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Title: Marriage and Morals by Bertrand Russell Russell, Bertrand Arthur Russell ISBN: 0-87140-211-4 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: March, 1970 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.4 (5 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Provocative
Comment: It's hard not to cheer when you realize Russell wrote so forward-thinking a piece in the late '20s. Its ideas are still being debated today, especially in light of the recent trend toward opting out of conventional, legally bound marriages in Western countries. As a married man myself, I found Russell's condemnation of conventional sexual morality quite convincing. He doesn't advocate immature hedonism, nor does he pardon all infidelity. He actually favors marriage when children are involved. He simply rocks the foundation of marriage on Christian asceticism ('fornication is sin') and the need for certain paternity. He gives an anthropological & historical perspective on the issue that is broader than anything you're likely to hear in current debates.
My only complaint with this otherwise provocative & well-reasoned work is that some of his commentary borders on anti-Catholic. I'm not Catholic myself, but I couldn't help but wonder whether some of his persistent jabs at the Church weren't motivated by a prejudice common at that time. That isn't to say he doesn't critique Protestant morality as well, but he seems to take inordinate glee in poking the Vatican.
Rating: 4
Summary: Marriage & Morals
Comment: I found this book very well-written and full of information about the history of marriage, sexual ethics, and morals. Bertrand, in his usual style, examines the social problems of his time and why they exist. This book was written in 1929, but is still logical and modern in thinking. Bertrand wittily and cynically speaks out against the restrictive dogmas of sex and love: ?It would seem that it is only with the introduction of the patriarchal system that men came to desire virginity in their brides. Where the matrilineal system exists young women sow their wild oats as freely as young men, but this could not be tolerated when it became of great importance to persuade women that all intercourse outside of marriage is wicked.? I strongly recommend this book for anyone doing a research paper on love, marriage, or sexual ethics. If you?re looking for something to make you think, it?s also a great book. I give it four out of five stars.
Rating: 4
Summary: A Curious Book
Comment: At first blush it looked like Russell wrote this book after having an extra-marital affair!
It's perhaps one of the greatest ironies with homosapiens that while they themselves will not always avoid adultry, they will never tolerate it when it's commited by their partner.
Even then the proposition that infidelity in marriage, since it cant be elliminated, should be tolerated is not a feasible solution not only from purely moral view point but also when human character is viewed in the light of evolutionary biology - men will not tolerate it because they will end up investing in others' offspring, and women because they will loose social and material resources to raise theirs.
Our capacity to form moral judgement (as on pre- , post-marital sex) developed much later than when we developed the strategies for reproductive success. It remains this constant struggle between our morality and our nature that will continue to trouble all those who concern themselves to give, or have, an explicit answer.
Perhaps the answer is in that immortal line of Forester (_African Queen_): "Nature, Mr. Allnut, is what we were put on this earth to rise above."
That aside, despite being written eighty years ago it's still a good book especially for readers from oriental part of this world.
Read it if you have not read on this topic.
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Title: Why I Am Not a Christian : And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects by Bertrand Russell ISBN: 0671203231 Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: 30 October, 1967 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Conquest of Happiness by Bertrand Arthur Russell ISBN: 0871401622 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: February, 1996 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Bertrand Russell on Ethics, Sex, and Marriage by Al Seckel, Bertrand Arthur Russell ISBN: 0879754001 Publisher: Prometheus Books Pub. Date: June, 1987 List Price(USD): $24.00 |
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Title: Religion and Science by Bertrand Arthur Russell, Michael Ruse ISBN: 0195115511 Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: March, 1997 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays by Bertrand Arthur Russell ISBN: 0415109248 Publisher: Routledge Pub. Date: December, 1994 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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