104 pages
English language
Published May 2, 2012 by Serpent's Tail.
Love without risks is like war without deaths - but, today, love is threatened by an alliance of liberalism and hedonism. Caught between consumerism and casual sexual encounters devoid of passion, love - without the key ingredient of chance - is in danger of withering on the vine. In In Praise of Love, Alain Badiou takes on contemporary 'dating agency' conceptions of love that come complete with zero-risk insurance - like US zero-casualty bombs. He develops a new take on love that sees it as an adventure, and an opportunity for re-invention, in a constant exploration of otherness and difference that leads the individual out of an obsession with identity and self. Liberal, libertine and libertarian reductions of love to instant pleasure and non-commitment bite the dust as Badiou invokes a supporting cast of thinkers from Plato to Lacan via Karl Marx to form a new narrative of romance, relationships …
Love without risks is like war without deaths - but, today, love is threatened by an alliance of liberalism and hedonism. Caught between consumerism and casual sexual encounters devoid of passion, love - without the key ingredient of chance - is in danger of withering on the vine. In In Praise of Love, Alain Badiou takes on contemporary 'dating agency' conceptions of love that come complete with zero-risk insurance - like US zero-casualty bombs. He develops a new take on love that sees it as an adventure, and an opportunity for re-invention, in a constant exploration of otherness and difference that leads the individual out of an obsession with identity and self. Liberal, libertine and libertarian reductions of love to instant pleasure and non-commitment bite the dust as Badiou invokes a supporting cast of thinkers from Plato to Lacan via Karl Marx to form a new narrative of romance, relationships and sex - a narrative that does not fear love.
Can't say we agree completely but it is an intriguing meditation on love.
The only disappointing thing about this book is that is was not longer and unfolded those few, strong ideas about love even more.
This book is an attack on the imperative to always look for the next thing, on always preferring 'freedom of choice' over destiny and fate (even with those you love), on playing it safe, on not getting (even more) hurt in this world. This book decides to bring it on, the whole hazardous chance of meeting each other and, importantly, sticking together without dissolving the difference between the two, which will never go away (unless you melt away into romantic unity, which this book has not much faith in).
The kind of love presented in this book is an antidote and a counter-example to the idea that all human relations rely on reciprocity, tic-for-tat, and even equality, in the sense of equal exchanges. Because love, here, is …
The only disappointing thing about this book is that is was not longer and unfolded those few, strong ideas about love even more.
This book is an attack on the imperative to always look for the next thing, on always preferring 'freedom of choice' over destiny and fate (even with those you love), on playing it safe, on not getting (even more) hurt in this world. This book decides to bring it on, the whole hazardous chance of meeting each other and, importantly, sticking together without dissolving the difference between the two, which will never go away (unless you melt away into romantic unity, which this book has not much faith in).
The kind of love presented in this book is an antidote and a counter-example to the idea that all human relations rely on reciprocity, tic-for-tat, and even equality, in the sense of equal exchanges. Because love, here, is in the end about something very different than exchanges. It is about truth, loyalty to truth, and experiencing a world not from the standpoint of unity (the one, the couple) but difference (two-some).
