The only subject every century rewrites
Love in literature is never just a feeling. It is a form of attention, a set of obligations, and usually an argument with the society that defines it. The genre changes with the era: sonnet, courtship plot, seduction, marriage, obsession.
Ask what the lovers want from each other beyond each other. The answer is usually status, safety, salvation or a story to live in.
Love as mutual identification — Catherine's love for Heathcliff is the same thing as her claim on herself.
“Whatever our souls are made of”
Why it mattersBrontë refuses the comfort of a likable romance. The love is total, destructive and treated as a fact of nature.
Love delayed by good advice, which the novel neither approves nor forgets.
“Half agony, half hope”
Why it mattersAusten's quietest book is about the cost of being prudent, and the dignity of a woman who has already lost once.
Love as a road not taken, carried as an inner life rather than a plot.
“The leaden circles dissolved in the air”
Why it mattersWoolf replaces the courtship plot with consciousness, so the love story becomes a question about what a whole life adds up to.
Love as the one thing that does not alter — a hard, almost legal definition rather than an emotion.
“Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds”
Why it mattersThe sonnet defines love by what it refuses to do, which is more demanding than any vow.
Long-distance relationships held together by messages. The couple who stay together because of the housing market. Falling in love with someone's online self.
An ethical dilemmaYou are offered a life and career abroad, and the person you love cannot move for family reasons. The relationship is good and not perfect. Waiting for them to become someone who can move is unfair to both of you.
What do we want from love that only another person can give?
For discussion