Editorial: Romance novels – love ‘em or leave ‘em?

By Sarah Schiavoni

Romance novels are described as romantic escapes for trapped housewives, soft core pornography for women, and women’s fiction. They follow a fairly well-defined format: a man and woman meet and get to know each other. Sexual and emotional tension build and several passionate kisses ensue before the two finally make love. Just when everything seems perfect, a conflict arises and the lovers are drawn apart, but in the end, the two are brought back together to live happily ever after. Though these books are geared toward women and meant for casual reading, the way they portray characteristics of masculinity and femininity, as well as the way they construct gender roles, generates a lot of discussion—particularly, are they worth reading and how do they affect the women (and occasional men) who read them.

As a student of English and Women’s and Gender Studies, as well as the occasional reader of trashy romance novels (gimme a break!—they’re fun to read at the beach!), I often have the topic of romance novels and their worth come up in my day-to-day life. During a discussion of gender in the media in a Communications seminar this past spring, my class discussed romance novels at length—why they are or are not valuable reading for women (and men), what purpose they serve, and what problems they present. The great part about romance novels is, well, the romance. You get the physicality of love--the trembling of hearts, the passion of the first kiss, the flaming desire behind the first sexual encounter—but you also get the story behind that love. The not-so-great part about romance novels is that you typically get a stereotypical man-to-woman relationship, in which the man has all the power and the woman goes weak in the knees for him.

Personally, I’m all for reading a crappy romance novel every once in a while. While I wouldn’t pick one up at the bookstore, I’d be more than happy to pluck one off of a hotel bookshelf while on vacation or borrow one from a friend on a rainy day. Romance novels are typically light, easy to follow, end happily, and essentially give us (women) the same feeling that a chick flick would. Okay, so maybe I’m playing right into a female stereotype, but I like reading about romance. I like watching two people fall head-over-heels for each other, and I like to pretend sometimes that life can follow the same cookie-cutter format that romance novels do. The problem comes in looking at how romance novels have traditionally portrayed men and women. Romance novel leading men are typically strong, lustful, and independent. More than likely, they’ve had more sexual partners than you can count, and they insist they’ll never get married. The typical leading lady of romance novels is what I call a Taming-of-the-Shrew-woman—she feigns independence and strength, insisting she doesn’t need a man, but in reality, she’s a virgin who just wants to be saved by a man: a man who she hopes will someday see how much he needs her—sees that she is “different” from all the others. It’s hard to be on board with something that gives men so much power and women so much weakness. My only advice to rabid romance readers is to not get so wrapped up in the story that you believe this is how all love stories should go—that cookie-cutter format is not all it’s cracked up to be and real love rarely seems to play out in such a way. Read the novels for fun, and perhaps for study, but don’t take them too seriously and don’t worry about seeming silly for reading them. I myself enjoy a trashy romance novel every once in a while, and as much as I hate to admit it, sometimes I really love when the leading man, a sort of knight in shining armor, saves the beautiful maiden, and they live happily ever after in anti-gender studies bliss.