Roundup: All You Need is Love (and a Good Story)

As we launch a new blog format for the new year, we’re also looking back at all the great posts since the blog started in 2009. Our roundups explore the archives and gather past posts around a certain theme to help you jump-start your week. This week we have posts on love.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Well, on the fourteenth, but it’s never too early to start spreading the love, and great literature about love, for that matter. Everyone likes a good love story.

• Remember writing acrostics in elementary school? (Hint: Poems make great Valentine’s gifts!) Poet Bridget Lowe tells us how personal they can be.
• In her article, “Fleas Are for Lovers,” Ms. Lowe tells that “once upon a time the flea was also a popular emblem of erotic love.” Who knew?
• Last Valentine’s Day we picked out some our favorite love-themed literature. The Princess Bride, Persuasion, and The Confessions of Zeno made our list. What stories make yours?

• Writer and blogger Ryan Zee reviews Junot Diaz’s latest short story collection, This Is How You Lose Her. As Diaz says, the collection attempts “to come to terms with what love means” for males who’ve spent “most of their [lives] avoiding vulnerability.”
• Way back in July Pshares visited The City of Brotherly Love in our Literary Boroughs series. Featuring the LOVE sculpture, cheesesteaks, and of course, great literature, find out what Philadelphia has to offer.