Don’t Disrespect the Romance Novel

Broadly defined, romance fiction focuses on a love story and ends happily. This best-selling genre of fiction is also the most popular among library patrons. Yet critics have targeted romance fiction for promulgating harmful idealism and disparaged its readers as naively complicit in social ills from patriarchy to capitalism. Even when they usefully identify far-reaching systemic problems on view in romance, these criticisms smack of age-old anxieties about female authority — specifically, women’s capacity for self-determination in love, labor and leisure. Such critiques might also be explained by the fact that romance fiction is largely written by and for women.

Recent reports suggest only 16% of Americans read for pleasure. But when our family toured college campuses a few years back, I saw dorm room shelves holding paperbacks by romance writers such as Emily Henry, Sarah J. Maas and Sally Rooney. College students in the United States are reading for fun. And they are reading romance novels. 

Teaching romance fiction among other Irish literary works in my courses has given students a chance to consider how romance captures recent and rapid transformations in Irish culture: the peace and reconciliation process in Northern Ireland, the rise and fall of the Celtic Tiger economic boom in the Republic, the waning influence of the Catholic Church in the wake of revelations of widespread institutional and clerical abuses, the increasing racial and ethnic diversity of a once largely homogeneous population and an altered relationship with Europe.

Many of these changes have been associated with progressive attitudes toward gender and sexuality. In recent decades, for example, the Republic has decriminalized homosexuality and divorce, legalized same-sex marriage and abortion and recognized the preferred gender of trans persons. Romance also provides the means to witness cultural transformations; many novels portray a diverse society where seemingly intransigent biases can be overcome.

IRISH ROMANCE AND REAL LIFE 

In recent years, romance fiction has responded to legitimate criticism that it favors a world of white, heterosexual affluence. Irish romance fiction, particularly Young Adult (YA) romance, increasingly features varied linguistic, racial and ethnic identities, as well as a broader spectrum of gender identities. In many books, protagonists have bodies that do not conform to instantiated physical ideals or assumed abilities; they push against the filtered versions of selfhood we see on social media. Bangladeshi-Irish writer Adiba Jaigirdar, whose novel “The Henna Wars” was named one of the best YA novels of all time by Time magazine, is one of many authors who paint a portrait of a more diverse Ireland. Her queer adolescent characters negotiate racism, xenophobia and homophobia while finding their “happy for now,” notably with the support of their friends and families.

We also see diversity reflected in popular television adaptations of romance fiction. Sally Rooney’s “Normal People” follows two young adults whose differing socio-economic statuses challenge their relationship. Netflix’s “Bridgerton” invites us to celebrate racial and ethnic diversity. And HBO’s “Heated Rivalry” chronicles a sensitive and supportive same-sex relationship between two professional hockey players. 

In an increasingly polarized world, romance novels and their television adaptations imagine a world in which human connection trumps divisive forces. These books are not strictly a snare that refuses political and social realities. They imagine and suggest more enriching futures.

‘A WORLD BUILT ON HUMAN CONNECTION’ 

Criticism of romance fiction that underscores its complicity in the darkest flaws of patriarchy, heteronormativity and capitalism can be correct. It took years of therapy for me to accept that “Jane Eyre”’s broody and manipulative Mr. Rochester was not a romantic ideal. But also correct are analyses that insist the predictable pleasures of romance fiction can encourage readers to imagine a better and safer future. Romance fiction depicts a world built on human connection and flourishing that can unfurl within and without betrothal and marriage.

With the rare exception of James Joyce’s novel “Ulysses,” poetry, drama and the short story were the dominant Irish literary forms until the late 20th century. But “Ulysses” didn’t come out of nowhere. Across centuries, Irish women writers have produced hundreds of popular novels, many of which were romances. In the early decades of the 20th century, Katharine Tynan wrote more than 100 novels, Rosa Mulholland more than 50. It is not that there was no tradition of the Irish novel; instead, these novels were dismissed as sentimental books written by women.

This particular discovery came from my roaming the stacks of Dinand Library, which holds shelves full of these older Irish romances. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, these romance novels clearly were enjoyed by the priests teaching here, as well as by their male students.

Discoveries like these change the narrative. American readers relish the genre’s lively dialogue and vivid representations of contemporary Irish life. Since the 1980s, novels by Maeve Binchy have been international bestsellers. Her “Tara Road” was an Oprah’s Book Club selection. Passages from her novel “Circle of Friends” are included on the matriculation exam for Irish universities.

When studied in the classroom, Irish romance fiction often underscores the possibilities enabled by social change. Critical readers, like those we help develop at Holy Cross, understand complex and contradictory aims and outcomes in literature. Our students learn to engage their brains and hearts, enjoy rigor and pleasure, and take or leave the lessons of romance novels – Irish and otherwise – in pursuit of their own happy ever after, whatever shape that may take.

Paige Reynolds is the Stephen J. Prior Professor of Humanities and author of “Modernism in Irish Women’s Contemporary Writing: The Stubborn Mode” and “Modernism, Drama, and the Audience for Irish Spectacle.” In 2025, she and the Museum of Literature Ireland launched the exhibition “Happy Ever After: Falling in love with Irish romance fiction,” with support from Holy Cross’ Edward Callahan Support Fund for Irish Studies.