Contrary to our desires, love does not always make people happy. Unrequited feelings, ill-considered actions – all this can turn love into a curse. How to avoid mistakes and keep your happiness is better to learn from books than from bitter experience.
It is overly romantic to think that love is a matter of intuition rather than effort. Thousands of years of experience, not only in life, but in legends, epics, and novels, assert that everlasting love is something that one has to create with one’s own labor, rather than having only the good fortune to meet once. The most clinging, life-affirming and unforgettable stories happen when we try our best to fight for love: in the hardest circumstances of life or even in everyday life – fighting the Groundhog Day and the squabbles of everyday life. So here are our top 5 books about tough love. The list is presented in random order and is not a popularity rating.
Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding
Bridget Jones is not physically or mentally ill, there is no war going on around her, and she faces no real obstacles beyond herself. Bridget is an ordinary girl with ordinary not-so-serious problems. Everyone has heard of this book, but it is doubtful that many men have read it. Nevertheless, they would have benefited from it: the beautiful voice of the main character and the brilliant comedy take this book to a level above ordinary “women’s” literature. An important line in the story is the heroine’s relationships with the many different men in her life. In spite of the love story and the heroine’s heartbreak, Fielding’s iconic work is imbued with a sense of humor, so her bestseller is rightfully included in our review of the world’s funniest books.
Daniel Martin, John Fowles
The novel reveals the fate of the eponymous writer and Hollywood screenwriter. Various life circumstances hindered his love, but could not extinguish it completely. Being a lifelong lover of his friend’s wife, the hero is faced with a difficult moral dilemma. And the decision does not get any easier when, dying, the friend asks Daniel Martin to take care of his wife.
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
When it comes to love deferred, “Love in the Time of Cholera” (different translations-the book is the same) leaves “Daniel Martin” behind. Florentino and Fermina fall in love in their youth, but Fermina’s father and circumstances (and later she herself) prevent these feelings. And Florentino is forced to wait… to wait until he is old. When does devotion turn into obsession?
The Good Luck of Right Now, Matthew Quick
Bartholomew, who was ridiculed in school for being “retarded,” has lived with his mother all of his 38 years. When she dies, he has to start a life of his own, helped a little by a local priest who suffers from bipolar disorder. Bartholomew falls in love with a psychologically traumatized librarian and travels with her to meet his father.
Norwegian Forest by Haruki Murakami
Curiously enough, many of the books on this list have been brought to life on the screen. Conflicting and difficult love stories take on a completely different connotation in movies than they do on paper. The novel is somewhat reminiscent of Daniel Martin’s story. Tooru’s friend commits suicide at age 19, and now the main character begins to fall in love with his girlfriend, the beautiful and fragile but psychologically traumatized Naoko. The novel allows the reader to learn about the boring life of a Japanese student and, at the same time, to empathize with the touching love story that brings bright colors to the tired everyday life.
Works about love can teach us a lot. They help us make sense of our own feelings, finding a response in the plot of literary masterpieces. By describing someone else’s failure, they teach us to avoid fatal mistakes. Let us accept their lessons with gratitude, so that love will not be our undoing, but will illuminate our lives.
