The Eternal Poles

There is no discipline more austere than that imposed by the worship of Eros, for it involves not only the ordeal of pain, but the more perilous ordeal of pleasure. -from "Androgyne" One of the most extraordinary figures of the popular intellectualism of the early 20th century, Claude Bragdon was an architect and designer who turned his mathematically fueled artistic bent toward the metaphysical... and anticipated the new quantum physics with a philosophy of existence that bridged the rational and the transcendent. This poetic consideration of human love in light of modern scientific wisdom was first published in 1930 but feels fresh and relevant today. Bragdon's discussions of romantic love, life-affirming sex, and the duality of marriage is extraordinarily insightful, and may make you look at yourself and your own relationships in a whole new way. Other works by Bragdon available from Cosimo Classics: Yoga for You, Four-Dimensional Vistas, Projective Ornament, The Beautiful Necessity, Architecture and Democracy, Episodes from An Unwritten History, and A Primer of Higher Space (The Fourth Dimension). American architect, stage designer, and writer CLAUDE FAYETTE BRAGDON (1866-1946) helped found the Rochester Architectural Club, in the city where he made his greatest mark as a building designer with structures including Rochester Central Station, Rochester Institute of Technology, and the First Universalist Church; he also designed Peterborough Bridge in Ontario. In later life, Bragdon worked on Broadway as scenic designer for 1930s productions of Cyrano de Bergerac and Hamlet, among others.