Marital Misconceptions

"In recent decades," Stephanie Coontz writes, "many parts of the world have seen a revival of the more pernicious form of nostalgia … the longing to re-create not a pleasant feeling or specific experience from the past, but rather a bygone way of life." Coontz, considered one of the foremost experts on the history of marriage, is very concerned about people trying to re-create the 1950s. But one gets the sense reading her new book, For Better and Worse: The Complicated Past and Challenging…