A Thinking Person’s Guide to Love

In this book, over 30 years in the making, the author surveys and sums up the world’s understanding of love in all its aspects over the last 3000 years in order to show the stages of love and of falling in love and why, how, when and where they occur. "Having already given us a truly magisterial account of Love in the Quran, the author now demonstrates his exceptional grasp of the idea of love in a wide range of cultures. This beautiful and wise book surveys all aspects of love... making it essential reading for 'thinking persons' and especially for lovers everywhere." — Paul S. Fiddes, Professor of Systematic Theology, University of Oxford

Contents

1. What is Not Love?
2. What is Love?
3. What is Beauty?
4. How Does Love Work?
5. What is Falling in Love, and How Does it Work?
6. Who Loves?
7. When is Love?
8. Where is Love?
9. Why is Love?
Appendix 1: Keys to Plato
Appendix 2: The Stages of Love in Jane Eyre, in Detail
Appendix 3: The Stages of Falling in Love in Ivan Turgenev's First Love, in Detail
Appendix 4: The Total List of 70 Stages of Love Select Bibliography: The 33 Best Books on Love and Why