a romance novel surprising. In general they were embarrassed that, as col-lege students, they would be seen reading what they considered inferiorliterature. Some described family taboos based on the supposition that thebooks mainly involved sexual relations. Most reported that they had sim-ply not wanted to read the books in the past, although in some cases familymembers were known to read them.Before actually reading a romance, these students clearly had a set ofideas which colored their experience. Listed below are underlying assump-tions derived from student responses regarding the readers of the text aswell as the content and literary value

 

 I.AssumptionsAssumptions regarding the genre derive, in most cases, from largersocial discourse concerned with what the books are, who reads them,and the role they play in the culture.1.Assumptions about the readers of romance novels.1. a.Readers lack romantic relationships.
Nearly everyone that I spoke to about reading the book made com-ments about lonely or desperate women reading romances.1. b.Readers lack sexual relationships.
Romance novels seem to focus on physical beauty and the intensityof lust. Maybe this is a stimulating topic for some women whoperhaps are looking for a more exciting, lust-filled sex life.2.Assumptions about literary level.This category of response wasthe evaluations of the books themselves: beliefs that the booksare formulaic and without literary merit.2. a.Romance novels are of poor quality: minimal character andplot development.
I’ve never considered them to be worthwhile reading material andtherefore never took the time to read one.2. b.Romance novels are oriented around excessive “trashy” sex.
As far as my opinion on romance novels, well, I believed that theyusually lack a good plot, contain way too much sex, and are ingeneral rather boring.
Moreover, prior to reading the book I really did not have any respectfor romance novels. I thought they would be a total waste of timeand equated romance novels with trashy pornographic texts madefor women

 VALUES AND THE ROMANCE NOVEL553.Assumptions about feminist/anti-feminist messages.This categoryis concerned with the assumed content of romance novels.Readers anticipate negative portrayals of women as dependentand in need of a man.3. a.Women will be portrayed as weak and passive.
Before I read my romance novel, I already had preconceived no-tions about romance novels. I thought they were cheesy, corny andportrayed women as weaklings and submissive to men.
Furthermore, I thought that women’s and men’s sex roles would beportrayed in very traditional terms. For instance, the man wouldbe constantly “rescuing” the woman, who would be viewed as notbeing able to take care of herself.
This stems from my preconceived notion that these books would befilled with negative depictions of women.3. b.Romantic relationships will be unreal.
My opinion of romance novels is that they are predictable in theirportrayal of an idealized and immature view of love. They perpet-uate the stereotype of a powerless damsel who is rescued by theso-called love of a strong Casanova.Because of what readers assumed they would find in romance novelsand from their stereotypes of the readers, they anticipated what their ownencounters would be. As a result, they were embarrassed to purchase thebooks and to be seen reading them. They anticipated a stigma attachedto romance novels that would label them as deficient. They thought thatreading these books detracted from their scholarly standing. They thereforecovered the books when reading them in public and were careful to assureothers that this reading had been imposed on them by a professor, notselected by them. Assumptions about the novels provided an elaboratedset of expectations of what they would find and what their experiencewould be.II.AnticipationsThe assumptions led readers to anticipate their own experience.1.Anticipations about content1a.Readers predict that they will be offended by finding toomuch sexual content.
Before reading the book I felt kind of confused because I thoughtromance novels are trashy and are filled with sex, so what is thereto learn from them or analyze about them