À propos d'amour

I read this at the end of 2023 and never finished my review. I took another look today, skimming through and dipping in at a couple of spots. I liked it much better than when I first read it, which mostly comes down to this mode of reading and my mindset. Like I say in my full review, it's probably best approached for inspiration, not as a non-fiction explainer.

First post after my redesigning my blog, btw. Looks much nicer now, I think 😊

Bell hooks proses and musings on love. Not sure why, but I expected it to be a feminist text engaging with the idea of love. It is more a love text engaging with feminism. I recently lost my mom and "recently" ended a handful of important relationships and want to engage with this concept of love from someone I respect. I want to both play with an openness to love and optimism being apart of politics and I want to feel open to love when feeling like vulnerability can be so hard.

I liked her engagement with childhood and learning love that we reproduce when we are older, at least when we don't interrogate it and seek to change that relationship. And her critiques of patriarchy and the ways that socialized men and socialized women commonly relate to love, care, and empathy.

The section on grief and love was my favourite part, and how we know love fully, and the love and value we have for a person, in the process of grief.

Definitely lots of engagement with Christianity and spiritually which doesn't speak to me but the politics and musings on childhood and patriarchy and loss are worth the read.

I was wondering "what is it with love and our culture ?" (A certain type of) love seems to be everywhere in the media and in social norms, and nowhere in theory and philosophy, and general social sciences. Then I picked up this book, and it helped me articulate a lot of things. For most of the book I just thought "that's it exactly!"

Essential reading.