Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo," - a line from Romeo and Juliet that has become one of Shakespeare's most well-known lines. Juliet is actually speaking to herself, not realising that Romeo is hiding beneath her balcony. "Deny thy father and refuse thy name;" she says, asking Romeo to ostracise himself from his own family, so their forbidden love can become real. Is this romantic? Definitely.
Today is Valentine's Day — anxiously awaited by many young girls around the world, who hope every year for their first anonymous Valentine's Day card. It's a day when — traditionally — people around the world should confess their feelings to the loves of their lives, express their feelings for their loved ones and generally make their partners feel special.
It's a day of romance and love. The day is actually the feast day of Saint Valentine; a martyred saint of ancient Rome. "Valentine" derives from the Latin "Valens" meaning strong, powerful, able and healthy.
It's not until the 14th century, however, that the Saint's day became associated with romantic love. Antiquarians argue that it was Geoffrey Chaucer and his circle of fellow English writers that first made this association.
Somewhere over the years, however, the romance of Valentine's Day has been lost, with year after year of the retail industry cashing in on each and every opportunity to merchandise.
I received a press release designed to market a particular company's mobile phone for February 14 last week. "Spoil your loved one this Valentine's Day," it read, "with a new mobile phone". Is this romantic? Definitely not. Practical maybe, useful yes, but romantic? Not in the traditional sense at least.
Perhaps the best examples of merchandising for Valentine's Day can be found in the supermarkets and card shops I've been in this week. Monstrously huge teddies grasping oversized floppy red cushions with "I love you" sewn into them, heart-shaped fluffy toys, mugs bearing sickly messages and Valentine's garlands. I even found some red-heart tinsel — and here I was thinking tinsel was a Christmas decoration.
Just tell them
OK, so people do buy their loved ones presents on this day, but these examples I just mentioned are just over the top.
Is this romantic? I don't think so.
If you really want to show someone you love them, I think you should just tell them.
When my grandma and granddad got married, at the beginning of the Second World War, she had ball chrysanthemums in her wedding bouquet. The flowers have a large ball as their head, and look almost like an exploding firework.
Every year on their wedding anniversary, my granddad would buy her the number of chrysanthemums corresponding to how many years they'd been together — so for their second anniversary he bought two.
On their 50th wedding anniversary, my grandma asked him to stop. The scent of 50 flowers in the house was amazing, but not only was he spending all of his pension on her anniversary present, but she didn't have enough vases.
After she died he didn't know what to do. Just four months afterwards he decided he didn't want to live without her and so simply stopped eating and slowly faded away.
You could say he died of a broken heart. Is that romantic? It's more than just romantic - it's true love.
