Are Romance Novels Political?

In the current state of political turmoil around the world, many voices have been urging to keep politics out of reading spaces. And like me, most authors and readers will tell you that books are inherently political. 

So here’s my little spiel on this issue.

Are my books political? Hell, yes.

But I write romance. Yes, exactly why my books are political.

Because romantic love has always been political. If it weren’t, society wouldn’t have spent an inordinate amount of energy trying to define what kind of love is acceptable and which is not. Interracial, interfaith, inter-caste, love across borders—all these are castigated because love is entrenched within structures of power in every society, and has the potential to unsettles those very structures. So is kink, queer love, and polyamory. That is the reason romance books are political. 

And it is not just who we love, but also how we love. What are our expectations from romantic love? Why is mutual respect and equality in a relationship bothersome for some? Books either challenge heteronormativity or espouse it with urgency. 

Why does mainstream opinion equate romance books to porn? It is because women have never been allowed to define their own pleasures and desires with such ease. When they do, they threaten to upset the social conventions that have defined women as subordinate and femininity as submissive. When romance delineates how powerful female sexuality can be, it threatens to upset the dominant narratives crafted through the centuries. 

Heterosexual romance creates a world where women can trust men, rely on them for emotional support, find true friendships and unconditional love— things that the detractors of romance say are unrealistic. And there is a reason for this. To be all this, men would have to give up the power that patriarchy and masculinist cultures bestow upon them.  It creates a world where women are not pitted against each other and can be the greatest champions for other women. (A shameless self-plug here, my book The Ex Factor does this emphatically.)

Now consider the converse. There are romance books that do the exact opposite and work hard to uphold the existing structures of power. Both are political. Both are interested in examining and upsetting or upholding the systemic inequalities in society. And this brings us to an important point: not all romance is feminist. But all romance is political, just like every other genre. 

Let’s take this a bit further. Why are some books, across genres, expected to be universal while others are slapped with the tag of diverse stories? Why are marginalized peoples expected to relate to characters in these so-called universal stories, but people with privilege can voice their discontent that they didn’t relate to any of the characters in the “diverse” stories?

Even when we have the most innocuous-looking stories, a peek underneath the superficial top layer gives us an idea of the discrepancies and inequalities in a society. 

Consider who the two main characters are. Where are they located? Who are their friends? Who are the people surrounding them? Are there any people from a traditionally disadvantaged minority in the story? What is their role? How are they portrayed? Are they in a position of power? Are they in a supporting cast only to uphold the main lead? Are they given a history of their own? Goals and dreams of their own? Are they given any thoughts and feelings that are their own, that do not echo the emotions of the main leads?

And finally, if we find ourselves in stories that don’t seem political to us, chances are we are enjoying the privileges embodied by the cast in these stories. We are enjoying the power that these characters have. 

So when we are tempted to say books aren’t political or aren’t supposed to be political, we must introspect on what political means to us and why we are so insistent on romance not being political. 

There is a reason people in power are afraid of artists and writers. Because writing is political, reading is political. That is the reason for book bans. Because books are political.