Love is a deep and profound concept, both at an individual level and in society at large. Though a marriage based on companionship and attraction was not a readily accepted idea until, arguably, the Victorian era, the first marriage ceremony took place over 4,000 years ago. The evolving and historical practice of marriage — and love’s role in it — is perhaps most easily mapped through literature, as it reflects societal norms of its time. To name a few, both Plato (428-348 BC) and Aristotle (384-322 BC) parsed thoughts on love, the book of Numbers tells of Zimri and Cozbi’s story (and subsequent demise), William Shakespeare constructed an entire play around star-crossed lovers with “Romeo and Juliet” (1597), C.S. Lewis drew on the Greeks and Christian commentators’ thoughts to describe the types of love in “The Four Loves” (1960), and the “Twilight” series spent 274 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list in the early 2000s.
The stories of star-crossed lovers — Zimri and Cozbi, Romeo and Juliet among them — have enticed people to believe and even engage in relationships set up for failure, usually in the name of passion. After all, no records document Zimri and Cozbi as married, and Romeo and Juliet knew each other for all of 24 hours before their marriage ceremony. But what of relationships set up for success? Vampire Edward and human Bella certainly seemed to be on a star-crossed path headed for doom, but they took matters into their own hands, setting themselves up for success. They found a way to make their relationship work “till death do us part” — or, in their case, for the long haul of immortality.
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