Free How the French Invented Love by Marilyn Yalom

Prince de Clèves had not managed to lead his princess into the Land of Tenderness.
    And now, of course, a third party enters the scene. The Duc de Nemours, the most handsome and attractive man at court, meets the princess in a thoroughly romantic manner: without ever having seen her before, he is ordered by the king to dance with her at a betrothal ball for the king’s daughter, Claude de France. This fairy-tale meeting amid a crowd of awed admirers can lead in only one direction. Predictably, Monsieur de Nemours falls wildly in love with the princess, and the rest of the book describes his ill-fated attempts to claim her as his own. Or, in the language of the seventeenth century, Nemours plays the game of galanterie with a mastery unequaled by anyone else at court, and yet he fails to obtain the rewards he considers his due.
    Why not? That is the essential question one asks after finishing the book. It is not because the princess is lacking in passion; the intense arousal sparked by the Duc de Nemours bears no resemblance to the sexless feelings she has for her husband. No, indeed. Little by little, she comes to know the joys and torments of burning love for a man who is the darling of the French court and even a candidate for the hand of the queen of England, Elizabeth I. For the first time in her life, the princess conceals her feelings. But her mother is no fool, and she begins to suspect her daughter’s budding love. Worry about her daughter precipitates her sudden illness and contributes to her decline, but before she dies, she makes sure that the princess becomes fully aware of the dangers before her. “You have an inclination for M. de Nemours; I do not ask you to confess it to me . . . you are on the edge of a precipice.” Madame de Chartres counsels her daughter to withdraw from the court in order to avoid “the miseries of a love affair.”
    While the loss of her mother causes the princess great affliction, it also strengthens her will to resist the Duc de Nemours’ advances. As a narrative strategy, the mother’s death is a form of sacrifice for the good of her daughter, who retreats to the country and clings to her husband more than ever in the hope that her attachment to him will provide a defense against the duke. But in time, the prince and princess are obliged to return to the court, and she is once again confronted with the duke’s winning ways.
    He manages to declare his love to her in the oblique manner favored by les précieuses . “There are women to whom one dares give no sign of the passion one feels for them. . . . Since we dare not let them see we love them, we should at least like them to see that we have no desire to be loved by anyone else.”
    If anyone today were to declare his love in this manner, we would think of him as peculiar, if not downright zany. We would find such speech roundabout and devious. American men tend to be more laconic in their expressions of love, however sincere. And what about Frenchmen today? Do they still practice an art of verbal gallantry meant to please the ladies? Some do, particularly older men of the educated classes, for whom le bon mot —the clever phrase—is still a must. It is still not uncommon for Frenchmen to make advances in a flowery style they learned from the classical texts they read in school. “ Madame s’amuse à Paris avec nos hommes galants? ” (“Madame is having a good time in Paris with our gallant men?”) “ Cette robe a été faite exprès pour rehausser la couleur de vos yeux. ” (“That dress was made specially to bring out the color of your eyes.”) “ Votre passion pour la littérature française nous honore. Et le plaisir? ” (“Your passion for French literature honors us. And what about pleasure?”) Pleasure? In French, the word for “pleasure” has a distinctly sexual connotation. I knew exactly what that gentleman had in mind, just as the princess knew exactly what the duke was saying.
    Despite her good