While studying the covers and titles of modern romance novels in India, we found a sharp divide between the genders when it comes to romance novels.
“Chick Lit and Lad Lit speak from the vantage point of two different perceptions of time. In the romance titles by women, the protagonists (mostly female), are looking out to the horizon on a clear-sighted forward march, while the romances by men have protagonists (mostly male) looking back in reckoning, revealing their emotions…
In this map of romance novels, it’s almost as if there are two kinds of fantasy that Love offers to its modern readers: that women have a future, and men have an inner emotional life. Between the covers and amidst the titles of these novels, there breathes a promise: one that love in real life is yet to fulfil
