Literary Couples

By Eilis Flynn

Literary couples. What could be more appropriate in honor of Valentine’s Day, for Romance Writers of America?

Here’s a database of some of literature’s classic couples, ranging from Jane Austen’s Darcy and Elizabeth, Antony and Cleopatra, all the way to Wesley and Buttercup. (You don’t know Wesley and Buttercup? Do we know you?) It’s a good start, at least:

http://student.tfc.edu/elama/DataBase.htm

Then there is the other kind of literary couple, the kind who actually do the creating (you know, folk like us!). This blogger comments on the kind of literary couple where one is the author and the other, a “legendary spouse.” Examples used here are Vera and Vladimir Nabokov, Fanny and Ralph Ellison, and Sophia and Nathaniel Hawthorne, not to mention Virginia and Leonard Woolf.

http://esperanzazine.blogspot.com/2006_06_01_esperanzazine_archive.html

The Write Marriage: When it comes to literary couples, is two a crowd? Can smart, literary couples–in love and yet trying to steal time from each other to work–be productive and happy? That’s the question that this writer poses.

http://maisonneuve.org/index.php?&page_id=12&article_id=551

And finally, for those who may be a tad jaded, the Annoying Literary Lovebirds Poll: Need I say more?

http://gawker.com/news/jonathan-safran-foer/annoying-literary-lovebirds-poll-228171.php