'A many-splendoured thing': Love and its recent Indian literary manifestations (IANS Column: Bookends)

It is the most cherished, yet complex, not to mention a much misunderstood human emotion. It can make one person break out in song and another into tears, transform a person from rage to meekness, and make people amenable to giving up personal freedom for commitment and togetherness. It is called love.

"... Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, / And men below, and saints above; / For love is heaven, and heaven is love...," wrote Sir Walter Scott once and the sentiment, in its romantic manifestation, that is, has always remained as entrenched in literature as well as human affairs across the ages.

For why this is so, the same work, "The Lay of the Last Minstrel"

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