A brilliantly original history of privacy with a simple and urgent argument: private life is a precious and sustaining resource that must be defended.‘Brilliantly original . . . Endlessly fascinating’– Alice Loxton, author ofEighteen‘An intricate cultural history . . . Thought-provoking’–The Sunday Times‘Lucid and elegant’–The DailyTelegraphFrom ancient times to our digital present,Strangers and Intimatestraces the dramatic emergence of private life, and argues that it is now in mortal danger.In this sweeping history, acclaimed cultural historian Tiffany Jenkins takes readers on an epic journey, from the strict separations of public and private in ancient Athens to the moral rigidity of the Victorian home, and from the feminists of the 1970s – who declared that ‘the personal is political’ – to the boundary-blurring demands of our digital age.Strangers and Intimatesis both a celebration of the private realm and a warning: as social media, surveillance and the expectations of constant op
