In Search of Passion

A history of the romantic and sexual relations between men and women. It shows how love and sex have been romanticized in the 20th century, painting a rich portrait of Western society's emotional and sexual development.

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Over the past century we have widely accepted that sexual enlightenment is the secret of happy relationships. The irony is, the greater our sexual sophistication, the more the our grasp of the emotional and spiritual dimension of relationships has weakened. Sexual dysfunction and addiction, obsession with body image, short-lived commitments, and rising divorce rates signal a contemporary crisis. Several decades of growing dissatisfaction have given rise to nostalgic myths of golden times that never really existed. This book demonstrates a compelling revisionist portrait illustrating how deeply the anxieties and expectations of the present are rooted in the past. Through each decade of the 20th century Patricia Anderson guides us through the landscape of the West's sexual development: the burgeoning sexual concerns of the early years, the changing morality of the 20s and 30s, the liberties of wartime, the 1950s veneer of rectitude, to the freedoms, pleasures, fears and disappointments of the following decades. On the way she gives fresh meaning to the role of passion in our culture and new hope for the future of relationships.