Rating: 
Summary: Brings up some interesting points about marriage
Review: The author has some interesting things to say about marriage, relationships, and affairs, which makes it worth reading. I would have rated this book higher but found her writing style to not be very readable - as if she's trying to impress someone with her obscure vocabulary. In my opinion a book doesn't have to read like a college textbook to be taken seriously. What the author does well is bring up society's influence upon marriage and how many "truths" we take for granted in relation to love & marriage are actually fads of our society that serve a social/corporate agenda. "Why do we say marriage is work?" "Doesn't it seem exhausting to spend 9 hours a day at work and then have to come home and work at your marriage?" "Couldn't relationships (even marriage) be more fun than work?" "Why are so many modern marriages so lonely and lifeless?" "Does lowering our expectations in marriage also train us to be little corporate sheep with low expectations for work enjoyment and pay?" "Is adultery society's release valve for people to continue with their unhappy, lifeless marriages instead of demanding real change in all areas of their lives?" All this and more. It's a very interesting topic but the author stops short of actually suggesting any possible solutions to our nation's current marriage woes.
Rating: 
Summary: Love American style.
Review: With divorce rates increasing by 30 percent since 1970, Laura Kipnis considers marital dissatisfaction to be a national epidemic in our country. Tossing one cherry bomb after the next at the institution of marriage, her book is not so much a polemic against love, as a brutally honest argument in favor of unconditional love and the pursuit of happiness outside the "domestic gulags" of marriage. Kipnis compares the love-takes-work ethic of marriage to industrial factory work, and entertains the possibility that "there could be forms of daily life based on something other than isolated households and sexually exclusive couples" (p. 179). She calls singles and adulterers "freedom fighters," who have escaped the barbed-wire fences of the Christian model of marriage so deeply ingrained within America, a nation we mustn't forget that was founded on a Declaration of Independence. Kipnis is an academic. Her book is smart and witty. The eight-page catalogue of things you can't do because you're in a couple, but sacrifices we nevertheless make for the sake of companionship and occasional sex (pp. 84-92), will leave more than a few readers questioning the point of romantic relationships altogether. By rattling a few convictions about married life, AGAINST LOVE succeeds at exactly what it sets out to do.G. Merritt
Rating: 
Summary: Overselling Adultery
Review: This long essay (it hardly lays claim to the stature of book) is delightfully well written, and it mounts a very convincing series of arguments against the institution of marriage and the false ideas about the eternality of love that are associated with it. It is certainly well worth the read. Unfortunately, Kipnis' argument that adultery is a significant form of political resistance to oppressive social mores is far less successful than her argument against marriage. While there is undoubtedly a political element to cheating (inasmuch as marriage is an inherently social phenomenon), she wildly overstates its subversive power. In fact, it would not be at all difficult to argue that adultery oftentimes prolongs the misery of a bad marriage. One could even argue that cheating simply carries the delusions typically associated with marriage into non-married territory. People who cheat on their spouses are like the Luddites, the factory workers who attacked the factory machinery instead of the plant owners--their rage is real and valid, but entirely ineffectively directed. Opposed to marriage? Don't get married, and don't hesitate to tell people why you think marriage is a bad idea. Unhappy in a marriage? Get divorced. But whatever you do, don't try to couch fundamental dishonesty in the rhetoric of righteousness (as Kipnis does here)--we get enough of that from our corporate CEOs and politicians.
Rating:
Summary: Stunningly Accurate!
Review: This book is full of unpleasant truths about love. In particular, it lays bare the social context Americans use to justify their overwhelmingly unpleasant domestic unions. The book is fantastically well researched and footnoted, and unapologetic in its treatment of coupledom, the ultimate sacred cow. It portrays modern adultery as a wholly justified reaction to marital frustration and repression. Voluntary yet often-loveless couplings have replaced arranged marriages as the preferred tool for managing property and succession. We have ended male patriarchy only to have men and women as equal patriarchs, controlling each other's behavior and expecting their partners to act as sentries against their petty insecurities. Monogamous marriage has taken on the lexicon of the factory, where long term success in the relationship is "hard work" and expectations have been irrevocably lowered. Adultery thus becomes a cry for help, a cry for change, when families and pair-bonded social networks become the enemy of personal satisfaction (or even feeling alive). The book is often laugh-out-loud funny, especially the list of things you can't do while in a relationship. These few pages alone are worth the price. Kipnis is also politically minded, asking astute questions: Why do [alternative lifestyle folks], who have long enjoyed libidinous freedom, now want so badly to participate in the same repressions as heterosexuals? Instead, why don't activists attempt to decouple access to government benefits from the state of marriage? Why did Americans spend so much energy condemning President Clinton for his adultery, when we all know that politicians are prone to such behavior? Moreover, why didn't Americans instead mount a debate on the merits and hypocrisies of the institution of marriage itself? Kipnis sheds light on what amounts to a national epidemic of dissatisfaction. What is amazing to me is how this book still mirrors society as a whole, in that it is afraid to look for alternatives or solutions. She touches briefly on polygamy and polyandry, and questions why, if consensual, these are so abhorrent to society? There is no mention in the book of any alternative ... lifestyles, such as consensual non-monogamy (open relationship), ethical polyamory, swinging, intimate networks, etc. All of these have pitfalls, to be sure, but certainly no more than traditional marriages. But marriage, it seems to me, will be viewed by our descendents 100 years in the future the same way we now view slavery. If the struggle to end the tyranny of monogamy is a war, this book is certainly the opening salvo. It has touched a nerve and should be applauded by anyone wanting to engage in truthful dialog about this difficult subject. Kipnis concludes the book with an analysis of the double meaning of the title "against love", which can just as easily mean "up against love". Since she is very sketchy with her personal details in the book, one can only imagine the irony of the title has a personal significance. It is a cliche (but true) that we all need love. But this is a great reason to write a book, and I hope her candor helps others to confront the same deep-seated and very human concerns.
Rating: 
Summary: Marriage as a Gulag
Review: Marriage, as the basis of family, is by the far the most venerated social institution in the United States. It is where two uniquely attracted people can supposedly fully realize true love. Yet, half of all marriages do not last. That fact coupled with the actual characteristics of surviving marriages leads the author to a rather strong critique of the entire institution. The author finds that passion and attraction, those things that make courtships so exhilarating and that are considered to be core elements of marriages, disappear rather quickly. Frequently, what remains are relationships bubbling with rancor that have become deadened. All manner of surveillance of the marital partner is used to squash any possibility of infidelity. Large doses of blame are doled out because of perceived failures to attend to, and even anticipate, the psychological and emotional needs of the partner. The reactions are withdrawal, subservience, or hostility. Among the counselor community this state of affairs may need adjustment, but is regarded as basically normal. The author derides the notion that this state of affairs is in any way normal and all that is needed is "hard work" to increase marital harmony. The author compares the control regime and lowered expectations of marriages with workplace environments and even citizenship. In an era of economic dislocation, the admonition to work harder is hardly liberating. Rebels, meaning those who actually attempt to grasp for more and counter established authority, are dealt with harshly. This is the context in which the author places adultery. When passion suddenly appears, many will take large risks to escape marital suffocation. The author, well aware of the risks, does not advocate adultery, but does find it to be far more than a spur-of-the-moment whim. The book is witty and unfortunately captures the reality of many, if not most, marriages. It is a valid criticism to say that the book is one-sided; however, the author does acknowledge that some marriages manage to escape the strangulation syndrome. The writing style is a little difficult, but not impossible. It is pretty hilarious to see some reviewers so offended by the book; if the institution of marriage is so strong, surely it can take hits from critics.
Rating:
Summary: Witty and Blunt
Review: A barbed expose of the myths surrounding the sacred cows of marriage and monogamy. I found myself shaking my head in agreement many times while reading this book. I also laughed until tears rolled down my eyes at the long list of things one mustn't do while in a long-term relationship. The only thing that kept me from giving this book five stars was Kipnis' excessive use of run-on sentences. Otherwise, good job!
Rating:
Summary: Read this Book!
Review: Kipnis (and any author of polemic writing) has one mission; to stir the pot. Kipnis does so with wonderful audacity and biting sarcasm. You might enjoy it even more if you do not agree with her. Regardless, it gets the debate going.
Rating: 
Summary: Infantilism Amok...
Review: Divorce rates are climbing all the time, and now here comes more advice from the unloved that encourages the very selfishnesses that push people apart in the first place. Should we still be dating into our nineties? No doubt Ms. Kipnis will make a bundle writing that book someday.
In the end, families are all we have, and all we can count on, so why throw that away for a date? Better to overcome one's laziness and concentrate on making relationships work. It's not supposed to be easy.
You get what you give in life, unless you can hook people into thinking you're offering something useful, like this book.
Rating:
Summary: The Blind 'I'
Review: Authors sometimes are the last ones to understand their own motivations. Richard Rhodes wrote a book ("Making Love") which is supposed to be a paean to love but is actually one long rationalization for leaving his wife for a much younger woman. Catherine Texier wrote a book about divorce ("Breakup") which was supposed to blame her husband but ends up completely validating his reasons for leaving her. And Laura Kipnis has written "Against Love" which is not so much 'a polemic against love' as a long whiney justification for behaving like a ten-year-old. Her much-vaunted list of "things you cannot do if you're married" reads like a list of pre-teen temper tantrums: leaving dishes in the sink, clothes on the floor, hair in the drain, etc. These have nothing to do with love or marriage, and everything to do with being grown up. Some authors spend years researching the lives of a historical figure in minute detail before writing the definitive biography. The reader of such a tome benefits from the author's hard work by learning something that she otherwise wouldn't. From Kipnis's book I learned nothing -- except that I'd cross the street to avoid meeting her on the sidewalk.
Rating:
Summary: The Case Against the Case Against Love
Review: This polemic has an unusual beginning. It starts off with a short preface reminding readers that it is a polemic and as such is likely to be exaggerated and unfair. Swell. Just what we need, a book that starts off by admitting that it's not really serious. Even worse, this doesn't really modify Laura Kipnis' argument. It is important to note what Kipnis is arguing. She is not arguing that modern marriage is unfair to women. She is not arguing that sentimentality and romanticism are making it hard for real couples to live difficult lives. She is not arguing that public moralism over the fate of the children is used as a substitute for ways to actually help them. She is not arguing that the increasing work week and the demands of employment are making life more difficult for families. She is not even arguing that love is being puffed up as an individualist panacea while ignoring problems that are collective in nature. It is true that through her slim little book she makes allusions to all these arguments. But this is not one of the two much better books on the subject written by Stephanie Coontz. What she is really arguing against is love itself. Kipnis, in other words, is a Christopher Lasch for swingers. The result is, obviously enough, shallow and counterproductive. Kipnis starts off by noting how much the marriage counselling industry makes use of metaphors of work (ie. We all have to work at this relationship). Where Lasch would have commented on the insidiousness of the culture of therapy, and others might have commented on therapists' poor taste and shallowness, Kipnis leaps to the conclusion that love is nothing more than another rationalization of capitalist labor-discipline. In her view love is the most successful of Foucault's self-disciplining traps. One chapter, less than tastefully, is entitled Domestic Gulags, and includes several pages on all the restrictions of a possible marriage. In Kipnis' view adulterers are quasi-utopian rebels whose desire could potentially be liberating for all. It should be pointed out that there is little serious discussion of why people get divorced in America (and even less in the rest of the world). Her facile treatment of love in the past assumes that modern matrimonial love is a modern invention: but she only mentions the somewhat outdated historians Philippe Aries and Lawrence Stone. Only once does she mention children, largely to quickly dismiss it. She also is critical of prosecutions for polygamy, strikingly unaware of both its gender bias and its contractual inequality (men get the benefit of several women, and in Utah anyway it is the man, not the woman, who decides who gets to be the new wife. What kind of contract is that?) Now Lasch himself could, in his later years, be unsympathetic, judgemental and overly romantic about his lower middle class subjects. But he would also point out the flaw that if divorce and adultery are somehow "radical," why have they increased at the same time the Republican Party has moved from triumph to triumph? Kipnis looks vaguely radical, and she makes brief allusions to Marx, Thompson and Jameson, but her account is more like Ayn Rand. The core of Marxism is that because human beings are social animals, the full self-expression of any individual is only possible with the help, and the respect for, other human beings. It is for this reason that the socialist tradition has been sceptical about sexual promiscuity. Kipnis has written a book in which the only pleasure of one's company is sex, and cannot conceive that other people are needed to make one truly human. In this way the comparison with Rand, who saw people only as disciples or acolytes, is even stronger. Moreover, Kipnis is self-refuting. Since part of the pleasure of adultery consists of the delirium of falling in love, devaluing love will only devalue adultery.
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