a great example of romantic love because of the strong love between the two and the strong presence of the "right" person archetype. As the quote above says, cynics believe romance is actually lust in disguise but I disagree. Although the right archetype is overdramatized at times, it is true that romance , specifically the language of it, still thrives and does exist in lustless terms. This language of romance is all around us in form of songs to artworks, it's strong. Chivalry which refers to a knightly gesture, is also considered to be dead in terms of love. Although not as strong as it was back then, chivary as well does exist still in similiar forms as the language of love.

Rings Photography by Beatriz Perez Moya-https://unsplash.com/photos/M2T1j-6Fn8w

      " Love is merely a madness"- William Shakespeare

    Love as an amusement is a way for individuals, mostly royals and the rich, to use love as an entertainment. One way of doing this is through courtship which is a man pursuing a women to have her hand in marriage or a relationship. This can be as sortof a game in a way with the back and forth between individuals in the process. The quote above compares love to being mad. This quote ispretty accurate in it's saying, especially in terms of courtship where it is treated like a game for fun.

    The set up of marriage in love is a unique one compared to a standard relationship. Traditionally, the man in the marriage is the breadwinner and supports his wife and children. The wife is usually the one at home that cleans, cooks, and cares for possible children. Nowadays this dynamic has changed alot to a more equal one. Sometimes the roles are even switched. There were some stigmas in marriage back then such as women not staying virgins until marriage being bad but not vice versa for men.

Conclusion

   In conclusion, love has alot of interpretations and forms. It's a universal topic discussed by a variety of individuals, from poets to philosphers to singers. Everyone has their own meanings and connections to love as well as expression of it, positive or negative.