"Viruses of love " infect millions with disease and despair Susan, 29, a Ph.D. in English literature from Harvard, knew her boyfriend had a herpes infection and consulted her gynecologist about the safety of having intercourse. The doctor reassured her that herpes was only contagious if her partner had festering sores. Susan slept with her friend, who had no obvious signs, and within a week got herpes. Don, 47, an engineer, succumbed to the temptation of a local lady while ...

The dark is good for all kinds of things, like love, trysts or even murder. Now, however, another nocturnal activity can be added to the list: fine dining. In Cologne's trendy Unsicht-Bar , light is absolutely verboten, and patrons gather to wine and dine in utter darkness. With the complete loss of vision — and the resulting heightening of the other four senses — an evening at Germany's first-ever dark restaurant is an extraordinary culinary adventure. "You smell better, you are ...

Portraits often mirror the artist as much as their subjects. On the walls of the Berkshire Museum in Pittsfield, Mass., last week, hung a collection of portraits that were animated with gentle strength of character, aglow with love of children. They depicted many famous men—Philosopher William James, Pablo Casals, Richard Harding Davis, Robert E. Sherwood . But what they described with even greater certainty was their creator, Ellen Emmet Rand, who plainly painted with malice toward none.The collection showed 90 works of an artist who eagerly started ...

They fell in love in Johannesburg. Bennie Hermer was the young resident physician in Durban's King Edward VIII Hospital. Olda Mehr was a concert pianist, pretty, 18, with glowing black eyes. When she won the Royal Music Academy Award in 1938, she sailed for London, promising she would come back in a year to be married. In London Olda was a sensation. Sir Henry Wood made her his orchestra's soloist for the Albert Hall season in early 1939. Olda's parents ...

Girls for All SeasonsSir: There are no words to describe the immense pleasure and happiness your cover story on Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave [March 17] gave me. Having seen Georgy Girl three times and Morgan! once, I can understand why the world is in love with these two fantastic artists.SUZANNE R. FRIED Queens, N.Y.Sir: Pity the British theater, and TIME for resorting to the Redgrave menage for a cover story. The paucity of theatrical talent is aptly illustrated in the Lynn-Vanessa Redgrave act: typical Lynn, ...

Girls for All SeasonsSir: There are no words to describe the immense pleasure and happiness your cover story on Lynn and Vanessa Redgrave [March 17] gave me. Having seen Georgy Girl three times and Morgan! once, I can understand why the world is in love with these two fantastic artists.SUZANNE R. FRIED Queens, N.Y.Sir: Pity the British theater, and TIME for resorting to the Redgrave menage for a cover story. The paucity of theatrical talent is aptly illustrated in the Lynn-Vanessa Redgrave act: typical Lynn, ...

COVER STORY Love 'em or hate 'em, they are a national mania Cat: One Hell of a nice animal, frequently mistaken for a meatloaf. —B. Kliban, cartoonist Muhammad cut the sleeve from his robe rather than disturb his friend, asleep on the Prophet's gown. Samuel Johnson daily pampered his spoiled companion Hodge with meals of fresh oysters. Victor Hugo cherished Gavroche. Cardinal Richelieu left a generous legacy for the 14 he owned. Napoleon is said to have broken into a ...

JOHN KEATS by Walter Jackson Bate. 732 pages. Harvard University Press. $10. JOHN KEATS by Aileen Ward. 450 pages. Viking. $7.50. Romantic poets, the legend went, all died young and full of melancholy. Eloquent escape artists in flight from reality, they contrived, if possible, to be afflicted alike with consumption and unrequited love—both, it was firmly understood, great heighteners of poetic sensibility. Then, like dying nightingales singing their hearts out while impaled upon the thorn of the everyday world, they ...

The U.S. Navy SEAL team that killed Osama bin-Laden and removed a bonanza of documents and flash drives may have left behind another vital source of intelligence — bin-Laden's wife, Amal Ahmed Abdul Fatah. The story of how she found her way back to bin-Laden's hideout in Pakistan from Yemen could well have revealed crucial clues as to whether or not Pakistani authorities had been aware of the al-Qaeda leader's presence in their country. And if U.S. ...

"It's the accuracy of the photos compared to real thing that's the biggest problem," says Power Li, a 32-year-old civil servant. "You see a girl on the website who you quite like the look of, but then when you ask her out you find they look nothing like their online photos." Ah, modern love. With a steady career and his own house and car, the 32-year-old Beijinger is settled, successful, upwardly mobile and part of a new craze sweeping china — ...