![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/02\/natural-history-of-love-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>A Natural History of Love<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Diane Ackerman, MFA \u201973, PhD \u201979<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n After her success with A Natural History of the Senses<\/em>, the journalist and poet turned her attention to love with this 1995 nonfiction work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As Publishers Weekly<\/em> observes: \u201cHer perspective is both long\u2014beginning with the first writings about love from ancient Egypt and Greece\u2014and wide, encompassing love of pets, religious fervor, and altruism, along with her principal focus on romantic love.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ackerman also penned the memoir One Hundred Names for Love, <\/em>about the aftermath of the stroke that left her writer husband almost entirely unable to speak.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, it chronicles how their connection and mutual love of words helped him heal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Diksha Basu \u201905<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Named a best book of the year by Marie Claire<\/em> and the New York Post<\/em>, this chick lit novel follows a woman who travels from NYC to India attend her cousin\u2019s posh nuptials\u2014and get a break from her personal and professional woes. But naturally, drama and romantic complications ensue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s the awkwardness of her divorced parents each looking for love with other people; coping with the fallout from her best friend\u2019s iffy choice in men; and (above all) the possibility or running into a British guy she previously dated.<\/p>\n<\/div> <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Publishers Weekly<\/em> calls it a \u201ccharming, soul-searching tale,\u201d adding that \u201cBasu is a capable plotter and creates vibrant set pieces, such as the elaborate wedding. From Brooklyn to New Delhi, Basu never ceases to entertain.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Vladimir Nabokov<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cA compelling record, it confirms Nabokov as possibly the most happily married writer of the 20th century,\u201d the Guardian<\/em> says of this collection of missives spanning from 1923\u201377. \u201cEvery one of his books was dedicated to V\u00e9ra; she was the sure center of his world. Though V\u00e9ra destroyed her side of the correspondence, she remains a strong presence, and we can surmise what her letters said.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The volume was first published in 2014, decades after the death of the famed novelist and legendary Cornell faculty member.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Their long marriage was a notable partnership, both personally and professionally<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n As Nabokov wrote to V\u00e9ra early in their relationship: \u201cYou came into my life\u2014not as one comes to visit (you know, ‘not taking one\u2019s hat off’) but as one comes to a kingdom where all the rivers have been waiting for your reflection, all the roads, for your steps.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alison Lurie<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Lurie, a professor emerita of English who passed away in 2020, set a number of her books at (or at least connected them to) a thinly disguised Cornell called \u201cCorinth University.\u201d In this 1974 novel\u2014later made into a TV movie starring Elizabeth Ashley and Richard Crenna\u2014it\u2019s the backdrop for upheaval in the marriage of a couple in their 40s, after the wife learns that her professor husband has been having an affair with a graduate student.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While touching on timeless themes, the book is very much a tale of its era.<\/p>\n<\/div> Hippies, women\u2019s liberation, and the antiwar movement figure into the plot, along with such topics as encroaching real estate development and teenage angst.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Said the New York Times<\/em> upon its publication: \u201cThe War Between the Tates<\/em> is a thing to marvel at, very nearly all that the novel was meant to be.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nicola Yoon \u201994<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Both this and Yoon\u2019s previous young-adult novel\u2014Everything, Everything, <\/em>about a teen confined to her home due to an immune condition\u2014were New York Times<\/em> bestsellers and had film adaptations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A finalist for the National Book Award, The Sun Is Also a Star<\/em> has dual high school-age narrators who meet and fall in love on the streets of New York in a single day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One is a Jamaican-born girl about to be deported, the other a Korean American boy on his way to a college admissions interview.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n School Library Journal<\/em> calls it \u201cpart coming-of-age, part romance, and all extraordinary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Melissa Bank, MFA \u201988<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Bank made a smash in 1999 with this New York Times<\/em> bestselling collection of seven interlinked short stories, which Entertainment Weekly<\/em> dubbed a \u201cswinging, funny, and tender study of contemporary relationships.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The title tale\u2014inspired by now-infamous dating advice books of the era like The Rules<\/em>\u2014follows a woman who hits it off with a fellow guest at a wedding. But their relationship goes off the rails when she tries to stick to the \u201cplay hard to get\u201d formula laid out in How to Meet & Marry Mr. Right<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Two of the book\u2019s other stories were adapted into the 2007 romcom Suburban Girl<\/em>, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar and Alec Baldwin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joyce Bauer Brothers \u201947<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Published in 1972, this vintage self-help guide is one of many that the psychologist and pop culture icon penned during her long career. (Soberingly, they also included Widowhood<\/em>, written after the death of her beloved husband, Milton Brothers \u201947, BA \u201948.) It\u2019s long out of print, but used copies can be found online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With alternating offerings for husbands and wives, it includes such sections as \u201cHow Did HE Get to Be the Boss?,\u201d \u201cTry a Little Role Reversal,\u201d and \u201cMoney Is Power.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBelieving that the feminist movement of the 1960s and \u201970s ignored the needs and desires of housewives who sought \u2018freedom, responsibility, and equality\u2019 within their marriages, she created \u2018The Brothers System\u2019 for achieving a \u2018liberated marriage\u2019 that embodied personal fulfillment and romance,\u201d the website Psychologist Feminist Voices notes in a profile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It adds: \u201cShe encouraged relationship dynamics that were egalitarian rather than authoritarian, where the wife was unafraid to ask her husband for what she needed in order to achieve personal satisfaction in the marriage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kurt Vonnegut \u201944<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n This compilation of love letters from the celebrated novelist to his first wife, Jane Marie Cox, was edited by their daughter\u2014who found them while cleaning out her mother\u2019s attic\u2014and published in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTheir correspondence reveals a fitful courting,\u201d observes the New Yorker<\/em>, \u201cwith a persistent Vonnegut peppering Cox with declarations of love, even as both attend casual dates with other people.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Dating from 1941\u201345, the missives cover Vonnegut\u2019s time on the Hill, which ended when he dropped out to enlist in the Army in 1943.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNaturally your recent letter ripped my heart from my wounded breast (poetic license),\u201d he wrote to the woman he nicknamed \u201cWoofy,\u201d going on to say: \u201cApropos, are you ever going to get married? I am willing to fill out any required forms in duplicate, triplicate, and quintuplicate for your hand and all accessories thereof: not now, but sometime. You don\u2019t object to my playing with the idea, do you? Write me a letter, sweet mamma.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brenda Janowitz \u201995<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cA nostalgic and intriguing story that blends a modern-day love triangle with details from Audrey Hepburn\u2019s life,\u201d says Kirkus<\/em> of this 2023 chick lit novel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Its heroine grew up as the child of servants on an estate reminiscent of the one in the classic Hepburn film Sabrina<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now, she\u2019s torn between two men she\u2019s known since childhood: the grandson of the estate\u2019s owner and the son of the former chauffer, now a developer who wants to tear the property down.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Janowitz\u2019s other novels on similar themes include The Liz Taylor Ring<\/em> and The Grace Kelly Dress<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n E. B. White 1921<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1929, the future author of wholesome classics Charlotte\u2019s Web<\/em> and Stuart Little<\/em> teamed up with his New Yorker<\/em> colleague James Thurber for this cheeky (but occasionally heartfelt) examination of love and relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s illustrated with breezy line drawings by Thurber that, for the era, weren\u2019t all necessarily \u201csafe for work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBy and large, love is easier to experience before it has been explained\u2014easier and cleaner,\u201d they write.<\/p>\n<\/div> \u201cThe same holds true of passion. Understanding the principles of passion is like knowing how to drive a car; once mastered, all is smoothed out; no more does one experience the feeling of perilous adventure, the misgivings, the diverting little hesitancies, the wrong turns, the false starts, the glorious insecurity. All is smoothed out, and all, so to speak, is lost.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Karl Pillemer<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n A gerontologist and the Hazel E. Reed Professor in the psychology department, Pillemer has conducted numerous surveys of older Americans\u2014here, tapping them for relationship advice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Pillemer and his research team gathered responses from more than 700 people over age 65 who have been in long marriages (lasting three decades or more).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The result, subtitled Advice from the Wisest Americans on Love, Relationships, and Marriage<\/em>, rounds up no-nonsense suggestions that promote lasting unions,<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n They include taking an interest in what your partner likes to do, maintaining a standard of politeness, and fairly delegating household chores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe advice is astute, fresh, and well selected by Pillemer,\u201d says Publishers Weekly<\/em>. \u201cThis book would serve as an excellent gift for newlyweds.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jane Mendle<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Before Mendle joined the Human Ecology faculty, she published this 2004 novel\u2014in which, per a Publishers Weekly<\/em> review, she \u201chumorously and sympathetically captures the outsize ambitions and insecurities of young actors and directors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her heroine is a grad student in film at Columbia who\u2019s looking for love and artistic fulfillment. Teaching yoga on the side, she meets a hunky student who\u2019s a soap opera star, and they start dating. But when she mixes her personal and cinematic lives\u2014casting her new beau in a film\u2014things start to go off the rails.<\/p>\n<\/div> <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMendle\u2019s characters are more interesting and multidimensional than most chick-lit offerings,\u201d says Booklist<\/em>. \u201cHer plot isn\u2019t predictable, and her snappy dialogue is romantic-comedy ready, which may prompt readers to turn off their TVs, pop some popcorn, and curl up with this book instead.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cindy Hazan<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Interested in a more academic take on the subject?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hazan, a psychologist, is the Andrew H. & James S. Tisch Distinguished University Professor\u2014and she co-edited the definitive textbook on the science of affectional ties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis tightly edited volume provides an integrative overview of human bonding from infancy through adulthood. Through an attachment lens, the book synthesizes classic and cutting-edge research on close relationships and their profound impact in everyday life,\u201d notes the publisher.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTopics include infant-caregiver attachment, human social nature, child and adolescent social development, mate selection, love and sexual desire, hooking up and online dating, keys to relationship success, predictors and consequences of relationship dissolution, and the role of social connectedness in psychological adjustment and physical health.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Amanda Quain \u201913<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dashed<\/em><\/a> is Quain\u2019s third contemporary young-adult novel<\/a> inspired by the works of Jane Austen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It follows Ghosted<\/em> (in which the stately manor Northanger Abbey is recast as a haunted high school) and Accomplished<\/em>, which puts Mr. Darcy\u2019s younger sister from Pride and Prejudice<\/em> at center stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Quain\u2019s latest is an updating of Sense and Sensibility<\/em>\u2014focused on the youngest sister, Margaret (who plays a minor role in the original novel). <\/p>\n<\/div> With her levelheaded oldest sister Elinor happily married, Margaret aims to follow her example rather than that of their volatile middle sibling, Marianne, who barely survived a car crash fueled by a dramatic heartbreak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cQuain moves the story along with ease and charm, spinning a tale that\u2019s as much about the love between sisters as the intrigues of unexpected romance,\u201d says Kirkus<\/em>. \u201cCharacters and key themes maintain the Austen connection, but Margaret\u2019s journey of healing from trauma and accepting herself is a Quain original.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Michael Fontaine<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n A classics professor<\/a> on the Hill, Fontaine is a regular contributor<\/a> to a Princeton University Press series offering ancient wisdom for modern readers. In his latest<\/a>, he translates (from the Latin) 2,000-year-old romance tips from the Roman poet Ovid, whose suggestions range from heartfelt to humorous and downright raunchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some of the wisdom echoes the common-sense advice you\u2019d get from your besties after a romantic reversal: staying busy, taking up a new hobby, going on vacation, and \u201cminimizing and belittling your ex\u2019s best features.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n (Even the most broken-hearted readers, however, will likely decline another of Ovid\u2019s tips: putting your lost love out of your mind by going off to war.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n How to Get Over a Breakup<\/em> is Fontaine\u2019s fourth entry in the series, following How to Drink<\/em>, How to Tell a Joke<\/em>, and How to Grieve<\/em>. Up next: How to Have Willpower<\/em>, followed by How to Speak Freely<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Jessica Saunders \u201903<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In the CALS alum<\/a>\u2019s debut novel<\/a>\u2014which Kirkus<\/em> calls \u201can entertaining and quick read about self-discovery\u201d\u2014a successful lawyer and soccer mom in New York\u2019s Westchester County discovers cracks in her marriage while reconnecting with her first love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The protagonist, Rachel, is shocked to discover that her husband has a gambling problem, and has amassed huge debts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And worse: he has paid them off by selling letters from her high school boyfriend (Jack, who\u2019s now a major movie star) to a tabloid.<\/p>\n<\/div> <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSaunders sparkles in her emotional second-chance romance debut,\u201d says Publishers Weekly<\/em>, going on to add that the author \u201ckeeps readers guessing which it\u2019ll be up to the very end while drawing them in with snappy prose and skillful characterization. Flashbacks to Rachel and Jack\u2019s early relationship make it especially easy to invest in their connection. This should win Saunders plenty of fans.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Top: Illustration by Caitlin Cook \/ Cornell University<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Published February 8, 2024; updated January 27, 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n For Valentine\u2019s Day, check out these amorous titles\u2014from literary fiction to tips from the poet Ovid on how to get over a breakup<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":31690,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"alumni_hub_syml_posts":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[644],"tags":[],"cornell_year_post":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-31688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books"],"yoast_head":"\n
\n\n\n\nDestination Wedding<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>Letters to V\u00e9ra<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nThe War Between the Tates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>The Sun Is Also a Star<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nThe Girls\u2019 Guide to Hunting and Fishing<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>The Brothers System for Liberated Love & Marriage<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nLove, Kurt<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>The Audrey Hepburn Estate<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nIs Sex Necessary?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>30 Lessons for Loving<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nKissing in Technicolor<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/alumni.cornell.edu\/cornellians\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2024\/02\/Human-Bonding-A.jpg\")
<\/figure>Human Bonding<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nDashed<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/figure>How to Get Over a Breakup<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\nLove, Me<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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