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Why we love Nicholas Sparks' star crossed lovers on the page and on the screen By Fran (26, USA)
It's not as if audiences don't know what to expect going in: a man not looking for love meets a woman who seems badly suited to him. She's not looking for love either, but guess what they find in each other? But alas circumstances are keeping them apart, whether it be in the form of disease, an accident, or a war, the lovers have a limited time together. Of course this makes their love more sweet.
The appeal of doomed love is nothing new. We think of Romeo and Juliet as the classic doomed lovers but even before they loved and lost, there was Tristan and Isolde, and Abelard and Heloise. Not much has changed in the last few centuries. When film was invented, it gave as a new medium to watch doomed romance. In 1936 film audiences flocked to see Greta Garbo as the courtesan in Camille, dying of consumption and sacrificing the happiness of her last days to spare her true love's family a damaging scandal. In 1970 Erich Segal's novel, Love Story, sold 21 million copies worldwide. The film version starring Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal was the number one attraction at the box office that year. Audiences were drawn to the tale of Oliver, a Harvard student from a wealthy family who falls for Jennifer, a working class girl. They have nothing in common but love and marry in spite of his family's objections, but even their love can't defeat the leukemia that's soon to claim Jennifer's life.
In 1996 Nicholas Sparks' novel The Notebook became the modern equivalent of Segal's Love Story. It spent over a year on the New York times hardcover best-seller list and adapted for the screen in 2004. Readers and viewers alike fell in love with the tale of Allie, a beautiful girl from a wealthy family, and Noah a local country boy. The lovers are separated by college, WWII, and Allie's disapproving family, but their love overcomes all obstacles and they spend their lives together. However as Allie ages dementia sets in and she forgets the love of her life. Still the devoted Noah lives with her in a nursing home and reads her the story of their love from a notebook.
After the initial success of the novel, The Notebook, Nicholas Sparks went on to write a string of best sellers, six of which have been made into films. Message in a Bottle was published in 1998 and the film came out in 1999 (before the film version of The Notebook was made). In this story a single mother, Theresa, finds a message in a bottle as she walks down the beach. In the message, a man named Garrett speaks of his undying love for a woman named Catherine and his anger at her for dying and leaving him alone. Intrigued by this letter Theresa tracks down Garrett and the two fall in love. However their relationship is threatened by Garrett's past love which he can't let go of, and Theresa's newspaper column where she writes about Garrett's letters. After a falling out Garrett meets with tragedy and Theresa learns that he left a final message in a bottle- this time for her. This story appealed the audience that loved The Notebook, as well as some slightly older readers/viewers who liked that the lovers were forty somethings rather than teens.
Sparks' next novel, A Walk To Remember, came out in 1999 and was adapted for the screen in 2003. This was about Landon, a popular bad boy in the 1950s who is threatened with expulsion from school if he doesn't do community service. This task leads him to Jamie, the daughter of a local church pastor who warns Landon not to fall in love with her. Of course Landon does just that. But Jamie has leukemia (the same disease the claimed Love Story's heroine Jennifer) and isn't responding to treatment. Sparks dedicated the novel and the film to his sister, Danielle Sparks Lewis who died of cancer in 2000. Before she died she met a man who loved her enough to marry her in spite of her terminal diagnosis. Sparks admitted that the character of Jamie was based largely on his sister.
The next Sparks novel to be adapted for the big screen was Nights in Rodanthe. Here Sparks switched back to writing about middle aged lovers (after the teenage couple that took center stage in A Walk to Remember). This story was about about Adrienne, separated from her husband, who spends the weekend at a bed and breakfast where the only other guest is Paul, a doctor estranged from his son. A hurricane keep the two strangers trapped indoors where they find themselves talking and falling in love. Adrienne encourages Paul to patch things up with his son, and Paul flies to South America to do just that. After a mudslide claims Paul's life his son finds Adrienne to give her a box of Paul's things and to thank her for giving him his father back.
The most recent Sparks adaptation to hit theaters is Dear John which alters the formula somewhat. Switching once again to young love, Dear John tells the story of Savannah, a young college student who falls for John, a US soldier on leave. When John goes to war he and Savannah continue to write to one another, but eventually they drift apart and Savannah marries someone else. When John returns to the US he learns that Savannah's husband is dying of cancer and cannot leave the hospital. The only thing that will allow him to die at home is an experimental drug that they can't afford. John sells his most prized possession to allow Savannah's husband to die at home. Still in spite of the differences (neither of the lovers die!) many elements are constant: cancer, strained family relationships being resolved and soul mates kept apart by cruel fate. Nicholas Sparks didn't invent this genre. It was popular long before he was born. But he's made his career on it. These romances dangle a dream that anyone wants: someone who loves you whole heartedly, who accepts you as you are, with whom every day is a gift. But they remind us that happiness is elusive and is all the more beautiful to us because it is fleeting. As Shakespeare said over 400 years ago: “This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong/To love that well which thou must leave ere long.”
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