How does the romance reading community understand the genre in relation to sociopolitical concerns? This paper draws on interviews, observations of romance writers’ conferences, and a variety of text data to explore how popular romance fiction functions as an aesthetic public sphere, a site of political discourse. While I find that romance novels and the romance community address a range of sociopolitical issues, readers and writers debate whether they should address these issues. Some think romance should only provide entertainment, while others embrace the genre’s potential for active engagement with sociopolitical issues. These expectations play out in both romance novels and in community relations. Despite debate over the ideal purpose of romance, there is widespread agreement among readers that the genre is fundamentally about hope and the belief that love—and romance reading—can transform the world. This research extends the aesthetic public sphere concept to popular genre fiction, showing that romance is a particular kind of reading experience that allows readers to engage with serious sociopolitical issues with the promise of a happily-ever-after.

中文翻译：

---

永远幸福的政治：作为审美公共领域的浪漫类型小说

浪漫阅读社区如何理解与社会政治问题相关的流派？本文通过访谈、对言情作家大会的观察以及各种文本数据，探讨流行言情小说如何作为审美公共领域、政治话语场所发挥作用。虽然我发现言情小说和言情社区解决了一系列社会政治问题，但读者和作家争论他们是否应该解决这些问题。有些人认为浪漫应该只提供娱乐，而另一些人则认为这种类型具有积极参与社会政治问题的潜力。这些期望在言情小说和社区关系中都有体现。尽管对浪漫的理想目的争论不休，读者普遍认为，这种类型从根本上讲是关于希望和爱情——以及浪漫阅读——可以改变世界的信念。这项研究将审美公共领域的概念扩展到流行的类型小说，表明浪漫是一种特殊的阅读体验，它允许读者参与严肃的社会政治问题，并承诺永远幸福。