Name: Mating in Captivity
Rating: 4.192857142857143 (70 reviews)
ISBN: 9780060753634

Esther Perel

A guide for loving couples who are looking to renew sexual passion in their lives explains how societal taboos and ideals about domestic equality have compromised the healthy expression of eroticism in today's relationships, in a resource that explains how to overcome personal constraints for greater intimacy. 40,000 first printing.

Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic

Mating in Captivity

Bastien Vaucher

Erotic intimacy holds the double promise of finding oneself and losing oneself. It is an experience of merging and of total self-absorption, of mutuality and selfishness. To be inside another and inside ourselves at the same time is a double stance that borders on the mystical. The momentary oneness we feel with our beloved grows out of our ability to acknowledge our indissoluble separateness. In order to be one, you must first be two.

Rather than inhibiting a couple's sexuality, recognizing the third has a tendency to add spice, not least because it reminds us that we do not own our partners. We should not take them for granted. In uncertainty lies the seed of wanting. In addition, when we establish psychological distance, we, too, can peek at our partner with the admiring eyes of a stranger, noticing once again what habit has prevented us from seeing. Finally, renouncing others reaffirms our choice. He is the one I want. We admit our roving desires, yet push them back. We flirt with them, all the while keeping them at a safe distance. Perhaps this is another way of looking at maturity: not as passionless love, but as love that knows of other passions not chosen.

Greg Talbot

"There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it." Oscar Wilde “In the crooks of your body, I find my religion.” Sappho "We want it all, and we want it all with one person" (p.242). And with this expectation, Perel guides us through adventures of romance, infatuation, eroticism and matrimony to share insights into how modern couples work toward the womb-like serenity we believe we can find. Although, where we find it seems near impossible for many of us. Our expectation is "the one". Marriage no long about a finding a respectful partner for a business relationship..but the ultimate source of connection in friendship, sexual partnership, co-partner, co-financier, spiritual companion and completing us in our own unique way. Despite the general promiscuous culture, and endlessly swiping, this person fills more illusive than ever. And that ever unsteady balance between concupiscence and steadfast weaves through our desires. "The grand illusion of love is that we think our partners are ours. In truth, their seperateness is unassailable, and their mystery forever ungraspable. As soon as we begin to understand this, sustained desire becomes a real possibility (p.235)." Perel reaches deeper than columnist editorializing or reductive prescriptive solutions for couples to make a long-term relationship. She starts by analyzing the real disease of our western culture - our spiritual and social isolation from community, deep relationships and existential meaning. And this attempt to understand ourselves, and our families and our habits, and really what it is we are looking for anyway. Do we understand the ever-present shadow of the third party ready to enliven or rob a couple of happiness? Do we understand why deep erotic fantasy is readily looked for outside the wedding vows? This examination of reality and fantasy is both the source of deep marital bliss and deep discordant separation. Sex is an area we demand little explaination or genuine interest from. Our culture is far from open or sexually positive. Taboos are exploitation for advertising. Sexual desire something for immature teenagers or perverts. And sexuality still is something reserved as a minor in a married or committed couples toolbox for family or expectation. Like many questions of identity, what we find from sex may surprise us. Our values and desires may conflict. Our ideas of the sacred and the pleasurable may be unbridgeable. The boundaries between fantasy and genuine well-being may be bridged or walled up by shame depending on our honest communcation with them. The invitation to see sex as a language, desire it's ever-present creative instrument and spiritual union toward a both a selfish and selfless pairing may await us.

One of the world’s most respected voices on erotic intelligence, Esther Perel offers a bold, provocative new take on intimacy and sex. Mating in Captivity invites us to explore the paradoxical union of domesticity and sexual desire, and explains what it takes to bring lust home. Drawing on more than twenty years of experience as a couples therapist, Perel examines the complexities of sustaining desire. Through case studies and lively discussion, Perel demonstrates how more exciting, playful, and even poetic sex is possible in long-term relationships. Wise, witty, and as revelatory as it is straightforward, Mating in Captivity is a sensational book that will transform the way you live and love.

Unlocking Erotic Intelligence

Tim Pendry

Now this really could be a life-changing book if it hit the right person at the right time. The thesis is simple and powerful and the only problem with the book is that the personal stories pad out a simple message. What Perel does is undermine the more dumb-ass aspects of the Anglo-Saxon approach to psychological fidelity and relationships in favour of a more European view that permits play, calculated deceit and fantasy in a way that is really quite shocking to contemporary femino-liberalism. She is right and the tight-buttocked 'liberals' are wrong - the divorce rate and lack of ability to talk about sexuality with any erotic wisdom amongst grown persons is proof enough that she has identified a problem that is endemic to contemporary liberal culture. This book is like Bataille without the neurosis and nasty bits and written with compassion as a challenge to generations of learned behaviour. Recommended as liberating. But it could have been snappier and less eager to join the self-help shelves in the book store. What is it with psychotherapists that they have to talk down to us?

Emily Burns

I've listened to Esther Perel on so many podcasts I have lost count; it felt like the right time to dive in to one of her books. I listened to the audiobook so it was a breezy listening experience that didn't result in weird looks on the subway! Such a great complement to other books in the category (ie. Emily Nagoski's Come As You Are) without being repetitive, and sheds plenty of light on the intricacies and complexities of the erotic and the domestic.

Bouke van der Bijl

The contents of the book is fine, with some good suggestions based on the observations the author has made over many years of being a relationship therapist—e.g. recognize that there's a difference between intimacy and eroticism and that it's important for a couple to maintain their individual identities to keep some tension in the relationship. What I found really annoying however is that this is such a Quote Book. The author sprinkles random quotes all over the book from lots of different sources in an attempt to add legitimacy to the book, when it could stand on its own just fine. There's even a quote from Benjamin Franklin! Why!

I couldn’t put it down! I was fun to read about it other couples’ sexual situations and see how I could relate to them. I also like the subtle insights to the norms and taboos of different cultures.

Amelia Pokorny

When you love someone, how does it feel? And when you desire someone, how is it different? In Mating in Captivity, Esther Perel looks at the story of sex in committed couples. Modern romance promises it all - a lifetime of togetherness, intimacy and erotic desire. In reality, it's hard to want what you already have. Our quest for secure love conflicts with our pursuit of passion. And often, the very thing that got us to into our relationships - lust - is the one thing that goes missing from them. Determined to reconcile the erotic and the domestic, Perel explains why democracy is a passion killer in the bedroom. Argues for playfulness, distance, and uncertainty. And shows what it takes to bring lust home. Smart, sexy and explosively original, Mating in Captivity is the monogamist's essential bedside read.

How to keep desire and passion alive in long-term relationships

Kat A

Keep an open mind while reading this (especially the bits concerning Freud) but I did find this book fascinating with a lot of ideas and insight to take into a long term relationship or marriage. Also think that lots of good discussion for partners who are open about their relationship and sex life can come from this book. 

I'd also highly recommend it to Americans as Perel is European and discusses differences she sees in American vs European relationships when it comes to sex. Super interesting.

Madison Aumua

Honestly so many mind blowing and much needed lessons gain through reading this. Definitely not light reading but really great and informative non fiction if you’re feeling like learning more about relationships and yourself.

Luke Kanies

I think this book would be useful to pretty much anyone who's in a long-term relationship.

I found it helpful enough that I read most of it twice. Yes, there is some useful actual advice in here, but so much of it is really about giving you a space to think about a big part of your life, that you probably don't otherwise have space or time for.

I can't speak to other countries, but in the US, it's nearly impossible to have healthy conversations about sex, either around or within relationships. This book went a long ways toward helping me think about my life and my relationship in a better way. If nothing else, it was an exercise in empathy, in learning to think far more about what the other person is thinking, which is very hard to do when you've known someone as long as I have known my wife. It's easy to believe you know; much harder to think deeply about it.

Dani C

An absolute must read for any aspiring relationship or sex therapist, psychologist, or coach. And a great read for anyone wanting to bring the heat back into their relationship. Perel speaks intelligently and without bias, providing wisdom on how to regain and accept our freedom to be the erotic, sexual beings that we are in a way that nurtures the relationships we're in while acknowledging that each individual has their own, autonomous desires as well.

Eva Cace

When you love someone, how does it feel? And when you desire someone, how is it different? Looks at the story of sex in committed couples.

Mating in Captivity Reconciling the Erotic and the Domestic

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