Romance

Romance and romantic love encompass a number of ideas about love, which are interrelated for historical and cultural reasons:

passionate feelings of attraction—a mental state of "being in love", with focused attention (salience) towards a specific individual for courtship or pair bonding; the cultural practice or idealization of initiating intimate relationships for feelings like these, over more practical or ordinary concerns; a relationship or love affair initiated or maintained this way, which may be premarital or absent a commitment; and a love story involving these elements. In psychology, romantic love is considered to be a motivation or drive, which is distinct from (but related to) the concept of attachment. The terms romance and romantic love are used with multiple definitions, which can be contradictory at times. The philosopher Arthur Lovejoy once wrote that "The word 'romantic' has come to mean so many things that, by itself, it means nothing." Collins Dictionary defines romantic love as "an intensity and idealization of a love relationship, in which the other is imbued with extraordinary virtue, beauty, etc., so that the relationship overrides all other considerations, including material ones." The concept of romantic love also came to represent the idea of individualistic choice in marriage and sexual partners, although it's rarely realized fully and can be a source of both gratification and disappointment in relationships. People who experience little to no romantic attraction are referred to as "aromantic".

General definitions The meaning of the term romantic love has changed considerably throughout history, making it difficult to easily define without examining its cultural origins. The term is used with multiple definitions by academics. In Western culture, the term may be used indiscriminately to refer to almost any attraction between men and women or which includes a sexual component (heterosexual, homosexual, or otherwise), although romance and love are distinguishable concepts. According to the psychotherapist Robert Johnson, the conflation is based on a kind of confusion over terms, with a cultural history of idealizing falling in love and passion-seeking over more ordinary concerns like affection and commitment. The term is often used to distinguish from other types of interpersonal relationships (conjugal, parental, friendship), and in contrast to the modern interpretation of platonic love (which precludes sexual relations). The notion that romantic love only occurs within a relationship of some kind, however, has been called a misconception. It has also been argued that romantic love can actually be "platonic" in some cases, for example, as in the case of a romantic friendship which involves passionate feelings without sexual desire. In academic fields of psychology, the term romantic love might be used in reference to any of the common definitions (courtly love, romantic idealization, being in love, etc.). The psychologist Dorothy Tennov once criticized the reactions to romantic love in the scientific literature as "confused and contradictory".

The literary tradition

The word romance is derived from the Latin word Romanus, meaning "Rome" or "Roman". In the modern day, the word is used with multiple connotations, but its history has a connection to the telling of love stories. After the fall of the Roman Empire, a Latin adverb Romanice (from Romanus) became used to mean "in the vernacular" to identify languages which were derivatives of Latin, when Latin itself was used in more formal contexts at the time. In Old French (one of the Latin derivatives), this later became romans or romanz, which referred both to the language itself, and also to works composed in it. In the Middle Ages, this romans/romanz took on a meaning as referring specifically to a type of narrative verse about chivalry and love (called chivalric romance). Some of the earliest literature containing themes considered "romantic" in a more modern sense was written by French poets known as troubadours—initially often exploring themes of unrequited love, and emphasizing the worship of a lady (a "cold, cruel mistress"). Poets like Chrétien de Troyes were encouraged by royalty to compose works exemplifying certain ideals (now called "courtly love"), notably in the towns of Poitiers and Troyes; later, Andreas Capellanus was influenced by this culture to write The Art of Courtly Love. Courtly love also became emphasized as a theme for chivalric romance, a popular form of literature at the time. The French word romans was anglicized into romance, and initially the term romantic love referred to those attitudes and behaviors of courtly love. Courtly love involved themes elevating the status of the woman, of passionate suffering and separation, and a transformation of the lovers to another plane of existence. This is said to have originated from the troubadour poetry and the work by Capellanus, although they were also influenced by even earlier works. Often, stories inspired by this tradition are depictions of tragic or unfulfilled love. Some examples of "romantic love" stories in this vein are Layla and Majnun, works of Arthurian legend (i.e. Lancelot and Guinevere), Tristan and Iseult, Dante and Beatrice (from La Vita Nuova), Romeo and Juliet and The Sorrows of Young Werther. Rather than always being pessimistic, however, others expressed an early "humanistic" perspective on passion—that is, idealizing "human love" in contradiction to religious ideals or social interference—as in the happy ending found in Aucassin and Nicolette. The modern romance novel as it's known today (e.g. by Jane Austen) emerged during the 18th-century period of the larger movement. Modern depictions of this type of love story are in Twilight (Edward Cullen and Bella Swan), and Star Wars (Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala). The courtly and romantic traditions are said to have influenced attitudes towards love in Western culture, attitudes which continue to be present in the modern day. The cultural movement is critiqued for promising a kind of "story-book" or "fairy-tale" love when the stories themselves actually involve depictions of suffering and tragedy, perhaps making the culture "blind to love's madness". According to the cultural critic Denis de Rougemont, "Happy love has no history—in European literature. And a love that is not mutual cannot pass for a true love."

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