What Is Love?

Harvard FAS

What is love, and what can art teach us about it that a psychologist or philosopher never could?What is love? A union of souls? An emotion? An act of willing the good of the other? A bunch of chemicals in the brain? Can we choose whom we love? And what do we even mean when we utter the words — utterly generic and yet, in context, utterly singular — “I love you”? This course will introduce you to one history of answers to this question through great works of Western civilization.Readings…