Valentine’s Day is marked by love, kindness, compassion, and romance. It is also seen as a marker of modernity by a sizeable section of Ind...
Valentine’s Day is marked by love, kindness, compassion, and romance. It is also seen as a marker of modernity by a sizeable section of India’s young people. To celebrate this day, they often take their cue from images in films and sitcoms: they dine at restaurants, exchange gifts, or take short getaways. Such a narrative of celebration of love tends to gloss over another, less talked about aspect of love – its dark side.
Romantic experiences are not all glorious and satisfactory. They tend to hurt as well, during the relationship at times or upon a break-up. In other words, romantic relationships can lead to feelings of pain, hurt, and heartbreak, as well as experiences of betrayal, guilt, or shame. These, I refer to as injuries of love, for these experiences, caused when in love – or because of love – can injure or wound an individual’s sense of self. They can also augment a feeling of vulnerability, related either to finding that perfect love or holding on to “true” love.
Only very recently, film director Karan Johar tapped into these vulnerabilities by presenting himself as the messiah of those injured or untouched by love, in his Netflix reality show, What the Love?
These injuries of love...
