A wide-ranging and eclectic collection of short stories on the theme of love in its various forms: romantic, erotic, impossible, undying and exhausted. No other aspect of the human experience regularly inspires such an outpouring of poetry, prose and philosophy as love. From passionate declarations to clinical analysis, writers of every age have been fascinated, tormented and inspired by love. This beautifully produced collection of short stories will combine the best of contemporary and classic fiction on the theme of love, from Catullus to Alice Munro. Edited and introduced by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of 'Middlesex', this wonderfully heterodox look at love will include, amongst others, 'A Rose for Emily' by William Faulkner, 'The Lady with the Lapdog' by Anton Chekhov and stories by Lorrie Moore, Milan Kundera and Guy de Maupassant.

«When it comes to love, there are a million theories to explain it», notes the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Middlesex in his introduction to this collection of love stories from literature. «But when it comes to love stories, things are simpler. A love story can never be about full possession. Love stories depend on disappointment, on unequal births and feuding families, on matrimonial boredom and at least one cold heart. Love stories, nearly without exception, give love a bad name.» Here then are 27 such cures for lovesickness and antidotes to adultery — by Harold Brodkey, Grace Paley, William Faulkner, James Joyce, Milan Kundera, and Vladimir Nabokov.»