Dangerous Books For Girls: The Bad Reputation of Romance Novels Explained Read online

  First, some of the disdain was reserved for the form of the novel itself. “Oh, it’s only a novel,” Jane Austen writes, undoubtedly with sarcasm, in Northanger Abbey. It is only “some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language.”

  Second, women in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries had limited education and experience in comparison to men. If novels were to be realistic and accurate representations of real life, then how could these lady authors, whose “experience in life is seldom wide and never deep” do this well? How could honorable and virtuous young women write credibly about passions? (And God forbid she wrote it from first-hand experience.) Even if women did manage to write well-plotted stories with “pleasing sentiments” and well-drawn characters, the Lady Author was still doomed to fail simply because of her sex: “The views of life and the judgments of conduct must be imperfect and superficial, and will often be thoroughly unsound.”[20]

  It was also thought that if women must be doing this in their spare time with little education or formal training, then it must be hackwork. “There are vast numbers of lady novelists, for much the same reason that there are vast numbers of semptresses [seamstresses],” Greg writes. “Thousands of women have nothing to do and yet are under the necessity of doing something.” This perception was hardly helped by the sheer volume of such novels published then and now.

  But all this criticism hardly stopped women from reading and writing such novels. Greg writes “the supply of the fiction market has mainly fallen into their hands” and today romance accounts for most fiction sold in the United States. What does this mean? Money.

  Many women throughout history have found writing a suitable way to work from home. As much as romance novels were stories of women embarking on adventures out of the house, it was a job one could do while running a household, especially since mass production of household goods during the Industrial Revolution freed up some of women’s time. (We see this again later in the 1950s and 1960s when new labor-saving appliances freed up so much of a housewife’s time that it spurred many to join the workforce.)

  Writing then gave women a semi-respectable way of earning money while still largely upholding a traditional role. “We had imagined that destitute women turned novelists, as they turned governesses, because they had no other ‘lady-like’ means of getting their bread,” George Eliot writes in her essay Silly Novels by Lady Novelists. Two of the bestselling American lady novelists that everyone seems to have forgotten, E.D.E.N. Southworth, author of The Hidden Hand, or Capitola the Madcap, and Susan Warner, author of the massive bestseller The Wide, Wide World, supported their families with their popular and prolific writing about tragic girls left to make their way alone in the world, twists of fate, and reversals of fortune. And those are just two examples.

  Women wrote themselves into positions of authority. On one hand, this demand for books for women, about women, and by women helped launch a whole new marketplace in which women were—and are—principal players. This meant money, which translated to more power in the household, or even the ability to leave it.

  But this position of authority manifested in other ways. When women wrote stories about women and their experiences, it was a topic of which they were experts, or at least more expert than men. And when women wrote, they often created stories where men are brought around to love, respect, understand, and value a woman. Rather than wait for outside validation by a man, each story written by a woman, about a woman, who declared their worth.

  A writer is God and Queen, Lord and Master of her fictional world. She controls the weather, every heartbeat, every breath, every thought, and the fates of fictional people.

  It’s no small thing for a woman to have the experience of writing a story where she has power over an entire (fictional) world, especially when she may not have it in her real life.

  #5 Because female orgasms

  Hell, at this rate she’d end up in the mental institution by the end of the year. Cause: Celibacy.

  —The Marriage Bargain by Jennifer Probst

  The novel, and by extension the lady novel by a lady novelist, was born in the age of revolutions. The modern mass-market paperback romance novel we know and love today came out during the sexual revolution of the 1970s.

  After hundreds of years of restrictions on female sexuality, women were finally able to start exploring their own desires, thanks to bigger social trends from changing perceptions of a woman’s role to the invention and widespread use of the birth control pill.

  The modern romance industry was born in 1972 with the publication of The Flame and the Flower by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss, at a time when evenCosmopolitan magazine declared in a feature article that, “Women do not have sexual fantasies, period. Men do.”[21]

  It was, admittedly, a troubling start for the modern reader: In that epic, historical novel set at the turn of the nineteenth century, the hero mistakes the heroine for a prostitute (not that this should matter) and rapes her. Their forced marriage is the beginning of their grand romance, and this book is the beginning of the erotic romance that doesn’t shy away from depicting sex as an important part of a satisfying relationship.

  After centuries of being told that lust in women needed to be controlled or conversely that their gender was “not troubled by sexual feelings of any kind,” women found that their sexual feelings could be a mystery, even to themselves. Romance novels changed the conversation. Yes, women had sexual desires. Yes, women experienced sexual pleasure. Romance novels came to provide a safe place for women to explore their desires, free from the risk of rape, guilt, judgment, slut-shaming, disease, unplanned pregnancy, or regret. In contrast to so many other depictions of sex, from literature to porn to movies, romance novels are completely and unabashedly focused on the woman’s feelings and pleasure. And, most revolutionarily of all, romance heroines can enjoy sex and still live happily ever after.

  #6 Because HEA

  Decide what makes you happy and damn what anyone else thinks or says.

  —Rush by Maya Banks

  If a fictional heroine escapes the confines of the house, chooses love, has orgasmic sex, and dies at the end of the story, the message is clear: Don’t try this at home. But if she lives happily ever after? The message is also clear: Live the dream, girl!

  In romance novels, the heroine lives. Not only that, she lives happily ever after, which is shorthand for a life of being loved for oneself and for having achieved a measure of security.

  But the happy ending is about more than marriage and more than love. There is social acceptance of the romantic couple, showing that two individuals can push boundaries and still be accepted by society and perhaps even change it. Good people are rewarded. Bad people are punished. There is, quite simply, emotional justice. It is implied that the couple will have a measure of financial security. Often, they welcome babies, showing that mother and baby have lived through childbirth (a real danger for most of human history) and that there is a new generation, born and raised with love. Above all, there is hope for the future that is more loving and accepting of a greater variety of people.

  The happy ending also makes the reader happy. There is a certain feeling when one has just finished a good romance, and you’re basking in that happily-ever-after glow—you want to feel that again. So the lady readers seeks more books, the lady authors write more books, and publishers are financially incentivized to churn out more and more and more books declaring that women are worth it and that they deserve autonomy, pleasure, and love. More and more women come to believe that they deserve a good story—on the page, and in real life.

  Viva la romance revolution.

  PROOF OF SNARK

  EVIDENCE OF ROMANCE’S BAD REPUTATION

  If I had any doubt that the romance genre had a bad reputation, the survey data c
onfirmed it. People who took my survey for nonromance readers and had admittedly not read the genre offered the following descriptions: “Fluff reading, for not very bright individuals”; “Formulaic and generally mediocre writing”; “Unrealistic. Lesser quality writing and vocabulary”; “Not addressing the larger issues in life. Dependence upon detailed sex scenes which can be too stereotypically he-mannish.”

  They described the readers as “stuck in a rut,” “sorority girls or bored housewives,” and “romantics, people who like their comfort zone, not very original perhaps?” And those were just the first few responses. Overall survey respondents thought romance readers were less educated and had a lower income than they actually do.

  Romance readers are well aware of how they and their beloved books are perceived. Eighty-five percent of readers feel that romance novels have a bad reputation and 89 percent also believe that romance readers were looked down upon. Half of readers felt they should keep their romance reading a secret. “I definitely had the conception of dedicated romance readers as cat ladies,” says Jenn Northington, the former event manager at WORD Bookstore in Brooklyn, New York. That is, before she started reading them, meeting the readers, and eventually becoming a romance fan herself.

  The truth is, there is a huge variety of romance novels and readers, but still, the stereotypes remain. “It’s just out there in the ether,” says Courtney Milan, a bestselling author of historical romance. It certainly appeared to be so, but I wanted to find proof of the snark. I found examples in the way we talk about romance novels, but it’s most apparent in how and where we do not talk about romance novels, such as the book review sections of prestigious publications, academic institutions, or even the dictionary.

  A romance by any other name

  The Urban Dictionary defines a romance novel as “literary porn,” which in its own way is flattering in that it is a rare instance of acknowledging romance as literary. Also, porn, by their definition, is “The best thing in the world.” However, indicative of contrasting views, the second definition is “garbage.”

  At least the Urban Dictionary actually offers a definition of romance novel. Look up romance novel in any other dictionary and you’ll be surprised at what you don’t find. Dictionary.com can’t find the word. Merriam-Webster.com wonders if you meant “roman numeral.”

  All of these dictionaries do offer standard definitions of “science fiction” and “comic book,” revealing that it’s not an issue with genre fiction overall, but a very specific type of genre fiction. However, Dictionary.com does offer a definition of mommy porn:

  noun, informal. 1. sexually explicit or pornographic books, photos, videos, etc., that appeal to women, especially middle-aged women. British: mummy porn.

  Ugh.

  If you look up just romance, the results go something like this:

  noun (1): a medieval tale based on legend, chivalric love and adventure, or the supernatural (2): a prose narrative treating imaginary characters involved in events remote in time or place and usually heroic, adventurous, or mysterious (3): a love story especially in the form of a novel

  They offer the classical definitions. But they also don’t say the same thing: They don’t offer anything remotely resembling the way millions of readers understand the genre to be today or come close to the official definition from Romance Writers of America (RWA):

  A central love story: The main plot centers around individuals falling in love and struggling to make the relationship work. A writer can include as many subplots as he/she wants as long as the love story is the main focus of the novel.

  An emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending: In a romance, the lovers who risk and struggle for each other and their relationship are rewarded with emotional justice and unconditional love.

  But if one were to look up romance novel in the Oxford English Dictionary of Literary Terms, a little book of required reading for university students in English departments, they would not find the term. Of course, science fiction and fantasy have a full page dedicated to each of them.

  I would like to see these dictionaries include a definition of romance novel that would be recognizable to millions of contemporary readers today. When nonromance readers were asked how they would define a romance novel, they hit the highlights of the RWA definition:

  “Girl meets boy/woman meets man, a few problems here and there but they manage to surmount them and voilà! happy ending.”

  “A story that features a couple getting together, being separated by evil relatives or innocent misunderstandings, then reuniting at the end.”

  “The romantic relationship is the main plot.”

  “Boy meets girl, fall in love, have sexual encounters, maybe a little problem or dramatic heartache/death something, but then somehow everything works out and they find love at the end.”

  If even nonromance readers have the same understanding of this term romance novel, it appears that we’re all operating with a similar definition of what it means.

  In recent years, selfie, bling, and dance-off were added to the Oxford English Dictionary. The Oxford Dictionary Online saw the addition of squee, twerk, and jorts. It’s time to include romance novel as we know it.

  Bodice rippers in the media

  For a long time the mainstream media mostly ignored the romance industry. There weren’t many reviews of the books, profiles of the authors, or discussions of trends in the genre. But occasionally, romance finds itself in the headlines of traditional media outlets and it’s often easy to see the snark.

  When HarperCollins (owned by NewsCorp) bought romance publisher Harlequin for $415 million, it was big business and publishing news. At a time when the publishing industry is in flux and the “Big 6” are consolidating, it’s a big deal when one massive publisher acquires another. Even for a serious business article, the New York Times used the headline “Bodice Ripper in New Hands.”[22] (even though the term bodice ripper technically never really applied to Harlequin romances).

  The first few paragraphs were wisecracks. There was the inevitable Fabio mention (“The very word Harlequin conjures images of shirtless hunks—Fabio Lanzoni was a famous cover model in the 1980s and ’90s—and lusty women.”). In contrast, when Penguin and Random House merged, the headline was a staid “Penguin and Random House Will Merge, Saying Change Will Come Slowly"[23] to match the straightforward text of the article: “Together, Penguin and Random House will make up the biggest and most dominant publisher in the business.” Yawn. But accurate. And snark-free.

  When the New York Times does talk about romance novels, the results are widespread, long-lasting, and cringe-inducing. They’re credited with popularizing the terms bodice ripper and mommy porn. Both phrases diminish the genre by reducing it to just “the naughty bits” and insult the reader by implying that they’re reading smut. But at least romance is being talked about?

  When Harper’s magazine published an article on the genre, “Bad romance: One genre and a billion happy endings,” [24] the author went to great lengths to position the genre poorly by juxtaposing the story of aspiring writers, self-published successes, and hunky cover models at a romance conference with a news story about a man who killed his friend’s wife, son, and dog, torched their house, and kidnapped the daughter. It’s not clear what the author was trying to accomplish—perhaps to highlight the stark contrast between the happy endings in books and real-life tragedies on the news? Romance authors are worried about selling their happy books when really, love is fucked up and people go crazy and die?

  In other instances, the lack of mentions of romance novels is shocking. In 2014, the Atlantic published an article entitled “Why Is It So Hard for Women to Write about Sex?”[25] It doesn’t even mention the billion dollar industry of women writing happily about sex. The subtitle of the article is “Because it’s easier to titillate, shock, and lie than to get at the messy truth about female desire.” Of course, this is something the romance genre has been doing explicitly for decades.
In 2013, the New York Times did a feature called “Let’s Read about Sex”[26] and neglected to include the perspective of any romance author. They at least published a Letter to the Editor from bestselling romance author Sarah MacLean, who wrote “I was dismayed to see that of the 15 authors asked to discuss writing about sex in the ‘Naughty Bits’ roundup, none write romance novels—the genre best known for its naughty bits.”[27]

  This all changed with the phenomenon of 50 Shades of Grey. When it was “discovered” by nonromance readers, suddenly this book became too popular to ignore. In a deluge of blog posts and articles, people declared this book the death of feminism and a cause of abusive relationships and criticized the entire genre (“Romance novels, like racists, tend to be the same wherever you turn,” writes William Giraldi, in a scathing piece for the New Republic).[28]

  But the romance lovers had a response for all those haters, and they took to their blogs to defend the genre. Some mainstream media even published articles that reported more favorably on romance. For example, the Atlantic published “Beyond Bodice Rippers: How Romance Novels Came to Embrace Feminism,”[29] which examines how authors are writing more empowered heroines, especially when it comes to sex. On their website, NPR published an article entitled “Don’t Hide Your Harlequins: In Defense of Romance”[30] about a romance reader overcoming the sense of shame she was made to feel for her reading material.

  Entertainment Weekly featured a multipage story about the romance genre, including graphics, in their October 2014 issue, which was widely regarded as fair and favorable. Some comments from the romance blog at USA Today were about what was awesome in the Entertainment Weekly article: that the author interviewed prominent authors (not obscure ones) to represent the genre, she attended the annual Romance Writers of America conference (the “right” one to go to), she didn’t take a condescending tone, and she reported on romance’s great numbers (the billion-dollar industry, the millions of readers, etc).