Today is St Valentine's Day, which is widely regarded as an indeterminate celebration of "love". Trying to look at it from a cultural perspective, what exactly is being "celebrated" in an age where there is no longer any social-sexual inhibitions, and even thirteen-year-old boys are fathering children? What I am trying to find an answer to is the question: what does St Valentine's Day mean to you/us/them?
Looking beneath the current conventions of chocolates, cards and flowers, the day-long celebration in its present form seems to be a relic of Victorian sentimentality.
In the county there were three distinct periods in which St Valentine's Day was marked:
In the medieval period it was one of a series of feast days that enlivened the winter months. Various "free love" customs are recorded (including mock marriages for the day); children are allowed to beg for money if they can recite specific chants; various superstitions were prevalent involving the divination of future marriage partners. All these customs were suppressed during the puritan period.
In the nineteenth-century St Valentine's Day was revived as a picturesque observance, entirely separated from its "misrule" origins and given a veneer of Christianity (one of the churches in the central hills still rings "a quarter peal of St Valentine doubles" on 14th of February). Magazines of the time publish mawkishly sentimental illustrations that idealise "love". The anonymous nature of many Valentines customs indicate that it was unrequited love that was being celebrated.
The Victorian celebrations came to an end about 1900, and were then revived in the 1920s when the sending of Valentines cards became prevalent. It is likely this custom came from America (although there are a few local examples that pre-date 1900). This is the form of St Valentine's Day that is celebrated today.
Above: even charities are using St Valentine's Day as a theme for direct mail campaigns.
The increasing commercialisation of St Valentine's Day has turned the "holiday" into a marketing opportunity and engine of sales for greetings card manufacturers, chocolate retailers, purveyors of coloured heart-shaped balloons etc. Pubs, clubs and restaurants provide themed events (at premium prices). From being a ritual way in which "love" can be expressed openly without being censored by society, the day has developed into an opportunity for demonstrating "love" through expenditure and consumption.
This isn’t especially to do with St Valentine’s Day, but I want to record it on this site and it may as well go here as anywhere else – the video directed by Philippe Andre (and could have been scripted by Jose Saramago): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQKegElRAcA
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