Masques and their function in The Tempest

http://shakespeare.let.uu.nl/masque.htm

What is love?

Love according to... Christianity

The Christian understanding is that love comes from God. The love of man and woman—eros in Greek—and the unselfish love of others (agape), are often contrasted as "ascending" and "descending" love, respectively, but are ultimately the same thing.
There are several Greek words for "love" that are regularly referred to in Christian circles.

• Agape: In the New Testament, agapē is charitable, selfless, altruistic, and unconditional. It is parental love, seen as creating goodness in the world; it is the way God is seen to love humanity, and it is seen as the kind of love that Christians aspire to have for one another.^[29]
• Phileo: Also used in the New Testament, phileo is a human response to something that is found to be delightful. Also known as "brotherly love."
• Two other words for love in the Greek language, eros (sexual love) and storge (child-to-parent love), were never used in the New Testament.

Saint Augustine says that one must be able to decipher the difference between love and lust. Lust, according to Saint Augustine, is an overindulgence, but to love and be loved is what he has sought for his entire life. He even says, “I was in love with love.” Finally, he does fall in love and is loved back, by God. Saint Augustine says the only one who can love you truly and fully is God, because love with a human only allows for flaws such as “jealousy, suspicion, fear, anger, and contention.” According to Saint Augustine, to love God is “to attain the peace which is yours.” (Saint Augustine's Confessions)

In Christianity the practical definition of love is best summarised by St. Thomas Aquinas, who defined love as "to will the good of another," or to desire for another to succeed. This is the explanation of the Christian need to love others, including their enemies. As Thomas Aquinas explains, Christian love is motivated by the need to see others succeed in life, to be good people.

 

Love according to... the Greeks

Greek distinguishes several different senses in which the word "love" is used:
Agape means love in modern-day Greek. The term s'agapo means I love you in Greek. It generally refers to a "pure," ideal type of love, rather than the physical attraction suggested by eros. It has also been translated as "love of the soul."
Eros is passionate love, with sensual desire and longing. The Greek word erota means in love. Plato refined his own definition. Although eros is initially felt for a person, with contemplation it becomes an appreciation of the beauty within that person, or even becomes appreciation of beauty itself. Eros helps the soul recall knowledge of beauty and contributes to an understanding of spiritual truth. Lovers and philosophers are all inspired to seek truth by eros. Some translations list it as "love of the body."

Philia a dispassionate virtuous love, was a concept addressed and developed by Aristotle. It includes loyalty to friends, family, and community, and requires virtue, equality, and familiarity. Philia is motivated by practical reasons; one or both of the parties benefit from the relationship. It can also mean "love of the mind."
Storge is natural affection, like that felt by parents for offspring.
Xenia, hospitality, was an extremely important practice in Ancient Greece. It was an almost ritualized friendship formed between a host and his guest, who could previously have been strangers. The host fed and provided quarters for the guest, who was expected to repay only with gratitude. The importance of this can be seen throughout Greek mythology—in particular, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.

Also...Socrates, in Plato's "Symposium", explained two types of love or Eros—Vulgar Eros (earthly love )and Divine Eros (divine love). Vulgar Eros is nothing but mere material attraction towards a beautiful body for physical pleasure and reproduction. Divine Eros begins the journey from physical attraction i.e. attraction towards beautiful form or body but transcends gradually to love for Supreme Beauty. This concept of Divine Eros is later transformed into the term Platonic love, a type of love that is chaste and non-sexual. The term is named after Plato, who was the first to describe this kind of love..

 

Love according to... psychologists

Compassionate vs. Passionate Love (Elaine Hatfield)

There are two basic types of love: compassionate love and passionate love. Compassionate love is characterized by mutual respect, attachment, affection and trust. Compassionate love usually develops out of feelings of mutual understanding and shared respect for one another.

Passionate love is characterized by intense emotions, sexual attraction, anxiety, and affection. When these intense emotions are reciprocated, people feel elated and fulfilled. Unreciprocated love leads to feelings of despondence and despair.
Hatfield suggests that passionate love is transitory, usually lasting between 6 and 30 months.
Hatfield also suggests that passionate love arises when cultural expectations encourage falling in love, when the person meets your preconceived ideas of an ideal love, and when you experience heightened physiological arousal in the presence of the other person.
Ideally, passionate love then leads to compassionate love, which is far more enduring. While most people desire relationships that combine the security and stability of compassionate with the intensity of passionate love, Hatfield believes that this is rare.

The Colour Wheel Model of Love (John Lee)

In his 1973 book The Colors of Love, John Lee compared styles of love to the color wheel. Just as there are three primary colors, Lee suggested that there are three primary styles of love. These three styles of love are: (1) Eros, (2) Ludos and (3) Storge.
Lee proposed that just as primary colors can be combined to create complementary colors, these three primary styles of love could be combined to create nine different secondary love styles. For example, a combination of Eros and Ludos results in Mania, or obsessive love.
Lee’s 6 Styles of Loving

• Three primary styles:
  1. Eros – Loving an ideal person
  2. Ludos – Love as a game
  3. Storge – Love as friendship
• Three secondary styles:
  1. Mania (Eros + Ludos) – Obsessive love
  2. Pragma (Ludos + Storge) – Realistic and practical love
  3. Agape (Eros + Storge) – Selfless love

Different types of love

Courtly love: http://www.britannica.com/topic/courtly-love




Pygmalion: Falling in love with your creation (http://www.shmoop.com/pygmalion-myth/)




Neoplatonic love: Beauty is God (http://www.slideshare.net/mjarry/neoplatonism)




Petrarchan Lover: Unrequited Love (see below)

The Petrarchan Lover suffers from unrequited love—the love is not returned or reciprocated, loves from afar. Often the object of love doesn’t even know someone is pining for her.

Idealizes—falls in love with an ideal, a vision of perfection, rather than a human being with strengths AND weakness. Falls in love with an idea—an idea of a person, the idea of love.

Idolizes—Turns the lover into an idol, an object of worship. Puts the lover on a pedestal (she’s high above/he’s a lowly peon), worships her from afar, compares her to a goddess or something holy.

This is not truly love. This is infatuation.

Infatuation—in love with the idea of love rather than a real person/ is in love with love/ is in love with longing rather than having

Language—Devices

• uses blazon to catalogue physical beauty and physical characteristics (similes and metaphors)
• uses conceit—exaggerated metaphors
• uses elaborate, flowery, exaggerated, embellished, artificial language
  Petrarchan love is not a sexual love.

Shakespeare on Lust

SONNET 129

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action; and till action, lust
Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust,
Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight,
Past reason hunted, and no sooner had
Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait
On purpose laid to make the taker mad;
Mad in pursuit and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;
A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe;
Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream.
   All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
   To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

Five theories on love

Five theories

Atwood on 'Why we need science fiction'

Pre-mock gold dust. Thanks Ms Robinson...


http://www.theguardian.com/film/2005/jun/17/sciencefictionfantasyandhorror.margaretatwood

Atwood talks about Handmaid's Tale

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02r76k2

Creepy? Or brilliant?

How might an article like this inform how you write about the modern context in which a book like Frankenstein is received (AO1)?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/12133410/British-scientists-granted-permission-to-genetically-modify-human-embryos.html

Power and repression is an internal dynamic, too!