Contemporary Romance

about
As culture has shifted through the decades, so has our ideas and perceptions about love and romance.
The "compendium" is a collection of quotes and bits from writers, essayists, and popular culture regarding modern romance, illustrated through moving imagery.

A Compendium of Contemporary Romance

Just as visual pornography sets up unrealistic expectations for sex and physicality, the media's fanciful stories of love wire consumers to expect Hollywood-style kisses in the rain and constant, epic moments of dramatic love. How can real life compete?
- Relevant Magazine

Do you really know when it’s right? And how do you know? Are there signs? Fireworks? Is it right when it feels comfortable or is that a sign that there aren’t any fireworks? Is hesitation a sign that it’s not right or a sign that you’re not ready? In matters of love, how do you know when it’s right?
To know when it is “right” is another way of phrasing a concern that has been repeatedly addressed in the show: the concept of the “One” or the soul mate. The roots of this idea might be traced back as far as Aristophanes’s famous account of love in Plato‘s Symposium, but it has grown pervasive in late-20th / early 21st-century American popular culture [...]
- Beatriz Oria

Whether one laments or praises courtship’s decline, it is clear that we have yet to locate a successful replacement for it — evidently it is not as simple as hustling the aging coquette out the door to make way for the vigorous debutante. On the contrary, our current courting practices — if they can be called that — yield an increasing number of those aging coquettes, as well as scores of unsettled bachelors. On college campuses, young men and women have long since ceased formally dating and instead participate in a “hooking up” culture that favors the sexually promiscuous and emotionally disinterested while punishing those intent on commitment.
- Christine Rosen

Marriage was an economic institution in which you were given a partnership for life in terms of children and social status and succession and companionship. But now we want our partner to still give us all these things, but in addition I want you to be my best friend and my trusted confidant and my passionate lover to boot, and we live twice as long. So we come to one person, and we basically are asking them to give us what once an entire village used to provide: Give me belonging, give me identity, give me continuity, but give me transcendence and mystery and awe all in one. Give me comfort, give me edge. Give me novelty, give me familiarity. Give me predictability, give me surprise. And we think it’s a given, and toys and lingerie are going to save us with that. Ideally, though, we’re lucky, and we find our soul mate and enjoy that life-changing mother lode of happiness. But a soul mate is a very hard thing to find.
- Aziz Ansari

We need to live by stories that help us deal with tough realities. Idealism has a role to play – it can convince us that no matter how misshapen, decrepit, or dull we are, there is someone out there for us.
- Phillip Hodson

I love that you get cold when it's 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.
- When Harry Met Sally

Why would you ever be excited to be with someone who is not excited to be with you? If they’re not happy with you now, what makes you think they’ll be happy to be with you later? Why do you make an effort to convince someone to date you when they make no effort to convince you?
The Law of “Fuck Yes or No” states that when you want to get involved with someone new, in whatever capacity, they must inspire you to say “Fuck Yes” in order for you to proceed with them.
The Law of “Fuck Yes or No” also states that when you want to get involved with someone new, in whatever capacity, THEY must respond with a “Fuck Yes” in order for you to proceed with them.
-Mark Manson

Oh my, my, my, what you do to me
Like lighting when I'm swimming in the sea
From the very first time we loved
From the very first time we touched
Walking on wires and power lines
You put your body on top of mine
Every time that you lift me up
To the heavens and stars above
– Major Lazer