I’ve been enjoying a new blog lately. Almost daily, Teach Me Tonight (“Musings on Romance Fiction from an Academic Perpspective”) serves up learned discourse from teachers and students of college classes on the romance novel. But while it’s always refreshing to see romance treated as literature rather than trashy novels read by bored and stupid housewives, some of the posts and comments over there have made me a little squirmy. Authors’ motives are discussed at length, and the unwritten assumption appears to be that the best romance novels contain “important” themes; most often about gender roles.
I chafe at the idea that every romance novel should mean something. Sometimes a good story is simply that. Sure, there must be a point to it, something my publisher calls the “take-away value.” But in general, I don’t expect every romance I read to contain Big Thoughts. In fact, I believe I prefer that they do not.
What percentage of romance authors, do you think, are writing “shallow” stories? And do you enjoy those, or would you rather be encouraged to think about something weightier than whether Jake and Amanda are ever going to stop fighting over the ranch and admit they’re in love?
No related posts.
As an author, and as an English teacher with a postgraduate degree in English literature, and as an ardent feminist, I always deal with Big Thoughts when I write my books. It’s just the way I think. I think carefully through the gender roles, the cultural mores, and the ideologies I’m portraying in my fiction; I plan symbolism and structure and theme and every single thing I teach my students to analyse in Austen and Dickens and Shakespeare.
That said, I fully expect my readers to read my books purely because they’re funny, sexy, and have a good story. That’s the main point, after all.
Whether we “mean” it or not, every text, from Hamlet to a shopping list, has a cultural context and a set of ideologies. They don’t have to bang you over the head; they just exist. Personally, I like being aware of them. That doesn’t make me “deep” because I see them; nor does it make other people who read for pure pleasure “shallow” because they don’t. I have specialised academic training I enjoy using, that’s all.
(And thanks for the link to that blog, which looks brilliant.)
Well, I think love means something. Romance novels celebrate love. Pretty meaningful. Beyond that, I’m there for the fun of watching Jake and Amanda fight.
I’m strictly middle of the fence on this. For one, I get enough heavy issues and real life from real life. Now that I’m out of school and I don’t have to read for credit anymore, I read for enjoyment and I don’t necessarily want someone to teach me a lesson as much as I want them to entertain me.
On the other hand, I suppose I’m guilty of sandwiching a very tiny bit of social commentary into my own work. I tend to like to give my characters some issue of life direction to deal with, career or family? immortality or mortality? how far can you go to break the rules and still be a good person? Giving readers a bit of a social or moral dilemma to debate while reading an entertaining book isn’t a bad thing, though it’s not always what I set out to do.
In my strictly jaundiced and irritable opinion, academics have no business studying genre. Those who “study” science fiction (which is where I live) have done it an immense disservice by applying Real Literature rules and assumptions to the study and bending the stories to fit them, rather than either bending the rules or creating new ones that illuminate the genre. However, many science fiction authors seem to feel that being studied academically gives the field “validation.”
In the June/July issue of Seed: Science is Culture magazine, there’s an essay followed by five science fiction stories, all written by academics. The essay itself is notable for a discussion of the literary form in which the words science fiction are never explicitly said. It’s quite chilling.
One of the stories in particular, touted as “groundbreaking,” explores an idea first discussed by my co-author in his SF short story “Charioteer,” first published in the May 1978 Amazing Stories, and which has been under discussion by other genre authors since. But this is the sort of historical error that happens in academia, which tries to rank work by Important themes, and Influential authors.
Sometimes, as you say, a story is only a story. A good story gives someone an hour or two of enjoyment on a really bad day, makes someone laugh, or exercises an imagination cramped and crumpled by nine-to-five — and that’s as Important as any Universal Theme.
In general, most romances are about overcoming obstacles that prevent people from feeling deeply. From living fully, if you will. So yes, I think most romances have a message or a lesson built into them. The message is going to be different for each character–depending on their obstacle–and in turn, for the reader. So really, there’s no such thing as a shallow romance! The message might be presented with a light touch, but it’s still there.
I think if it’s a message the reader needs, she’ll hear it. If it isn’t one she needs, she’d be more likely to view the book as a fun read. This has been my experience with fan mail and reviews of my books!
This is an interesting topic. And a question that, at least for me, isn’t black and white.
I agree with what Charlene said wholeheartedly. Love is important and heavy and deep, and romance novels celebrate love. However, I think some authors celebrate love better than others. Some write a story about people falling in love, and some write a story that makes your eyes open to some aspect of love that you may not have realized or thought of.
But, in the end, my favorite romance novels are those that go beyond love (to an extent!). Born in Ice by Nora Roberts is probably my all time favorite romance novel. It not only celebrates the theme of love–but the theme of home and belonging–two things which are central themes in most of my own writing.
I don’t think I’d want to read a romance novel laced with political commentary or social justice as it’s main theme. But, as an underlying theme, maybe… if it was done right.
Love should always be the central main stuff when it comes to a romance novel, but that’s not all I want to read. Sure, Jake and Amanda fighting might be entertaining, and I may even and enjoy the book– but in a few months I’m likely to forget the book entirely. A book that celebrates love while making you think about love will probably stick in the memory a little longer.
I need to check out that website. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. I’m glad that we can get academic discussion of romance novels. RWA has grants for academic papers, too. These are important because they then provide reference for journalists, etc. to look at for more background. If all that existed for background study were articles that repeatedly said, for example, that romances are cheap, repetitive, formulaic fluff — well, that’s what image would continue to be perpetuated.
Now to the question you raise. First and foremost, I want an entertaining story with interesting characters and a conflict that they need to struggle through on their way to falling in love. They don’t have to save the entire world while doing so, but that conflict or plot base needs to have some weight to it to keep my interest.
One of my favorite books is Susan Elizabeth Phillips’ It Had to be You. There’s a lot more going on with Dan and Phoebe than the fact that they’re forced to work together to save ownership of the pro football team. The emotional conflicts give the story its deep heart and those have to be overcome/resolved in order for the characters to win on all levels.
Oh my gosh, you are SO right, Brenda! I guess I’m on an even more polar opposite from you in that, I couldn’t even read the blog. Started reading the first few lines of a couple of the posts and it started sounding like the teacher on any of the “Peanuts” TV specials: “Wah Wah Wah Wah.”
Honestly, I loved reading as a kid. But once I got out of college, I stopped reading for fun. I never really analyzed why that was until a few years ago when the discussion came up of how we tend to overanalyze books, especially in school. Then I realized that’s exactly why I stopped reading for fun: I was so sick of the over-analization they did of every single fiction book in all of my English classes from high school on.
It wasn’t until I was in my thirties that I re-discovered reading and how fun it was, and part of that was because I was no longer pressured to analyze every book I read! I could just read simply for the pleasure of it! I have been a voracious reader ever since then.
I realize that analyzing or over-analyzing is really fun for some people, and I’m glad they have a place to go to discuss books in that way. But I have to say it would suck the fun right out of my reading experience. I’d really much rather be blissfully unaware of the “important” underlying themes about gender roles or whatever and just get caught up in the love story.
This is a great post because I find myself on the middle of the fence as well. As an academic who has written extensively on popular culture and popular fiction, I am of the group that doesn’t want to say that we can’t find worthwhile things to discuss in a genre such as romance. I read lots of romance novels that I would have no problem bringing into my classroom because of the issues that they deal with.
As a new romance writer who is also an academic, I find myself holding my breath wondering what a colleague my say or do if they did a literary analysis of my work. Or how might my colleagues in the Women’s Studies department critique my heroine’s decisions. This is because now that I am allowing myself the space to explore my creative side, I know something that I didn’t know when I was writing all those papers on other writers and their work. I know that when I am truly in the zone the stories flow from me. And I’m not really thinking about the issues I want to convey. I’m not saying they aren’t there. They are there just by nature of who I am, a feminist cultural critic who studies popular culture and literature. I have no idea what to do with this. I am happy that academics are paying attention to romance. We have some great novels and wonderful stories out there and they should be getting all the attention they deserve. I love it when I read a romance novel or any novel that makes me think about something in a different way.
I have an aunt who has read romance novels all her life. Any time her husband teased her about reading “those books” she would go on and on about the many things she learned when reading them. She talked about the places she might never visit, the concepts she’s been exposed to, all sorts of things. And she shut him right up! I’d like to think that this new academic attention might just shut a lot of folks who have had nothing positive to say about romance right up as well. Time will tell. By the way, there was recently a call for papers for an entire academic book on the novels of Jennifer Crusie.
Thanks for the thought provoking post!
Gwyneth
I read (and write) romance novels because I want to escape. Ah, escapism. Escaping from a world that can often be too stressful, too harsh. I don’t want to have to delve into deep, hidden psychological meanings in novels. I just want to enjoy myself. Not so complex, really. This nice escape is the same thing I look for in my movies–I want two and a half hours of fun, not hidden meanings and weighty issues.
[...] Brenda Coulters’s post at Romancing the Blog points to another blog, Teach Me Tonight. In it there’s a good post about male/male romance, referring to Queer as Folk and Brokeback Mountain, among other things. Whoa! Big shock here, people! A certain segment of the straight female population loves romances between gay men! [...]
For me, I think it’s like some have said above. It’s not so much that I have something to say when I write a book. I’m not trying to get some political agenda across. But I *do* want to show that people can learn and change and overcome their reluctance or old hurts, can adapt to situations they didn’t expect or think they don’t deserve, etc.
So, no, I don’t think all romances *must* be about something. I just think they often are. We write lives for our characters and lives are only very rarely about nothing.
I love romances for the escape and fantasy factor, too. But I am also disturbed by all the bad and cookie cutter romances out there, so I ask myself, are many romance writers (none here, of course) just selling us what we want to buy, and if so, why are we buying it? I will make the assumption that most of us dedicated readers have a feminist viewpoint, yet so many romances still feature an older, rich, lordly hero whom the heroine marries, though not for his money, of course. Does money make a man more sexy? This is the example of issues readers might think about without falling into the category of “literary criticism,” which I understand has scarred a generation of grad students of literature.
Happily, in the last decade, a good number of heroines have finally broken the Thirties barrier, so there is some progress.
I am thoroughly enjoying this discussion. Thanks so much, everyone, for taking the time to share your thoughts.
Whether or not authors think their books are about something, if they create characters with words on a page, what they produce tells us something about their time and their society, the way women and men are viewed and constructed and live in their world. This is true for Jane Austen or Nora Roberts. It’s the academic’s job to tease apart these things. It’s the reader’s job just to read the books in any way he/she chooses to read, but academics have just as much “right” to analyze that as the readers have to read.
For example. The most popular book for women in 1809 was Hannah More’s “Coelebs In Search of a Wife,” an incredibly conservative book that is almost unreadable now. But it sold more than any other book in England and America except Byron and Scott. Why? And why is unreadable now? And why was it readable 200 years ago? What did it give its readers? HOW did they read it? Why was it popular? What did it tell us about men and women 200 years ago and what might that tell us about men and women today and how we’ve changed/adapted/overcome.
I think Julie Cohen said it better than I’m able in the very first comment.
Nicole says “I don’t think I’d want to read a romance novel laced with political commentary or social justice as it’s main theme. But, as an underlying theme, maybe… if it was done right.” I would argue that social commentary is inseparable from romances without most readers even being aware of it. After all, in the modern romance, the man makes the concession that he can’t live without the woman, as much as the woman does. If that isn’t powerful, I don’t know what is.
And then you have people like Suz Brockmann, making gay romance mainstream!
Julie Cohen and others said it better than I could, but I’ve commented on the Teach Me Tonight blog too, because when I start commenting, I go on a bit.
I can see why some readers might not like reading academic analysis of books, just like some readers don’t like to read authors’ discussions of the craft of writing. It can pull you out of the emotion created by the story. But, on the other hand, it can also create a new appreciation for other aspects of the writing.
Mary Stella mentioned the RWA academic grants – Eric Selinger, who started the blog, has been awarded one of these grants for some work he’s doing on romance (not for the blog, but he wanted to do that anyway).
Whether we “mean†it or not, every text, from Hamlet to a shopping list, has a cultural context and a set of ideologies. They don’t have to bang you over the head; they just exist. Personally, I like being aware of them. That doesn’t make me “deep†because I see them; nor does it make other people who read for pure pleasure “shallow†because they don’t. I have specialised academic training I enjoy using, that’s all.
Thank you so much for saying this!
The idea that only academic readers analyze texts for “important” themes does not square with my experience in the Romance reading community. Reading different messageboards has given me an incredible appreciation for the fact that readers who adore a particular author’s work can match ANY academic in time spent and thoughts expended in piecing through the nuances of a particular text or series. They may just not use the same vocabulary of theme, motif, metaphor, etc. But the actual exercise of critical thinking is on full display. Critical thinking is not the same thing as criticizing a book, and when it comes to criticizing a book, I think we’ve seen that THAT is hardly an intrinsically academic activity!
As for reading for enjoyment, escape, whatever, in the same way that there are readers who love love love reading about virgin widows and rape fantasies and “feisty” heroines, there are readers who enjoy *talking about* these elements, too. Those who don’t can pass over such conversations.
I don’t personally categorize Romance novels as “shallow” or “deep,” but when I’m reading, I’m either engaged and compelled by a book or I’m not. If I am, I don’t usually start thinking *about* the book until after I’m done, and then thinking about what worked so well and why (and what didn’t) is like having a second helping of a wonderful dessert, whether it’s angel food cake or chocolate decadence. If I’m not engaged in a book, I’m much more likely to analyze while I’m reading, because, well, sometimes that will allow me to appreciate or be interested in a book in a different way. At the very least, it keeps me from publically concluding things like, “Author A obviously needs therapy and her books suck like a Hoover”!
My books have always had themes about the human condition and relationships – trust, letting go, self-worth, overcoming past hurts or mistakes, etc. Sometimes those themes are clear to me from the start, sometimes not until I’m midway through the second draft, and sometimes readers pick up on themes or ideas I didn’t even realize I’d subconsciously explored.
But my GOAL is to entertain, both myself and my audience, and I don’t see where the two — entertaining and substance — are mutually exclusive. One can be entertained while still being gently encouraged to perhaps look at something in a new light, or reassured, or given hope. I’ve gotten letters from readers who simply thought the book was fun, and from others who were deeply touched because the theme of the story — its backbone — hit home for them. Both reactions are equally valid.
Of course I’m delighted to see academics finally take seriously a genre devoted to that most basic of needs — connection with another human being. And as long as the analysis focuses on romance novels in general — i.e., how they reflect (or not) social mores or male/female relationships — I’m all for it. I do, however, have reservations about picking apart individual books, because the temptation there is to OVERanalyze, looking for deep meanings that may not be there, or were certainly never the author’s intent.
In any case, none of it affects me as a writer or reader, or readers in general. So they can have at it, and I’ll just keep writing the stories that come to me, and all will be well.
In my strictly jaundiced and irritable opinion, academics have no business studying genre. Those who “study†science fiction (which is where I live) have done it an immense disservice by applying Real Literature rules and assumptions to the study and bending the stories to fit them, rather than either bending the rules or creating new ones that illuminate the genre. However, many science fiction authors seem to feel that being studied academically gives the field “validation.â€
It’s funny you should say this, because I TA’d for a science fiction class in grad school (prof was one of the leading scholars in the field), and that class got me totally interested in reading sci fi for enjoyment. Before that class, I thought of sci fi as all about boys and their misogynistic/homoerotic toys. And THE COVERS! Oy, I couldn’t even get past some of those covers until I had the chance to get serious about the genre in an academic setting. From Octavia Butler to Philip K. Dick to Walter Miller to Karel Capek to Ursula K. Le Guin and ON and ON, I learned about the genre and I learned to love so much about it, as did many, many, many students.
I do, however, have reservations about picking apart individual books, because the temptation there is to OVERanalyze, looking for deep meanings that may not be there, or were certainly never the author’s intent.
I guess that’s why I’ve always been so turned off by analysis of fiction books…the romance genre specifically. Yes, there’s always underlying themes, and it’s fun sometimes to speculate on that. For example: “Do you think that the romantic hero here really meant it when he told the heroine he didn’t want children, or do you think that he just didn’t want to hope for something he thought he might never get?” Those discussions are often fun for me if not overdone.
But some discussions just seem over-the-top (in my opinion) in their analysis, like: “Do you think the author’s use of the color red here hints to the communistic-like attitudes of the villain?” It’s like, as you said, looking for meanings that really aren’t there.
I remember reading a comment Nora Roberts once put on her forum in answer to an “overly analytical” question she got: “Boy, you guys think about this stuff WAY more than I do!” She was more than happy to think about the question and answer it, but it gave me the impression that maybe people do tend to over-analyze and see hidden meanings that really aren’t there for the sake of academics.
Again, maybe it’s just me, but I’d rather just read a story and enjoy it.
It’s funny you should say this, because I TA’d for a science fiction class in grad school (prof was one of the leading scholars in the field), and that class got me totally interested in reading sci fi for enjoyment.
Which just goes to show that we all have our opinions, and good reasons to support them.
Interesting discussion.
Some of my favorite books are those great 80’s bodice rippers where they spend half the books hating each other and then go at it like animals. Because it’s a romance novel. That’s what I want. Romance.
Some books, where they slip in information and I learn without trying, it’s fabulous. But if I feel like I’m reading a text book with romance thrown in, it’s over.
Even if authors don’t go in with Big Ideas and Major Themes in mind, they happen. Writing inevitably reveals a lot about the writer — the things that interest them, the assumptions they make, the culture in which they live…
Romance novels have changed because people have changed. I used to read my mother’s historicals secretly when I was a pre-teen, and there were a lot of things that flew in the late seventies/early eighties that wouldn’t make it into print today. And it’s not just preferences have changed, but that what’s acceptable behavior in a relationhip is quite different.
Even the simplest romance novel tells about the social mores of the time it was written, and even more so each *new* subgenre.
People my age will call the dichotomy of reading a historical where people were having oodles of sex, and then reading a catagory set in modern times and having either no sex or the vaguest descriptions imaginable. That’s because the historical burst on to the scene during a time when women were starting to embrace their sexuality, while the categories were more in a state of slow evolution.
I remember Silhouette (in particular) during the eighties seeming to add new lines constantly — each one a little more explicit, as if they were wondering when women would say enough, and not wanting to give The Fully Monty all at once.
Beyond that, who hasn’t written a story, noticed an emerging theme that was not intentional, realized it was good, and reinforced it. Or had someone comment on a theme that you hadn’t even noticed until they said so, but then it seemed perfectly obvious.
I’ve only recently gotten back into reading fiction. For a long time, I would read maybe 2-3 novels a year and then in all my spare time I’d read non-fiction. Some of the non-fiction would be dry as can be. I’m a weirdo who picks up discount text books at used books sales. But the reason I was doing that is I wanted to take something away from the experience. After I put the book down I wanted to know something that I didn’t know before. In other words, I had a belief that non-fiction was where the real meat was, while fiction was either merely entertainment or some obscure tale of things that I had no way to connect to.
Of course, all of that is patently false, but that’s where I was. And I’ve finally started reading again. Five books of fiction in the last month, which is super fast for me. One reason I am reading fiction again is because it provides its own type of meat.
One thing to take away from fiction is the stuff that most academics (I am one but in linguistics) focus on – political roles, gender roles, culture, etc. Basically, English majors are supposed to be sociologists. That can be a nice thing to learn and its study is of value. But there’s another thing that fiction provides which is different and equally important.
It lets you spend time with people.
Of course, they are fictional people, but people nonetheless. In the hands of a good writer, you can be there with them and come to understand them. I am currently reading Jhumpa Lahiri’s collection of short stories “Interpreter of Maladies” and I am there in the first story where a marriage falls apart. I am there in the kitchen grinding at cumin seeds with a pestle understanding what it is like to be an Indian living in the U.S. while refugees flood from Bangladesh into India.
In a romance novel, I get to be there while someone falls head over heels in love. What a privilege?
Now, I confess that I have not been all that successful at reading my wife’s Romances. There are lots of reasons for this, the primary one probably being that I am not the target audience for the book. Another reason is that the industry has to crank these things out and sometimes a Romance novel is going through the motions of being in love, but not successfully creating the emotions. But when an author can really nail it, when they can make me feel the love her heroine feels, when I can understand that fundamental human emotion, well, sign me up. Love is as profound a thing to take away from a book as any analysis of gender roles.
Oops. Typo in my message above, which I want to fix as it could change how my post is read. I had, “What a privilege?” written after talking about feeling the emotions of love by reading romance. That might sound sarcastic, as if I don’t think it a true privilege. But it was not at all. Just change the question mark to exclamation mark (What a privilege!) and you get my real meaning.
Nothing to add to what has already been said.
Excellent question. Excellent comments.
Thank you.
When I think of romance novels and themes, I think “love conquers all”. That’s it. Simple.
Yes, there are often other messages, especially in inspirationals, but it’s this universal theme that makes romances what they are.
I write to entertain. Period. I have some over-arching themes to my work, usually related to justice/good v evil/righting wrongs, but in the end my first goal is to entertain readers. To do that, I have to entertain myself first.
I don’t write with overall themes in mind. I mean yes, the good guys win, the villains don’t and in all of my books, my heroines have to learn to accept themselves before they can find their happily ever after with the hero, but I write to entertain. I’m going for a great story, not something to be dissected as political commentary. And I like to read the same types of books that I write.
I’m torn, really. I totally bought into the academic perspective, got my high-falutin’ graduate-level literary creative writing degree, and felt nervous because I hadn’t read enough Proust — and then after a few years learned that I really do like to read for fun. No sitting hunched over the book searching for themes and analyzing imagery. Gack.
I’ve come to realize that the social facets will come through naturally, but what really attracts me are the emotional truths the author puts on the page. Those emotional truths — which come from deep within the writer — are far more interesting to me than plot structure, imagery, or the literary criticism from a postmodern perspective.
So I take it or leave it. I’m not sure academic analysis is really helpful in any commercial fiction genre — and why are we clamoring for “validation” when our genre doesn’t really need it? What are we validating ourselves for? Or against? (I don’t know. It’s a genuine question.)