Fifty years of romance writing didn't awaken Giong Yao (瓊瑤)from the illusion of love. From the turbulent era of WW2 (幾度夕陽紅) to today's technological world, (花非花霧非霧) her kingdom of Love remains perfect, passionate, and eternal. The medium of Love may change from letter writing to email, smartphone and skype, but the essence of Love remains the same. It's violent tempests or burning flames to consume lovers away. Say "I love you" a thousand times and her fictional lovers don't feel exhausted by the soothing words, but the audience do! Love, once expressed verbally, loses its mysterious luster and becomes jejune. Oscar Wilde perceived this well: "The essence of love is uncertainty." The most unbearable part of romance is when lovers confess their love and are accepted by their beloved. The beginning of marriage is the end of romance. No wonder, Giong Yao's kingdom of Love is populated by unmarried lovers suffering from either unrequited love or temporary misunderstanding. And her lovers are always willing to die for Love, as if they had nothing else to do in life except to love. [sigh]  Aye, one should always remember the friar's warning in Romeo and Juliet:    

These violent delights have violent ends
And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,
Which as they kiss consume: the sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness
And in the taste confounds the appetite:
Therefore love moderately; long love doth so----

My main objection to this romance does not lie in its undue passion, but the bourgeois mentality. Money still reigns in her kingdom of romance! Great love resides in the majestic castle in France. The two wealthy and handsome brothers own the fancy castle. They are the modern counterparts of ancient princes, only that their means of transportation are not white horses but luxurious cars. A big staff maintains the castle, keeping a sick and beautiful lady in good condition, if not imprisoning her in the highest tower of the castle. This time, the beautiful lady doesn't need to be locked in the tower; her stiffening body locks herself. A castle is always associated with dark paths, chambers and secrets; this one is no exception. The sexual identity reflects perfectly the bourgeois ideology. The heroines are invariably beautiful, tender, fragile and poor. In this latest romance, each heroine is identified as a little flower fighting against the harsh world. But the world is never really harsh for those beautiful ladies, whose saviors are the handsome and wealthy heroes. The chilvarous hero always comes to the aid of the helpless heroine when she is in dire need. As the quest of the knight is for the holy Grail, so the quest of a romantic hero is for his true love. During this quest, man assumes the role of savior/protector while woman takes the role of the weak/protected. Money sustains love, if not buying it. Romance spreads the illusioin of a Prince Charming to rescue his fair lady. But what if the lady is not fair but fat and ugly? Then, the chance is slim that there will ever be a Prince Charming to set his eyes on her, let alone save her. Herein lies the greatest harm of romance---the misleading concept on gender roles which endorses the union of a Prince Charming with a fair and fragile lady. 

Jane Austen once made a scintillating remark: "It's a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." Giong Yao's romance seems to elaborate on this, but ends up losing the grip of reality. Her glittering world of romance has no lack of single, rich men in want of wives. But those would-be wives share the similar traits. They are the passive roles waiting for the rich young men to find her, love her and own her. Whenever danger or difficulty arises, her rich young man appears to help her weather through it, precisely the "deus-ex-machina"! Ah, what an easy way out, and what a horrible pattern of romance!          

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