Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Daniel Burston (Duquesne University)
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Throughout the ages, there have been two schools of thought on the nature of love. One holds that love is an involuntary passion that springs from an inner sense of lack and thrives on illusions. Plato, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Freud and Lacan all subscribe to this point of view. By this account, love is “blind”, and therefore the adversary of reason or of the sober realism that characterizes the “lover of wisdom”. The other school, represented by Max Scheler, Martin Buber and Erich Fromm, claims that love includes a strong element of volition, is a creature of abundance and bestows insight that is impossible to achieve in any other way. From this perspective, a truly loving disposition and a truth-loving disposition generally go hand in hand. Therefore, Fromm rejected…

1923 words

Citation: Burston, Daniel. "The Art of Loving". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 November 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=16627, accessed 29 March 2024.]

16627 The Art of Loving 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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