Love Actually
It must be love … All you need is love … What’s love
go tot do with it … Let’s spend the night together …
Love hurts …
consider both parts of this –
“love” and “actually” … together …
* What meanings can we take from this?
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Context: Love Actually
O The Context title alerts us that we need to
Popular culture
We found love – Rihanna
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
Without You – Harry Nilsson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
The Power of Love – Huey Lewis (and the News) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
The Greatest Love of All – Whitney Houston https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg00YEETFzg
When Harry Met Sally https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNsu6CeTKpc
Four Weddings and a Funeral https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU9Z4i245Q4
Pride and Prejudice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU9Z4i245Q4
10 Things I hate About You https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7N6kB11GpE
High Fidelity https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnkrIObJqpk
Wot kidsa luv r thr?
Ancient Greeks said 4 kinds:
Agape – Unconditional
Phileo – Warm, tender Platonic love
Eros – passionate and intense
Storge - familial
We say …
Romantic love
Infatuation
Puppy love
Self-love (good and bad kinds) Compassionate/Humane
Platonic love
Brotherly love
Familial love
Maternal/Paternal Love
Filial love
Sexual/sensual love
Soulmate love
“True”
Love of God/Religious love
Love of country
Conditional/Unconditional love
Tough love
from the Bard himself…
SONNET 116
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
O
And a reply from someone closer to home (and apparently
somewhat less romantically inclined!)
Sonnet II
He said that love’s an ever-fixéd mark,
Makes firmament of that which wheels and whirls,
Describes as ‘light’ what’s mostly masked in dark,
That which bewilders this bewildered world.
He mourned a love that ever was suppressed,
By virtue that commanded every breath;
A grave silence quashing love’s poor protest,
A love unconsummated, save by death.
When eyes and lips freely take their moment-chance;
They seek and speak a prayer’s forbidden faith;
They meet in heat, a lusty love-semblance;
Heed no curbing hand nor license of ‘grace’.
When barest truth of love seems doomed to fail
Its grace attained because it is so frail.
O
Love?
What are the characteristics of love?
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Can we break down ‘love’?
What are its ‘parts’?
O “Intimacy, passion and commitment.”
(Psych)
O Trust
O Respect
O Attraction
O Sexuality
O Interest
O Faith
Is this love?
O Note found on fridge I
door.
want your room cleaned up, get your
homework done and your hair
washed before you even think about
playing video games.
love
Mum
* What is “mother” love? * Is it different from “father” love?
* Is family love instinctive? Earned? “Natural”?
Patriotism & love
O “… is the last refuge of the scoundrel.”
(Oscar Wilde)
O “If I had a choice between betraying my
country and betraying my friend, I hope
I’d have the guts to betray my country.”
(E. M. Forster)
O "Patriotism is supporting your country all
the time, and your government when it
deserves it.” (Mark Twain)
Is love a “good” thing?
O Then why does it ‘make’ us feel so bad?
O “There is nothing either good or bad, but
thinking makes it so …” (W. Shakespeare,
Hamlet)
O Is love beyond ‘definition’?
O What is “bad love”?
“Greater love hath no man ...”
What do we understand by this quote?
(Is it religious?)
(How does it complete?)
(How do we ‘know’ this?)
Do you think it is ‘true’? Or ‘valid’? (Which?)
What do you think of this
definition of love?
O Corinthians 13:4-8
New International Version (NIV)
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not
boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not
self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of
wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the
truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always
perseveres.8 Love never fails.
Some questions:
• What role has religion in a discussion about love?
• Is this view of love helpful?
“For God so loved the world that He gave his only son …”
 What does it mean, to “love the world”?
 Is (self-)sacrifice the greatest demonstration of love?
 Is love bigger than any human relationship?
 Is love of God the greatest love?
 Religions all preach love – why, then, do you think religious
belief provokes so much conflict?
 What is the same/different about spiritual love and human
love?
How can you kill love?
What happens to love when it goes?
• Does it disappear?
• Change – to hate or indifference?
• Can everyone love?
• Is our love a culturally “Western” concept?
Love-questions
O What’s the relationship between love and
O
O
O
O
O
O
power?
What do we mean, when we say, “The
language of love”?
What are love’s “counterfeits”?
Can loving be letting go?
What is Valentine’s Day about?
What is a “love-hate” relationship?
Is loving part of what it is to be human?