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Happiness: A History
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Happiness: A History Paperback - 2006

by Darrin M. McMahon

Drawing on numerous sources, including art and architecture, poetry and Scripture, music and theology, literature and myth, McMahon offers a sweeping intellectual history of man's most elusive yet coveted goal--happiness.


From the publisher

Today, human beings tend to think of happiness as a natural right. But they haven't always felt this way. For the ancient Greeks, happiness meant virtue. For the Romans, it implied prosperity and divine favor. For Christians, happiness was synonymous with God. Throughout history, happiness has been equated regularly with the highest human calling, the most perfect human state. Yet it's only within the past two hundred years that human beings have begun to think of happiness as not just an earthly possibility but also as an earthly entitlement, even an obligation. In this sweeping new book, historian Darrin M. McMahon argues that our modern belief in happiness is the product of a dramatic revolution in human expectations carried out since the eighteenth century.
In the tradition of works by Peter Gay and Simon Schama, Happiness draws on a multitude of sources, including art and architecture, poetry and scripture, music and theology, and literature and myth, to offer a sweeping intellectual history of man's most elusive yet coveted goal.

First line

The search for happiness is as old as history itself, one might venture, and in a certain sense that claim would be true.

Details

  • Title Happiness: A History
  • Author Darrin M. McMahon
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition Reprint
  • Pages 560
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Grove Press, New York, New York, U.S.A.
  • Date 2006-12-18
  • ISBN 9780802142894 / 0802142893
  • Weight 1.7 lbs (0.77 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.7 x 6 x 1.4 in (22.10 x 15.24 x 3.56 cm)
  • Themes
    • Ethnic Orientation: Multicultural
  • Library of Congress subjects Happiness - Social aspects, Happiness - History
  • Dewey Decimal Code 170

Media reviews

Citations

  • Christian Century, 12/26/2006, Page 33
  • New York Times, 02/18/2007, Page 28
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