Daemon in the Sanctuary

'Daemon in the Sanctuary' explores the uncanny contradiction between the phenomenological experience of home as a site of nurture and security and the empirical reality that people are far more likely to be hurt and even killed in their own homes by their intimates, rather than at the hands of strangers. Moving from the syrupy tributes of the god of love in Plato's 'Symposium' to the subject of domestic violence appears to be a giant leap, but he author shows that embroidered romantic ideas about love prepare the initiate poorly for the reality of intimate connection. Poets and philosophers who lead us to believe that love is heaven sent can leave us craving an extreme experience. We crave an earth-shaking, life-altering intrusion on our tranquility as evidence that love is real. Thus the naive initiate can easily mistake the flutter of the pulse, the quickening of the heart rate, the flush, the confused emotions, and the painful longing as signs of the god's gift. But these are also the signs of fear!