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I’ve been meaning for weeks to check this site out on a Thursday, and I finally remembered. Today the theme is (of course) romance. Specifically:
1. Love stories? Yes or No? and
2. If yes, “romances” as a genre? Or just, well, stories that have love stories? (Nobody's going to call “Pride & Prejudice” a “romance,” right?)
1. Yes - so long as they’re not that mushily sentimental ... stuff. Nothing on earth is ever going to make me read The Bridges of Madison County, for instance.
2. Both! I know that romance as genre gets rubbished by the - well, by certain people; I used to be one of them. Then curiosity overcame snobbery and I discovered they’re the perfect antidote to my perpetual suspicion that I’m carrying enough cynicism for someone three times my age. Reading something guaranteed to have an ending not just happy but idealised, allows me to slip the rose-coloured glasses back on for a few hours and pretend I still believe in all that fairytale nonsense.
I do have standards (the snob reasserting herself!); there has to be a good story and I do prefer to have some mystery or history thrown in (or at the very least, something to make me laugh).
And as for Pride and Prejudice ... some might not classify Jane Austen as romance, but there’s at least one librarian who’d disagree. The first time I read Austen’s Emma was when I checked it out from the Belconnen Library in Canberra - complete with a red heart sticker on the spine.
Bridges of Madison County was on TV last night and I was reminded of how I loved the book. It was criticized when it was published but I found that it hinted at the many complications of love and the choices we often face. Try it; you may find something of value in it now! It's a tiny book!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for putting a link to my blog on your site, it was unexpected.
ReplyDeleteI am so much enjoying your blog I thought people would find it an excellant link.
Carry on reading and posting!
Kindest regards
Dancin' Fool
Meeyauw: I said at the start of the year that I'd expand my reading horizons, so I'll accept that challenge! (Or I will as soon as I can track down a copy in the library system.)
ReplyDeleteDancin' Fool: Thank you! I couldn't pass up the opportunity to give a little publicity to those gorgeous images you have on your site.