Doxdirect’s Top 5 Most Inspiring Valentine’s Quotes
Posted in News on 10 February 2015
“To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose, and donn’d his clothes,
And dupp’d the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid
Never departed more.”
William Shakespeare, Hamlet.
Love is in the Air!
Valentine’s Day, also known as Saint Valentine’s Day or the Feast of Saint Valentine, is almost here again. It has been celebrated around the globe since the dawn of our early ancestors, and is a day set aside in the calendar for people to offer sentimental greeting cards, chocolates, flowers and other such nice things to their special valentine (or for themselves, we do not judge!) as a gesture of amorousness.
We like to think we’re a fairly cultured bunch here at Doxdirect (in a geeky way at least), so we’ve put together a collection of inspiring Valentine’s quotes which are as historic as they are romantic, to get you in the mood for love…
1. A Valentine’s Tweet
(Source: Wikimedia)
At 700 lines long, Geoffrey Chaucer’s poem The Parliament of Fowls or The Parliament of Birds isn’t exactly suitable for tweeting (see what we did there?) to your loved one. But here’s an extract from the piece, which was written to honour the first anniversary of the engagement of King Richard II to Anne of Bohemia.
“For this was on seynt Volantynys day,
Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese his make.”
In case youre not a historical linguist, this means: For this was on St. Valentine’s Day, When every bird cometh there to choose his mate. The poem is thought to be the origin of the phrase ‘lovebirds’.
2. Roses are Red
(Source: Fairyroom.com)
Another epic poem here. So epic in fact that the writer never got around to finishing it! The modern day ‘Roses are red, Violets are blue’ cliché goes all the way back to 1590. In the epic English poem The Faerie Queene, Edmund Spenser writes…
“She bath’d with roses red, and violets blew,
And all the sweetest flowres, that in the forrest grew.”
So now you know where that comes from! And if you want to impress your Valentine, why not have a go at finishing it?
3. Violets are Blue
(Source: Children’s Library)
Someone was obviously inspired by Spenser a couple of centuries later, judging by this later poem taken from the a 1784 book of English nursery rhymes called Gammer Gurton’s Garland
“The rose is red, the violet’s blue,
The honey’s sweet, and so are you.
Thou art my love and I am thine;?
I drew thee to my Valentine:?
The lot was cast and then I drew,
And Fortune said it shou’d be you.”
Hopefully grammar and punctuation in children’s books has come along way since then!
4. The Language of Love
(Source: BBC News – UK)
What list of Valentine’s quotes would be complete without something French? Written in the original language of love by none other than Charles, Duke of Orléans, to his dear wife…
“Je suis desja d’amour tanné, Ma très-doulce Valentinée.”
Sounds lovely doesn’t it? Unfortunately, it translates as: I am already sick of love, My gentle Valentine. Not exactly what you want to hear on Valentine’s Day! But to be fair, he was being held in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415.
5. Short and Sweet
On a lighter note, we’d like to end with a ‘happily ever after’ kind of feeling. Not technically a poem, but poetic all the same. Straight from the heart of the one and only Homer Simpson…
Once you stop this car, I’m gonna hug you and kiss you and then I’ll never be able to let you go.
We think you’ll agree that Marge is a lucky woman!