How did love – this thing that’s supposed to be beautiful, magical, transformative – turn into a neverending slog? We went searching for answers, and we found them in surprising places. On today’s show: a time-hopping, philosophical journey into the origins of modern love. (This episode first ran as Love, Throughline)

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Guests:

Andrea Wulf, historian and author of Magnificent Rebels: The First Romantics and the Invention of The Self

Moira Weigel, assistant professor at Northeastern University and author of Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating

Veronica Hefner, associate professor and director of the graduate studies in communication at St. Mary’s College of California