Trouble with Men

David Shields’s The Trouble with Men: Reflections on Sex, Love, Marriage, Porn, and Power is an immersion into the perils, limits, and possibilities of human intimacy. All at once a love letter to his wife, a nervy reckoning with his own fallibility, a meditation on the impact of porn on American culture, and an attempt to understand marriage (one marriage, the idea of marriage, all marriages), The Trouble with Men is exquisitely balanced between the personal and the anthropological, nakedness and restraint. While unashamedly intellectual, it’s also irresistibly readable and extremely moving. Over five increasingly intimate chapters, Shields probes the contours of his own psyche and marriage, marshalling a chorus of other voices that leaven, deepen, and universalize his experience; his goal is nothing less than a deconstruction of eros and conventional masculinity. Masterfully woven throughout is an unmistakable and surprisingly tender cri de coeur to his wife. The risk and vulnerability on display are in the service of radical candor, acerbic wit, real emotion, and profound insight—exactly what we’ve come to expect from Shields, who, in an open invitation to the reader, leaves everything on the page.

Problema cu barbatii a lui David Shields: Reflectii asupra sexului, iubirii, casatoriei, pornografiei si puterii este o imersiune in pericolele, limitele si posibilitatile intimitatii umane. Deodata o scrisoare de dragoste catre sotia sa, o contura nervoasa cu propria sa falibilitate, o meditatie asupra impactului porno asupra culturii americane si o incercare de a intelege casatoria (o singura casatorie, ideea casatoriei, toate casatoriile), The Trouble cu barbatii este echilibrat in mod deosebit intre personal si antropologic, goliciune si retinere.