Wisdom of the ages...
My grandmother just informed me that she doesn't like to read fantasy and would prefer a romance where the girl ends up with the rich man and they live happily ever after any day.
I'm not sure if she gets the ridiculousness of this statement.
I also find it amusing because the story I'm working on right now is "fantasy" in both of these aspects -- it contains elements of the fantastic, the supernatural, the unexpected, but at its heart, it's really a romance in which the girl will end up with the rich man in the end and live happily ever after. Of course it's more original than that sounds but the concepts are the same.
Lately I've been thinking about the differences between a love story and a romance. It seems to me that everyone who falls in love gets to have a love story. But a romance is something bigger and more complicated. A romance is when the obstacles to love are so great, and yet are eventually overcome by a passion so strong, that the story is relevant to everyone and not just the lovers.
I've also often thought about how the most interesting part of a love story, to other people, is the "getting together" part. The "meet-cute," to steal a term from romantic comedy screenwriters. And usually that only takes up a couple of sentences. Once two people are securely in love, they're the only ones to whom their being in love is really, truly interesting. We don't want to read about a relationship unless it's undergoing problems, changes, or upheavals. But we don't want to live relationships during these uneasy stages. Because while reading, we don't mind the unease of others, but our own is another story altogether.
...aaaaaand this is just me not writing my novel, so I'm going to stop now. Only I'm first going to mention that I love it so much that it's hard for me not to go back and re-read stuff I've written, because it's so good. Now I don't say this to be immodest because it's not really that good at all, but it's the first time I've felt good about writing a longer piece while still writing it. Usually I have to have discarded it and picked it up months/years later before I like it. This one, I still like, and I have a premonition I will like it even after I finish!
I'm not sure if she gets the ridiculousness of this statement.
I also find it amusing because the story I'm working on right now is "fantasy" in both of these aspects -- it contains elements of the fantastic, the supernatural, the unexpected, but at its heart, it's really a romance in which the girl will end up with the rich man in the end and live happily ever after. Of course it's more original than that sounds but the concepts are the same.
Lately I've been thinking about the differences between a love story and a romance. It seems to me that everyone who falls in love gets to have a love story. But a romance is something bigger and more complicated. A romance is when the obstacles to love are so great, and yet are eventually overcome by a passion so strong, that the story is relevant to everyone and not just the lovers.
I've also often thought about how the most interesting part of a love story, to other people, is the "getting together" part. The "meet-cute," to steal a term from romantic comedy screenwriters. And usually that only takes up a couple of sentences. Once two people are securely in love, they're the only ones to whom their being in love is really, truly interesting. We don't want to read about a relationship unless it's undergoing problems, changes, or upheavals. But we don't want to live relationships during these uneasy stages. Because while reading, we don't mind the unease of others, but our own is another story altogether.
...aaaaaand this is just me not writing my novel, so I'm going to stop now. Only I'm first going to mention that I love it so much that it's hard for me not to go back and re-read stuff I've written, because it's so good. Now I don't say this to be immodest because it's not really that good at all, but it's the first time I've felt good about writing a longer piece while still writing it. Usually I have to have discarded it and picked it up months/years later before I like it. This one, I still like, and I have a premonition I will like it even after I finish!