Unforbidden Pleasures

A great deal has been written, by psychoanalysts, among many others, about the pleasures that are forbidden to us. But what of the pleasures that are unforbidden and freely available to all? In his dazzling new book Adam Phillips, beginning with Oscar Wilde, explores the meanings and importance of the Unforbidden, from the fall of our ‘first parents’ Adam and Eve to the work of the great nineteenth- and twentieth-century thinkers. Unforbidden pleasures, he argues, are always the ones we tend not to think about, yet when you look into it, it is probable that we get as much pleasure, if not more, from them. We may have underestimated just how restricted our restrictiveness, in thrall to the Forbidden and its rules, may make us. ‘Phillips is one of the finest prose stylists at work in the language, an Emerson for our time.’ John Banville‘Phillips radiates infectious charm. The brew of gaiety, compassion, exuberance and idealism is heady and disarming.’ Sunday Times‘Startling, rewarding, illuminating, extraordinary. Phillips is one those writers whom it is a pleasure simply to hear think.’ Sunday Telegraph‘Reading Phillips, you may be amused, vexed, dazzled. But the one thing you will never be is bored.’ Observer