A Fine Romance

Have you ever cooed to a loved one via the telephone or on your cell phone or mobile on Valentine’s Day or otherwise?

Turns out that the inventor of the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell, might have been unwittingly prescient about this since he filed his patent application for his original contraption on none other than Valentine’s Day, February 14, 1876.

I Just Called To Say I Love You
No doubt Bell would be astonished to see us calling one another from everywhere imaginable for love or other reasons, including from cafes like this one that we photographed in Paris.

Ingrid Bergman’s Definition Of A Kiss
So much for virtual cooing by phone. Now it’s on to romance in the flesh, all year ’round and particularly on Valentine’s Day.

The actress Ingrid Bergman, probably best known for her portrayal of the character Ilsa Lund and her ill-fated romance with Humphrey Bogart’s character Rick Blaine in the romantic drama film Casablanca, summed it up well with her reflection about kisses.

“A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous,” she observed.

Brides And Grooms
Loving relationships between partners often result in marriage. So when we noticed some gorgeous gowns in a bridal shop in England and photographed them

Shakespeare’s Heroine Juliet Who Gets Valentines Every Year
On the other side of the fence are ill-fated relationships, including one of the most famous namely William Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet.

Fictional though the play may be and even though its star-crossed hero and heroine both die tragically by the end of the play, lo and behold Juliet still gets mail today, including about 1,000 valentines each year!

That’s because people still write to her, and more specifically to the Italian city of Verona where Shakespeare set his play.

Why, the star-struck lover even has an official club on line called ‘The Juliet Club’! Go to the site (link at the end of this article) and you can see a picture of the nine-strong group of secretaries who reply to the thousands of letters that Juliet receives throughout the year.

However, every year on Valentine’s Day, the most beautiful letter written to Juliet wins the ‘Dear Juliet Prize’ which is presented at a prize ceremony where the likes of film director Franco Zeffirelli (who directed the hit 1968 British-Italian movie adaptation of Romeo and Juliet) and operatic singer Andrea Bocelli have taken part in past years.

The Real ‘Casa Di Giulietta’, Perhaps?
When we traveled in Italy several years ago, we visited Verona where we also saw its famous Casa di Giulietta (Juliet’s House). Complete with a large courtyard and a romantically inspiring balcony, this 13th-century house went through a major restoration during the 1930s.

Located on Via Capello, it was owned by the dell Capello family for many years. The similarity between the real-life family of ‘Capello’ and Shakespeare’s fictional Juliet from the family of ‘Capulet’ has prompted many to believe that Shakespeare might well have adapted his character from this famous family and its opulent residence.

Gondolas In Venice With Chilean Poet Pablo Neruda
Verona is not far from the famous city of Venice, known for its romantic canals and gondolas. We went there shortly after seeing Verona, and we photographed those iconic gondolas gently rocking in the water.

Speaking of Romeo and Juliet and Valentine’s Day also brings to mind romantic poetry, and of course along with Shakespeare, many poets have written about the many dimensions of love.

So we turned to the 20th-century Chilean poet and politician Pablo Neruda who was a hero in his own country and feted throughout the world at large for his erotically charged love poems for a quotation from one of his poems:

Ah, loving is a voyage with water and with the stars that kiss by kiss we travel across
PABLO NERUDA (1904-1973)

The Power Of Flowers
Here are some statistics about flower power on Valentine’s Day: About 110 million roses alone, the majority red, are given to loved ones on the day.

Men are in the majority at 73% for those who queue up to buy such romantic bouquets.

‘X’ Marks The Spot
Another statistic is that around 1 billion Valentine’s Day cards are sent around the world each year, and included somewhere in the text of those cards many people will write the letter ‘x’ to symbolize a kiss.

Ever wonder how this symbolism came about?

Well, it is thought that it all began in the Middle Ages. Because many people could not read or write at that time, they signed an ‘x’ in front of a witness when they had to sign something important.

Furthermore, to establish that they were truly bound to what they had marked, such illiterate people had to kiss the ‘x’ to show they were serious.

Love In The Ancient World
No matter what age people lived in before and after Valentine’s Day which became associated with love during the 14th century, naturally love has been a driving force throughout the history of humankind.

For example, read the sensuous regard that it evoked in a quotation from a poem in ancient Egypt circa 1550 to 1080 BCE that reads