“Amor, ch'a nullo amato amar perdona, mi prese del costui piacer sì forte, che, come vedi, ancor non m'abbandona.” (Love, which pardons no one loved from loving, seized me with such a strong desire that, as you can see, it does not leave me still.) Dante, Inferno V, 103-105. We couldn’t help ourselves: when it comes to Love, let’s take Dante in the balance to unmask the myth of romance. (There’s also Episode 1, click here if you missed it.) Dante enchants us with the feeling that binds every loved one to love in return. But even if it leads to Hell? Especially so: once the Church shaped marriage as we know it, an entire literary current sprung up to sing of the passions between highborn ladies and valiant knights. A forbidden love? Yes... Oops, we did it again.
Picture this: there’s the wife of the lord, married off for politics or dynastic reasons, and a lower-ranked man to whom she chooses to give her heart. They’re nobles by title, blessed with beauty, and pure in spirit… apart from that little issue of the affair. But that’s precisely the point: they’re powerless against the passion that overwhelms them. Which brings us back straight to our thesis: Marital love vs. Romantic love. And after the “amor cortese” one, a new literary current rises in Italy, led by Dante Alighieri as our capo cannoniere. His Dolce Stil Novo speaks of a purely contemplative love, and the woman who “appears so gentle, and so honest” becomes a symbol of saving grace. In other words, it’s all about Platonic and transcendent love.
Again… no wife was the subject of the Great Poet’s sonnets, but the beloved woman is at once muse and one-way ticket to Paradise. Someone you don’t marry to secure an heir, but someone who breathes life into your verses and ennobles your soul. This kind of love (far removed from reality!) resonates in another word: romantic, that comes from romance, hence from those chivalric epics that drew on imagination to tell fantastic stories. Yes, you read that right: they were not real tales. The Romanticism literary current sweeps away both Enlightenment reason and Classical beauty with the Sturm und Drang. Passion and wilderness conquer every corner of life and art: from the tormented struggle to reach the infinite, to the escape from reality, to the exploration of irrationality where dreams, madness, and a storm of emotions collide.
But… when did we start pairing the word “romantic” to something that no longer means turmoil and wild abandon? Romantic dinners. Romantic weekends. Romantic comedies… And suddenly, we’re neck-deep in a pile of dusty clichés, led by the ultimate myth: Till Death Do Us Part.So here we are, wondering: will reality and possibility find a way to reunite, happily, ever after? Tell us your dilemma at supernova@remidastudio.com.
