Marriage, a History: How Love Conquered Marriage

What it is about

Stephanie Coontz’s Marriage, a History traces marriage as an institution for property, alliance, labour, and legitimate children long before it was widely organised around love. The later chapters follow the rise of the love-based, more equal, and more exit-prone marriage of the last two centuries, including debates over divorce and same-sex marriage. A Chinese edition has also appeared as 婚姻简史. This guide uses the later mainland title. The book explains change; it does not restore a golden age.

Questions it can answer

• When, historically, did marrying for love become a common expectation rather than a risk?
• Why can a more equal and affectionate marriage also be easier to leave?
• Which present arguments about marriage depend on a past that the record does not support?

What you will not find

• Exercises for a couple’s next quarrel
• A defence of one legal definition of marriage as timeless
• A how-to for courtship