Romance Tropes and Me
Apr. 22nd, 2008 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aseTonight I'm thinking about the current "Open-Source Boob Project" drama on LJ, and am torn between "gee, this is a big reaction to a small group of consenting adults at a con" and kneejerk rage because the context changed when people brought this out of the con and online. There's a post to be written about context and behavior. Meanwhile, have some thoughts on romance novels.
I lent![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hourglasscreate the first two Sharing Knife books, and thanks to discussion of same I've gotten a solid handle on why I lose at romance novels:
1.) I want the relationship to put the protagonists more in harmony with themselves and/or the people around them. This is why I can see rereading Pride and Prejudice in the future: Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet's pairing-off upholds social expectations, but their relationship is a compliment to their personalities and landed British gentry values. "Unsuitable on the surface, compatible in core values" is tough to pull off. As a corollary, I cannot abide Us Against The World unless The World (tm) is a complete dystopia and the protagonists' forbidden love is their one chance at a desperate scrap of happiness.
2.) The world is larger than two people. I want to know where all your friends are while you're diving into this mismatched relationship. Again, where is your community? Where's the context? And I want to know what both of you are getting out of it.
2a.) Acknowledging character... not flaws, but incompletions... is okay. In a "no, really, I know exactly why you're single, and some of these reasons make us a good fit and some of those reasons are why we will quarrel over breakfast some days" way.
3.) I am really, really bad at Happily Ever After. I see the problem of living alone and without love solved, but ask "so what about this other list of things? What about 20 years from now? 'Will you still need me, will you still feed me...' seriously, will you?"
This may explain why I love Mark and Kareen's romance in A Civil Campaign beyond all reason - it's a problem, it's character development, it's who you are and how that's defined by the social space you inhabit - while I have a harder time getting behind some of LMB's other romances. But Mark and Kareen are presented as both being aware that what they have is a relationship that can't be taken for granted, but must be worked at. (Miles... doesn't always get this.) Mark's humanity is a wonderfully grounding trait.
Anyway. So that's why I'm off romance novels, take three or four or ten. I want them to be buddy stories with character studies and engagement rings.
I lent
hourglasscreate the first two Sharing Knife books, and thanks to discussion of same I've gotten a solid handle on why I lose at romance novels:1.) I want the relationship to put the protagonists more in harmony with themselves and/or the people around them. This is why I can see rereading Pride and Prejudice in the future: Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet's pairing-off upholds social expectations, but their relationship is a compliment to their personalities and landed British gentry values. "Unsuitable on the surface, compatible in core values" is tough to pull off. As a corollary, I cannot abide Us Against The World unless The World (tm) is a complete dystopia and the protagonists' forbidden love is their one chance at a desperate scrap of happiness.
2.) The world is larger than two people. I want to know where all your friends are while you're diving into this mismatched relationship. Again, where is your community? Where's the context? And I want to know what both of you are getting out of it.
2a.) Acknowledging character... not flaws, but incompletions... is okay. In a "no, really, I know exactly why you're single, and some of these reasons make us a good fit and some of those reasons are why we will quarrel over breakfast some days" way.
3.) I am really, really bad at Happily Ever After. I see the problem of living alone and without love solved, but ask "so what about this other list of things? What about 20 years from now? 'Will you still need me, will you still feed me...' seriously, will you?"
This may explain why I love Mark and Kareen's romance in A Civil Campaign beyond all reason - it's a problem, it's character development, it's who you are and how that's defined by the social space you inhabit - while I have a harder time getting behind some of LMB's other romances. But Mark and Kareen are presented as both being aware that what they have is a relationship that can't be taken for granted, but must be worked at. (Miles... doesn't always get this.) Mark's humanity is a wonderfully grounding trait.
Anyway. So that's why I'm off romance novels, take three or four or ten. I want them to be buddy stories with character studies and engagement rings.
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(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 04:13 pm (UTC)Oh, yes yes yes. This strikes to the heart of why I was so annoyed by the ending of the second book. If you're writing a mainstream book where the mixed-race couple gets dissed by their families, and their reaction is to move to California "to work to improve race relations!!" I would... be highly skeptical, both of their motives and of their chance of success at their stated goal. I would totally think they were running away from their real problems to chase ideal figments... wait a moment.
Dag's family appearances struck me as more evidently dysfunctional.
Yeeees, there is that. Although Dag also appears to have a much better network of friends-and-relations. And he is, like, 70 or something, for crying out loud!
LMB does tend to write well-meaning but useless brothers and other family (hi, Ekaterin's relatives) in her romances.
Especially brothers. I'm not sure it's a coincidence that LMB herself has brothers... Ekaterin's brothers, Drou's brothers, Fawn's brothers, Cordelia immediately realizing Drou has brothers...
I haven't seen enough of that one to make me twitch. I don't plan to seek it out.
Eh. It's mercifully rare in mainstream fantasy, unless it's also doubling as romance. However, I was watching Enchanted the other day, which I actually liked quite a lot, but true love in one day, ick.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-25 02:22 am (UTC)This is where I nod sagely and crank the Rent Broadway cast soundtrack up a bit. (I'm entirely too sympathetic to Benny's perspective. I sing "La Vie Boheme" at the top of my lungs anyway.) In some ways, that sort of thing is very typical of the human condition, but not in smart ways.
I would totally think they were running away from their real problems to chase ideal figments... wait a moment.
*snorts*
Where are Dag's friends, anyway? Surely he's got more friendly contacts than his Aunt Mari and a couple friendly acquaintances from his last patrol. Right?
I haven't seen Enchanted, so I can't comment on how it does the "one night = true love" trope. I've heard mostly-good reviews about the movie, so it's on the (infinitely long) list of movies to see some day.