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From Valentino To Valentines: An Expert Dissects Romance
Tribune photo by SCOTT ISKOWITZ
USF professor Gaetan Brulotte speaks to students during his lecture Tuesday afternoon.
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Published: February 13, 2008
With Valentine's Day tomorrow, today really is the last day to do something about it.
So we sought out a resident expert in the field of romance and, ahem, erotica: Gaetan Brulotte, a professor of French and Francophone literature at the University of South Florida's world languages department.
His doctoral dissertation was on French erotic literature.
Brulotte, who has taught at the Tampa campus for 24 years, will give a lecture at noon Thursday at the USF library on his book, "The Encyclopedia of Erotic Literature."
Here are excerpts from a question-and-answer session with the love doctor:
Q: How do men and women view romance differently?
A: Stereotypically, men view romance in an active way, as givers and related to the duties of a worthy lover, an influence of courtly love times. Women see it in a more passive way as attracting and deserving their man's special attention. The former play; the latter rule. One thinks of sex rewards; the other thinks of relationship.
Q: Give us a list of romantic gifts or gestures.
A: In the distant past, a pair of white gloves from a man to a woman was a way of asking for her hand. Flowers, especially roses, at least since the medieval story "The Romance of the Rose," are associated with women, spring and fertility. Candies and chocolate come later, in the 19th century, and become associated with love for its euphoric properties.
Q: What's the connection between erotica and romance?
A: Historically they were at odds in the Western world with the lasting influence of platonic love. Today they are intimately connected as sex tends to be an expression of love and lovers blend the feeling with eroticism to create stronger bonds.
Q: What's the most romantic thing you've ever done?
A: I spent a romantic candlelight dinner and night in a lighthouse by the sea in the summertime.
Q: What is romance and how has it changed over the years?
A: Romantic love isn't a natural given. It's a cultural construction that appears in the early stages of civilization and has evolved over time. In the Middle Ages, we find that love mostly is prevalent outside of marriage (as marriages were arranged).
It was called "courtly love" and it forced men into strict behavior to deserve the (married) lady of their heart. It wasn't until the Renaissance in the 16th century that we find the promotion of a new kind of love, married love.
During the 17th century, with the refinement of civilization, rational love takes the front stage as emotions are submitted to will and duty. The head then controls the heart.
Confronted with the rational Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century, love collides with the libertine code of conduct and the art of love becomes the art of not loving.
Translation: Seduction skills are honed while avoiding falling in love. During the 19th century and the industrialization process, we see love becoming cynical when used for social promotion, or, on the contrary, becoming a cult with the romantic reliance on feelings to rule one's life.
It also became a transcendental tool to reach darker supernatural experiences of love beyond the grave.
At the beginning of the 20th century, under the influence of Freud, we discover the secret influence of the family over the way we choose our mate.
Love becomes progressively more sexualized, and today the art of love is inseparable from the art of making it, tightening its ties with eroticism. Serial monogamy is a widespread way of loving and living the transitory intensity of passion.
Q: Name some books or films that define what romance can be.
A: In nonfiction, Diane Ackerman's "A Natural History of Love" is a good read. In fiction, I would recommend "The Portuguese Letters" and "Manon Lescaut" by [Antoine] Prévost; "Belle du Seigneur" by [Albert] Cohen; "The Tunnel" by [Ernesto] Sabato; "Doctor Zhivago" by [Boris] Pasternak (and the 1965 film); "The Lover" by [Marguerite] Duras (and the 1997 film); "Love in the Time of Cholera" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (and the 2007 film); and movie classics such as "Casablanca," "Love Story," "When Harry Met Sally" and "Harold and Maude."
Brulotte will discuss his book in the library's Grace Allen Room, preceded by a reception at 11:30 a.m. at the same location. The event is free and open to lovers and nonlovers alike.
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