B007Q6XJAO EBOK (34 page)

121 Therapists add intimacy: For a summary of the therapeutic view that “incubating intimacy leads to better sex,” see Daniel Bergner, “What Do Women Want?”
New York Times Magazine
, January 25, 2009.

121 woman’s optimal pleasure: For a discussion of this ultimate quest in sexual research, see Mary Roach,
Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2008), 302; and see Marta Meana on female narcissism in Bergner, “What Do Women Want?”

121 As studies have revealed: See Meston and Buss,
Why Women Have Sex
, 156, 166, 29.

121 Surprisingly, they’re often: The most popular book genre, romance novels generated over 1.3 billion in 2010. See “Romance Literature Statistics: Overview,”
About the Romance Genre
, www.rwa.org/cs/the_romance_genre/romance_literature_statistics (accessed May 14, 2012).

121 Jack Travis: Lisa Kleypas,
Smooth Talking Stranger
(New York: St. Martin’s Paperbacks, 2009), 152.

121 “Murmuring words of love”: Diane Wolkstein and Samuel Noah Kramer, eds.,
Inanna, Queen of Heaven and Earth: Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer
(New York: Harper and Row, 1983), 108, 46, 108, 37, 38.

122 Taylor estimates: Timothy Taylor,
The Prehistory of Sex: Four Million Years of Human Sexual Culture
(New York: Bantam Books, 1996), 18.

122 Friedrich describes: Paul Friedrich,
The Meaning of Aphrodite
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), 143–144.

122 To pass muster:
Complete K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
, 179, 229.

122 If he does not succeed: Ibid., 113.

122 “complete harmony”: Lydia Flem,
Casanova: The Man Who Really Loved Women
, trans. Catherine Temerson (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997), 74.

122 “three-fourths”: Giacomo Casanova,
History of My Life
, trans. Willard R. Trask (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997), vol. 2, chap. 2, p. 25.

122 he discovered the clitoris-climax link: See Judith Summers,
Casanova’s Women
(London: Bloomsbury, 2006), 15.

122 He told her: Casanova,
History of My Life
, vol. 3, chap. 2, p. 36, and chap. 3, p. 39.

122 He conducted their love affair: Flem,
Casanova
, 112.

122 “never a thing to be hurried”: Ovid,
Art of Love
, 151.

123 Rick is onto something: Givens,
Love Signals
, 111. Givens explains that women like super-gentle strokes that strum the tender C-fibers, which reach the “sensual centers of the emotional brain,” 92–93.

123 Women have more sensitive skin: Ibid., 99, 111.

123 Skin is the largest organ: Ackerman,
Natural History of the Senses
, 80.

123 hero’s ankle play: Jennifer Crusie,
Tell Me Lies
(New York: St. Martin’s Paperbacks, 1998), 199.

123 kiss is turbocharged: See Meston and Buss,
Why Women Have Sex
, 68–69.

123 matter of timing: See Susan Quilliam,
Sexual Body Talk: Understanding the Body Language of Attraction from First Glance to Sexual Happiness
(New York: Carroll and Graf, 1992), 58–59.

123 Instead of rabid tonsil-hockey: See Givens,
Love Signals
, 104.

123 Michelangelo of oral pleasure: Jullian,
D’Annunzio
, 131, 243.

1231950 s lover Porfirio Rubirosa: Levy,
Last Playboy
, 225.

123 Like Aly Khan: Leonard Slater,
Aly: A Biography
(New York: Random House, 1964), 139.

124 Gray claims: John Gray,
Venus and Mars in the Bedroom: A Guide to Lasting Romance and Passion
(New York: HarperTorch, 1995), 116.

124 “This was all”: Udana Powers, “The Private Life of Mrs. Herman,” in Lonnie Barbach, ed.,
Erotic Interludes
(New York: Harper Perennial, 1987), 29.

124 “Most sex is about nonfeeling”: Quoted in Douglas,
Great Seducer
, 97.

124 “carried [her]”: Quoted in ibid., 219.

124 “indefatigable”: Quoted in ibid., 221.

124 “He satisfied me”: Quoted in ibid., 246, 177.

125 “spiritual and talked”: Quoted in ibid., 268.

125 “I felt in my heart”: Quoted in Dennis McDougal,
Five Easy Decades: How Jack Nicholson Became the Biggest Movie Star in Modern Times
(Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley, 2008), 351.

125
K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
admits: Hugo Williams, “Some Kisses from the Kama Sutra,” in Jon Stallworthy, ed.,
The Penguin Book of Love Poetry
(New York: Penguin, 1973), 110. The
K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
is emphatic about love canceling out the importance of technique: “when seized by passion, no particular order has to be followed.”
Complete K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
, 119.

125 “Gifts persuade even:” Euripides,
Medea
, in
The Hecuba, Medea, Phœnissœ and Orestes
, trans. G. Dindorf (London: Henry Washbourne, 1846), lines 968–969, 40.

126 recent poll: Cited in Hilary Black, “Introduction,” in Hilary Black, ed.,
The Secret Currency of Love
(New York: Harper, 2010), xvi.

126 another 2009 survey: “Bad Week, Good Week,”
Week
, April 3, 2009, no. 4.

126 economic motive: For a summary of this, see Norman O. Brown,
Life against Death: The Psychoanalytical Meaning of History
(Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1959), 238, 234–304.

126 “Wealth brings”: Quoted in ibid., 254. Also see Georges Bataille: “Within the Dionysiac cult, money in principle played no part.” Bataille,
The Tears of Eros
, trans. Peter Conner (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1989), 64.

126 “Falling in love”: Robert Louis Stevenson, “On Falling in Love,” in James L. Malfetti and Elizabeth M. Eidlitz, eds.,
Perspectives on Sexuality: A Literary Collection
(New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1972), 238.

126 Romantic passion: Rollo May,
Love and Will
(New York: W. W. Norton, 1969), 122. Among one of the characteristics of love in the
K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
is “indifference to money.” Complete
K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
, 417.

126 They’re embedded: This is David Cheal’s observation, cited in Helmuth Berking,
The Sociology of Giving
, trans. Patrick Camiller (London: SAGE, 1999), 13.

126 Women put stock: See Ellen Chrismer, “Researcher Examines Gender, Other Gift-Giving Trends,” December 13, 2002, dateline.ucdavis.edu/121302/dl_rucker.html, in a review of Margaret Rucker’s work on the science of gift-giving about women’s “personal view” of gifts and preference for “a romantic gesture.”

126 Receiving love tokens: Berking,
Sociology of Giving
, 11.

127 “The path” ibid., 12.

127 Zahavi’s “handicap principle”: See Miller’s discussion of this in
Mating Mind
, 122–129, passim. This is the old principle popularized by Thorsten Veblen in
The Theory of the Leisure Class
that the best way to demonstrate wealth is by wasting it on luxuries.

127 Kristeva points out: Julia Kristeva,
Tales of Love
, trans. Leon S. Roudiez (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987), 196.

127 “quite an art”: Ovid,
Art of Love
, 28.

127 Gifts must fulfill: See Marcel Mauss,
The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies
, trans. W. D. Halls (New York: W. W. Norton, 1990), 10, 24–25, 37–38, 74–75.

127 “At its finest”: Quoted in J. D. Sunwolf, “The Shadow Side of Social Giving: Miscommunication and Failed Gifts,”
Communication Research Trends
, September 1, 2006.

127 it’s an object of beauty: See Miller’s theory of this in
Mating Mind
, 258–291.

127 “emanation of Eros”: Lewis Hyde,
The Gift
(New York: Vintage Books, 1979), 27.

127 Phallic deities embodied: Georges Bataille,
Eroticism: Death and Sensuality
, trans. Mary Dalwood (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1986), 231.

128 Dionysus, the “giver of riches”: Otto,
Dionysus
, 80.

128 Courtly love: See Andreas Capellanus,
The Art of Courtly Love
, trans. John Jay Parry (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), 176–177.

128 Updike’s “Hamlet” novel: John Updike,
Gertrude and Claudius
(New York: Ballantine Books, 2000), 62, 64.

128 presented one lover with a spaniel: Derek Parker,
Casanova
(Gloucestershire, UK: Sutton, 2002), 136.

128 “absolutely irresistible”: Quoted in Charlotte Haldane,
Alfred: The Passionate Life of Alfred de Musset
(New York: Roy, 1960), 64.

129 “in her attic”: Quoted in ibid., 67.

129 Riches raise the stakes: Berking,
Sociology of Giving
, 41.

129 “It was like”: Quoted in Slater,
Aly
, 9.

129 Women were crazy: Judy Bachrach, “La Vita Agnelli,”
Vanity Fair
, May 2003, 202.

129 He furnished total: Ibid., 214, 205.

129 “The loves of most people”: Quoted in
A Thousand Flashes of French Wit, Wisdom, and Wickedness
, trans. J. De Finod (New York: D. Appleton, 1886), 142.

129 Sensual dishes follow: Guy de Maupassant,
Bel-Ami
, trans. Douglas Parmée (1885; New York: Penguin, 1975), 105, 108.

130 She hands him: Actually Duroy doesn’t pay with his money but takes the bills from the hostess’s purse at her request. The sexual symbolism is patent.

130 “After a perfect meal”: Quoted in Botting and Botting,
Sex Appeal
, 168.

130 Taste is the multisensory sense: For a summary, see Kate Hilpern, “Taste the Difference: How Our Genes, Gender and Even Hormones Affect the Way We Eat,
Independent
(UK), November 11, 2010.

130 Although men have: See “Male vs. Female: The Brain Difference,” www.columbia.edu/itc/anthropology/v1007/jakabovics/mf2.html (accessed May 14, 2011); and “Girls Have Superior Sense of Taste to Boys,”
Science Daily
, December 18, 2008, www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081216104035.htm.

130 Just as animal species: See Miller,
Mating Mind
, 209.

130 “gift of wine”: Quoted in Arthur Evans,
The God of Ecstasy: Sex-Roles and the Madness of Dionysos
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1988), 58.

130 “rich cream”: Wolkstein and Kromer, eds.,
Inanna
, 33.

130 In rural Peru: Botting and Botting,
Sex Appeal
, 81.

131 “Definitely rich, creamy”: Janelle Dension,
Wilde Thing
(New York: Brava Books/Kensington, 2003), 101.

131 “highly seasoned dishes”: Casanova,
History of My Life
, vol. 7, Introduction, p. 32.

131 He set the table: Flem,
Casanova
, 18.

131 “was never inclined to drink”: Peter Biskin,
Star: How Warren Beatty Seduced America
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010), 18.

131 His fabulous fêtes: Simon Sebag Montefiore,
Potemkin: Catherine the Great’s Imperial Partner
(New York: Vintage Books, 2005), quoted in 339, 341.

132 Food researchers point: See Eleanor Glover, “Rise of the ‘Gastrosexual’ as Men Take Up Cooking in a Bid to Seduce Women,” Mail Online, July 21, 2008, www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1036921/Rise-gastrosexual-men-cooking-bid-seduce-women.html.

132 Allende argues: Isabel Allende,
Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Senses
(New York: HarperFlamingo, 1998), 40.

132 Money, says book: Kate Ashford, “Women, Men & Money—How It Can Muck Up True Love,” HerTwoCents.com, February 15, 2010, interview with Hilary Black, ed.,
The Secret Currency of Love
, www.lemondrop.com/2010/02/15/the-secret-currency-of-love-truth-about-men-women-and-money/.

132 “hedonic treadmill”: The notion of the “hedonic treadmill,” coined by Brickman and Campbell in 1971, argued that increased wealth does not bring a permanent gain in happiness. Instead, we adapt and experience both decreased pleasure and increased desire for more goods. See P. Brickman and D. T. Campbell, “Hedonic Relativism and Planning the Good Society,” in
Adaption Level Theory: A Symposium
(New York: Academic Press, 1971), 287–302.

CHAPTER 4: LASSOING LOVE: THE MIND

134 “Love looks not”: William Shakespeare,
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
, in
Complete Works
, ed. Stanley Wells and Gary Taylor (Oxford: Clarendon Press/Oxford University Press, 1988), act 1, scene 1, line 234.

135 “be fully explained”: Irving Singer,
Sex: A Philosophical Primer
(New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001), 32.

135 Meredith Chivers: See Daniel Bergner, “What Do Women Want?”
New York Times Magazine
, January 25, 2009.

136 conscious part of the female mind: See cognitive neuroscientists Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam,
A Billion Wicked Thoughts: What the World’s Largest Experiment Reveals about Human Desire
(New York: Dutton/Penguin Group, 2011), 76–83, where they discuss this complex neural female operation.

136 “The powers of seduction”:
Juliet of the Spirits
, direc. Frederico Fellini, Rizzoli Film, Francoriz Production, 1965.

136 “Who loves, raves”: Baron George Gordon Byron Byron,
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage: A Romaunt
(London: G. S. Appleton, 1851), canto 4, stanza 123, 182.

137 “The important thing”: Email, May 30, 2009.

137 Romantic love, by nature: Robert Burton,
The Anatomy of Melancholy
, ed. Floyd Dell and Paul Jordan-Smith (New York: Tudor, 1927), 840.

137 “switch on a woman’s libido”: Quoted in Bergner, “What Do Women Want?” 51.

137 Over half of female fantasies: See B. J. Ellis and D. Symons, “Sex-Differences in Sexual Fantasy—An Evolutionary Psychological Approach,”
Journal of Sex Research
27, no. 4 (1990), 527–555; and Bergner, “What Do Women Want?”

137 What a woman craves: Quoted in Bergner, “What Do Women Want?” 51.

138 ardent advance: Stephen Kern,
The Culture of Love: Victorians to Moderns
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), 307.

138 “Let the man”: Ovid,
The Art of Love
, trans. Rolfe Humphries (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1957), 127.

138 Hindu author:
The Complete K
ā
ma S
ū
tra
, trans. Alain Daniélou (Rochester, VT: Park Street Press, 1994), 252.

138 “the door of love’s palace”: Andreas Capellanus,
The Art of Courtly Love
, trans. John Jay Parry (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), 83.

138 “anaemic and tailorish”: Robert Louis Stevenson, “On Falling in Love,” in Jeremy Treglown, ed.,
The Lantern-Bearers and Other Essays
(New York: First Cooper Square Press, 1999), 44, 45.

138 feel only aversion: Henry T. Finck quoted in Elaine Walster, “Passionate Love,” in Bernard I. Murstein, ed.,
Theories of Attraction and Love
(New York: Springer, 1971), 91.

138 males are the seducers: Matt Ridley,
The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature
(New York: HarperCollins, 1993), 178.

138 Fisher traces: Helen Fisher,
Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love
(New York: Henry Holt, 2004), 111.

138 Evolutionary psychologists see: See David M. Buss, who writes that “one strong signal of commitment is a man’s persistence in courtship,” in
The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating
(New York: Basic Books/HarperCollins, 1994), 102–103.

138 Whatever the motive: Louann Brizendine,
The Female Brain
(New York: Broadway Books, 2006), 59.

138 “I am here for you”: Ovid,
Art of Love
, 122.

138 when Freyr: www.hurstwic.org/history/articles/mythology/myths/text/freyr.htm (accessed July 7, 2011).

139 “For pity’s sake”: Chretien de Troyes, “The Knight of the Cart (Lancelot),” in
Arthurian Romances
, trans. William W. Kibler (New York: Penguin, 1991), 214.

139 “violent, unbridled”: Choderlos de Laclos,
Dangerous Liaisons
, trans. P. W. K. Stone (New York: Penguin, 1961), 190.

139 “I shall on no condition”: Ibid., 147.

139 His love is earth-shaking: Madame de Lafayette,
The Princesse de Clèves
, trans. Nancy Mitford (London: Penguin, 1950), 60.

139 “Let’s get some tea”: Mary Wesley,
Not That Sort of Girl
(New York: Penguin Books, 1987), 66.

140 In the first chapter: Maureen Child,
Turn My World Upside Down
(New York: St. Martin’s Paperbacks, 2005), 1.

140 “The man”: Ibid.

140 She crumbles: Mary Jo Putney,
The Rake
(New York: Topaz Books/Penguin, 1998), 172.

140 “intense and aggressive”: Mary Jo Putney, “Welcome to the Dark Side,” in Jayne Ann Krentz, ed.,
Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women: Romance Writers on the Appeal of the Romance
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992), 110.

140 Filippo Strozzi: Georgina Masson,
The Courtesans of the Italian Renaissance
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1975), 95.

140 “That is nonsense”: Giacomo Casanova,
History of My Life
, trans. Willard R. Trask (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1966), vol. 7, chap. 10, pp. 216, 217.

141 “doubts, qualms”: Dan Hofstadter,
The Love Affair as a Work of Art
(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1996), 6.

141 “My whole life”: Benjamin Constant,
Adolphe
, trans. Leonard Tancock (New York: Penguin, 1964), 54, 55.

141 abstract painter fastened on: Ruth Kligman,
Love Affair: A Memoir of Jackson Pollock
(New York: Cooper Square Press, 1974), 31.

141 “I want you”: Quoted in ibid., 41, 44.

142 To nail “targets”: Neil Strauss,
The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists
(New York: HarperCollins, 2005), 21.

142 “will do almost anything”: David DeAngelo, email, June 2, 2007; and
The Tao of Steve
, direc. Jenniphr Goodman, Good Machine, Thunderhead Productions, 2000.

142 According to
Maxim
: Lisa Lombardi, “Conquer Her,”
Maxim
, November 2001, 50.

142 To enamor women: Tom Terell, “Ten Ways to Be a Lover: A Man Looks at Romance Novels,”
Salon
, August 12, 2004, salon.com; and Why Your Wife Won’t Have Sex with You, Julia Grey Blog, http://juliagrey.wordpress.com/contributors-stories/ten-ways-to-be-a-lover-a-man-looks-at-romance-novels/ (accessed April 24, 2012).

142 “
do
appreciate men”: Quoted in Joann Ellison Rodgers,
Sex: A Natural History
(New York: W. H. Freeman Books/Times Books/Henry Holt, 2001), 221.

142 Charleen, a character:
Sherman’s March
, direc. Ross McElwee, First Run Features, 1986.

143 “O flatter me”: William Shakespeare,
Two Gentlemen of Verona
in
Complete Works
, ed. Stanley Wells and Gary Taylor (Oxford: Clarendon Press/Oxford University Press, 1988), act 2, scene 4, line 146.

143 Rolf possesses: Bernard Schlink, “The Other Man,” in
Flights of Love
, trans. John E. Woods (New York: Pantheon, 2001), 138.

143 “I was made”: Ibid., 145, 121.

143 According to erotic theorists: See Robert C. Solomon,
About Love: Reinventing Romance for Our Times
(New York: Touchstone Books/Simon & Schuster, 1988), 40–41, 199, 148, passim; and see Ethel S. Person,
Dreams of Love and Fateful Encounters: The Power of Romantic Passion
(New York: Penguin, 1988), 29, 30, 259, passim, where she points out that a defining premise of romantic love is to be “the most important person in someone else’s life.”

143 “maximizes self-esteem”: Solomon,
About Love
, 199.

143 Some extremists: See Theodor Reik,
Psychology of Sex Relations
(New York: Farrar and Rinehart, 1945), 91, 243.

144 They accord higher importance: See study in Anne M. Doohan and Valerie Mausov, “The Communication of Compliments in Romantic Relationships: An Investigation of Relational Satisfaction and Sex Differences and Similarities in Compliment Behavior,”
Western Journal of Communications
(Salt Lake City) 68, no. 2 (Spring 2004), 170–195.

144 may be flattery-operated: For a summary of the erotic effect of praise on women see Tracy Clark-Flory, “Narcissism: The Secret to Women’s Sexuality!”
Salon
, January 24, 2009, www.salon.com/2009/01/24/female_desire/.

144 “the object of erotic admiration”: Quoted in Bergner, “What Do Women Want?”

144 Beauvoir made the same point: See Simone de Beauvoir, “The Narcissist,” in
The Second Sex
, trans. H. M. Parshley (1952; New York: Vintage Books/Random House, 1988), 629–644.

144 “devil’s gateway”: Church Father Tertullian quoted in Susan Groag Bell, ed.,
Women: From the Greeks to the French Revolution
(Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1973), 85.

144 Fifty-five to eighty percent of women: For the 55 percent figure, see Cindy M. Meston and David M. Buss,
Why Women Have Sex: Women Reveal the Truth about Their Sex Lives, from Adventure to Revenge (and Everything in Between)
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2009), 193. On low female self-esteem, see Ulrich Orth, Kali H. Trzesniewski, and Richard W. Robins, “Self-Esteem Development from Young Adulthood to Old Age: A Cohort-Sequential Longitudinal Study,”
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
98, no. 4 (2010), 645–658.

144 Women are biologically primed: See discussion in Louann Brizendine,
Female Brain
, 40–41. For summary, see Aimee Lee Ball, “Women and the Negativity Receptor,”
O, The Oprah Magazine
, August 2008.

144 “A man can win us”: Geoffrey Chaucer,
The Canterbury Tales
, trans. Nevill Coghill (New York: Penguin, 1958), 283.

144 “applause response”: See Michael R. Liebowitz,
The Chemistry of Love
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1983), 102.

145 We feel exhilarated: Ibid., 91.

145 “Flattery works on the mind”: Ovid,
Art of Love
, 124.

145 “as much as possible”: Quoted in Richard Stengel,
You’re Too Kind
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2002), 155.

145 “What if our strongest wish”: Adam Phillips,
Monogamy
(New York: Vintage Books/Random House, 1996), 43.

145 He’s seconded by many theorists: See, for example, Jean Baudrillard,
Seduction
, trans. Brian Singer (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1990), 68; Solomon,
About Love
, 239; Roland Barthes,
A Lover’s Discourse
, trans. Richard Howard (New York: Hill and Wang, 1978), 19, 28, 158; and Ronald de Sousa, “Love as Theater,” in Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins, eds.,
The Philosophy of (Erotic) Love
(Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1991), 477.

145 worst gaffe: See discussion of the “Above-Average Effect” in 2010
Scientific American
reported in “Health & Science,”
Week
, January 29, 2010, 23.

146 “I marvel at you”:
The Odyssey of Homer
, trans. Allen Mandelbaum (New York: Bantam Classic, 1990), book 6, line 121.

146 The Eve that Milton portrays: For a summary of women’s position in Milton’s England, see Antonia Fraser,
The Weaker Vessel
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984).

146 She will be an “Empress”: John Milton,
Paradise Lost
, ed. Gordon Teskey (New York: W. W. Norton, 2005), 212, 213.

146 He admires her “difference”: Edith Wharton,
Summer
(New York: Harper and Row, 1979), 67.

146 “He was praising her”: Ibid

147 Sukie the town reporter: John Updike,
The Witches of Eastwick
(New York: Ballantine, 1984), 46.

147 They assure her: Gael Greene,
Blue Skies, No Candy
(New York: William Morrow, 1976), 20, 43.

147 She’s “Remarkable”: Ibid. 33.

147 to be a man’s deity: See Denis de Rougemont,
Love in the Western World
, trans. Montgomery Belgion (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983), 260, where he notes that at bottom, “passion requires that the self shall become greater than all things, as solitary and powerful as God.”

147 The “good,” authentic heroes: Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan,
Beyond Heaving Bosoms: The Smart Bitches’ Guide to Romance Novels
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2009), 233.

147 “Rick had been exposed”: Carly Phillips,
The Playboy
(New York: Grand Central, 2003), 13.

147 sailor, meanwhile, is even more: Jill Shalvis,
The Sweetest Thing
(New York: Forever, 2011), 228.

148 Excusing his ardor: Casanova,
History of My Life
, vol. 1, chap. 9, p. 276.

148 “Darling of the English Cleopatra”: Robert Lacey,
Sir Walter Ralegh
(London: Phoenix Press, 1973), 51.

148 The lady was: Gabriele D’Annunzio,
L’Innocente
, trans. Georgina Harding (1892; New York: Hippocrene Books, 1991), 12.

148 “To hear oneself”: Isadora Duncan,
Isadora
(1927 as
My Life
; New York: Award Books, 1968), “Introductory,” 11.

148 Lady Diana Manners: Philip Ziegler,
Diana Cooper
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1982), 94.

149 “the brightest color”: Quoted in ibid., 97.

149 “Two lily hands”: Quoted in John Julius Norwich, ed.,
The Duff Cooper Diaries: 1915–1951
(London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2005), 154.

149 “empress of seduction”: Quoted in Jean Bothorel,
Louise ou la vie de Louise de Vilmorin
(Paris: Gernard Gasset, 1993), 290.

149 “returned [his] kisses”: Norwich, ed.,
Duff Cooper Diaries
, 332.

149 “You are a treasure”: Quoted in Botherel,
Louise ou la vie de Louise de Vilmorin
, 160.

150 With his usual panache: Norwich, ed.,
Duff Cooper Diaries
, 436.