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HOW
IT'S DONE
SEX
AT THE TIME OF ULYSSES
Another
element that comes into play is the very nature of the sentiment
of love. We are used to considering our amorousness as peculiar
to humanity at all times, but this isn't so. Romantic love is a
modern concept, like the dishwasher and the telephone.
In the Iliad and the Odyssey, for example, we don't find a single
word about love as 'falling in love'. We find seduction, betrayal,
desire, but there is no romantic love. Penelope is a faithful woman
in a heroic way to Ulysses, but she is not madly in love.
Penelope is faithful because this is her social role as a wife,
her honour. Likewise Hector goes to his death to follow his sense
of honour. Primitive societies think of the individual as a single
person - with doubts, feelings, and afflictions.
Humanity doesn't begin to tell of men and women who act under the
thrust of their personal impulses until Shakespeare who invents
romantic love between Romeo and Juliet and sings of their sentiment
that renders the song of birds wonderful.
I am not saying that before then nobody was in love. I simply mean
that falling in love was unknown as a 'cultural phenomenon' within
society, just like today the period between love at first sight
and the relationship in crisis remains unknown.
A large number of our difficulties in love relationships stem from
the fact that they are new problems, which our ancestors never dealt
with seriously.
These problems didn't exist in the past at all, since the function
of marriage was never the search for and the development of mutual
pleasure. The purpose of marriage was economical and social. Life
as a couple was the first level of the organization of work.
Man specializes in the production of goods; woman in the production
of services. In this way, humanity has been able to increas its
productive capabilities enormously.
The idea of pleasure in life as a couple is the offspring of post-war
leisure time, of the 8 hour day, of the mechanization of work, and
of weekends. When people worked 12 hours a day and did everything
with muscle power, they were so tired at night that the only pleasure
was to eat and sleep. At most, a quickie. They had neither the time
or the energy to ask themselves if there was true love. The idea
of divorce was a rich man's idea. It is only recently that the idea
of "finding someone with whom to live happily" has developed.
Well... what prevents us from finding a solution?
Essentially nothing. If your relationship with someone grows and
you enjoy yourselves, there won't be an Inquisition that will persecute
you or accuse you of witchcraft. At most, they will envy you.
(Continue)
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