Thoughts on Love: bell hooks and Miriam Toews

Considering some quotes from bell hooks and Miriam Toews.

Jimson Weed, Georgia O'Keeffe 1936

I've been pondering these two quotes from two different books and I don't think they can be reconciled; that hooks' definition or description of love in action can be the same thing as what Toews talks about. To be fair, it's a non-fiction (hooks' book) and a fiction work (Toews' book) I am comparing here, just something to think about I suppose.


Why does the mention of love, the memory of love, the memory of love lost, the promise of love, the end of love, the absence of love, the burning, burning need for love, need to love, result in so much violence?

- from Women Talking by Miriam Toews


When we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another's spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful and abusive. Love and abuse cannot coexist. Abuse and neglect are, by definition, the opposites of nurturance and care.

- from all about love: new visions by bell hooks

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