If you and your partner are one of those mature couples that reads fiction, it’s no surprise that you seldom encounter characters like yourselves. Certainly, you occasionally encouonter a loving couple like Joe and Mrs. Gargery in Dickens’ Great Expecations. But overwhelmingly, they serve as Non-Player Characters (NPCs) of classic fiction. For the most part, protagonists in these classic novels seek to escape their lot. Or, as in D. H. Lawrence‘s Sons and Lovers, the author depicts married life as sordid and insufferable.
Consequently, the question becomes: why is this? If fiction reflects society, why do authors denigrate, or ignore altogether, writing about mature happy couples? Isn’t the goal or end game for their protagonisis marriage and living happily ever after? Is the topic too sacharine or bourgeois for modern tastes? Or, is it because they adhere to Tolstoy’s pronouncement in Anna Karenina regarding the interchangeabilty of happy families “being all alike”? Or its contrary, “each unhappy f amily is unhappy in its own way.” To put it succinctly, unhappy families provide more fertile ground for character development.
Below are a few salient considerations to help you decide:
No Mature, Married Couples: Four Reasons
- Plot focus–Fiction involves the depiction of intense emotions or conflicts. Because they are mature, happy characters, authors regard such protagonists as unsuitable as the source bed for displays of passion or violence.
- Genre expectations–fiction has become ever more segmented into genres and sub-genres. For example, fiction has become more balkenized in today’s marketplace with sub-categories aimed at children learning to read and young adults. With much of the advertising aimed toward young readers, fewer monetary incentives remain for stories directed toward the experiences of mature individuals, let alone couples.
- Emotional depth–elaborating on the previous point: given publishers’ focus on reaching younger readers, publishers may feel that emotions of older characters and their situations are too complex and won’t resonate with young readers. If that’s true, older readers seeking escape in fiction may not wish to see their life concerns reflected in literature.
- Market Demand–as indicated above, economics to a certain extent, drives what authors wish to write and what publishers are willing to promote. The market appears to be growing for mature characters in niche categories such as Romance fiction. Howver, the number of people who read fiction (or nonfiction) dwindles rapidly beyond a certain age group. They are even less likely to want the vagaries of society depicted in what they choose to read.
More Mature Couples: Some Suggestions
However, all is not bleak for the mature couples appearing on the fiction horizon. Female readership has always provided the black ink of publishers’ spreadsheets. Therefore, it isn’t surprising that the characters they choose to read about have matured along with their readership. Author Carys Davies summarizes the situation well in her Literary Hub essay, “Romance Finely Aged: On the Unique Dynamic of Older Couples.” For her tastes, the best fiction “crackles with the jeopardy of two people who have less time in front of them than they have behind them.”
Similar to my top five list of Valentine poems, social media platforms such as Redditt and Maryse’s Book Blog contain informed discussions about the best fomance novels whose protagonists are mature, loving couples. And, for those who like to cover the waterfront on certain topics, Goodreads lists over 90 novels whose main characters are mature couples in loving relationships.
No Mature Couples Upshot
The above seems to undercut my argument. However, remember that the recommended titles in these online sources reflect a perceived real need. Of the all the books published each year, these hundred-plus novels represent a tiny fraction of them. Whether pigeon-holed in a niche genre or identified as lilterary fiction, these novels administer to the sophistication and discrimination of mature reading audiencea. Moreover, an audience who wishes to see their problems, their realities reflected in the culture they inhabit.
What do you think? Have you found literature about maature, loving couples difficult to find? Should their concerns and conflicts be shoved aside and ignored? Let us know in the Comments.
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