A natural history of the romance novel

by Pamela Regis

"The romance novel has the strange honor of being the most popular but least respected of literary genres. While it remains consistently dominant in bookstores and on best-seller lists, it is also widely dismissed by the critical community. These scholars tend to regard readers, who are largely women, as passive consumers easily manipulated by romances, attributing the genre's overwhelming appeal to inadequacies and weaknesses in the readers themselves. In A Natural History of the Romance Novel, Pamela Regis argues that such critical studies fail to take into consideration the personal choice of readers, offer any true definition of the romance novel, or discuss the nature and scope of the genre.^ Presenting the counterclaim that the romance novel does not repress women but, on the contrary, is about celebrating freedom and joy, Regis offers a definition that provides critics with an expanded vocabulary for discussing a genre that is both classic and contemporary, sexy and entertaining