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Dewey Decimal Number: 809.933538 EAN: 9780151001033 ISBN: 0151001030 Label: Harcourt Manufacturer: Harcourt Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 276 Publication Date: March 29, 1995 Publisher: Harcourt Studio: Harcourt Editorial Review: Product Description: A collection of nine essays explores the intimate connection among sex, eroticism, and love and features a short history of love and eroticism in literature that provides insight into such works as Madame Bovary, Ulysses, and Plato's Symposium. Related Items:      see moreAverage Rating:
 Rating:  - Amazing study of .. being human.Fundamental, authoritative, thoughtful and insightful, with a truly scholarly study of the history and literature of Love and Eroticism (attraction, desire). rendered delightfully accessible by a master writer, poet, and student of Love. Octavio Paz's work continues to prove his genius and well-deserved respect and multi-facted successes. Rating:  - ENIGMATICA powerful tale of life, love , perplexing yet unifying emotions in beings from different times and different cultures. Masterful. A must read. Rating: - A Book to Be Absorbed - The Education of ErosI read this book slowly, underlining passages, re-reading certain passages to fully absorb the text. Paz is a passionate poet/thinker and his passionate prose is translated well into English by Helen Lane. He knows what he loves and his ability to both entertain and edify is outstanding. Like most surveys of Western Culture/History, he begins in Greece and traverses the centuries by exploring the trends, ideas and influences that resonate with love and eros from throughout the world. Plato's discussion on the love of beauty is here as is India's Kama Sutra and so forth. He discusses the role of the Troubadours in Provence, Courtly Love, Medieval Love, Dante, all the way up to the modern psychology of Freud and beyond. He is both a historian and interpreter, a critic and a specialist. In discussing our modern understanding of love, he too comments on 'eros' being prostituted by the mass market world we live in. Pornography is put under the mental microscope as is the abuse of sexual images used in advertising. The greatest present threat to eros and love is not the Church, Paz claims but promiscuity itself, turning 'love into a pastime, and money'. I am in complete agreement. The sacred, which was once so much a part of eros has been slackened and taken away. There is great truth in this book and beauty and a call to everyone to strive towards learning, not only about the world but about one's self. Paz reminds the reader of how greatly cultured our world is, how we are indebted to the minds of past artists and thinkers, how love and eros have benefited from mythology and the cultivation of narration and poetry. It is up to us to make sure we don't take for granted this great bounty of works and ideas. Rating: - Eroticism: In Its Finest FormThe big bang of my holiday reading began with ever-enigmatic Octavio Paz's another master piece, "The Double Flame". A three hundred sixty degree recount of history and genre of Love & Eroticism. During his diplomatic job at India, being inspired by the Buddhist erotic statues of Karli (alas the other Mecca of history & culture that I never had a chance to visit), Octavio wanted to write a 100 page polemic on this subject. He waited almost 15 years. Finally in 1993, wrote this 276 page authoritative, eclectic, mesmerizing and fascinating book. I found Paz always dwells on this interesting issue. In his poems about India such as Mathura and Vridabaan, Octavio brings the erotic images of ancient India as living objects. But through this book only I discovered the depth and breath of his reading on this occult issue. Beginning with Plato's Symposium, Paz gives us a short history of love and eroticism in literature throughout the ages. From Greeko-Alexandria to Roman-Europe to Tantrik Bengal, Octavio swims us through every current and under current of human sexuality. To him, eroticism to sexuality is same as poetry to language. The courtly love in Heian Japan to twelfth century amorous lit of France, Paz is everywhere. It helped me understand Baudelaire better. It explains the erotic nuances of Madame Bovary and Ulysses. The Double Flame is translated to English by Helen Lane and published by Harcourt Brace & Company. Rating:  - Insights from one of Latin America's greatest poet-essayists"The Double Flame: Love and Eroticism," by Octavio Paz, is an impressive prose exploration of the title subject. The book has been translated from Spanish into English by Helen Lane. In this extended multi-part essay, Paz considers the presence of love, eroticism, and related phenomena in literary works that span many cultures and centuries: the biblical Song of Songs, the writings of the Marquis de Sade, Joyce's "Ulysses," Murasaki Shikubu's "Tale of Genji," Mohammed Ibn Dawud's "Book of the Flower," the poems of Sappho, and much more. Paz also considers a wide range of other social and scientific phenomena that are relevant to his project: the "Big Bang" theory, the AIDS crisis, artificial intelligence, the Buddhist concept of Nirvana, the "Luciferian" movement in art, and more. Occasionally, Paz seems to be a little too full of himself; he sometimes issues pronouncements on highly debatable points as if they were undebatable facts. But his overall passion and intelligence make these occasional lapses forgivable. "The Double Flame" is also rich in what I call "Pazisms": characteristically witty, wise, and highly quotable statements. Here's one of my favorite Pazisms: "Love has been and is still the great act of subversion in the West" (from the 5th chapter, "A Solar System"). If you are interested in love and eroticism, in the art of nonfiction prose, or in Latin American literature, check out this book. |
Sales of semiconductors in November indicate that consumer products such as LCD (liquid crystal display) TVs, digital music players, and other devices sold well during the holidays, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said Monday.
November chip sales rose 2.3 percent year-on-year to $23.1 billion, the SIA said.
Unit demand has far outpaced last year. But falling chip prices have hurt industry revenue, the chip association said. For example, DRAM (dynamic RAM) bit shipments grew 25 percent in the three months through mid-December, but average selling prices have declined 20 percent over the same period.
The association also noted that rising energy prices and concerns about the sub-prime lending issue in the U.S. do not appear to have had a significant impact on consumer spending for the holidays, the SIA said. The group reiterated its forecast that worldwide semiconductor sales will reach a new record in 2007. But it will take a stronger than expected December selling season to reach the 3.8 percent growth goal the group had forecast earlier this year, the SIA said.
Investment banking firm Credit Suisse was not as optimistic as the SIA.
The November data was below normal seasonal trends, noted analyst John Pitzer, in a report on Monday. Even if December reaches its normal seasonal growth, 2007 industry revenue will only reach $255.7 billion, up 3.2 percent over last year. The growth percentage would fall short of the SIA's 3.8 percent target.
The slow November prompted Credit Suisse to lower its 2008 chip industry revenue forecast to 9.4 percent year-on-year growth, down from a previous target of 13 percent.
