Love Triangles

Love Triangles

In Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, the entire story is based around one other thing besides crossdressing: a love triangle. Duke Orsino has fallen in love with Olivia, Olivia has fallen in love with Cesario - who is actually Viola in disguise – and Viola has fallen in love with Duke Orsino. In the end, there is confusion but a happy ending with the marriage of Duke Orsino and Viola.

Love Triangles are an interesting twist in literature, but are they ever a good idea in real life or anything beyond fiction?

Now in fiction, a love triangle makes for an interesting plot twist, keeping the reader or viewer – whatever the medium is - on the edge of their seats with suspense as to who will fall in love with who. In real life, however, such an act of compassion could have undesired consequences, and might not end with a happy ending.

The best reflection of this is TV’s sitcom How I Met Your Mother. The series follows one Ted Mosby on his quest to find true love while dealing with the lives of those around him. On the sitcom, Ted falls in love with many girls, often at the same time. The most notable and perhaps well known of these times is when he is dating Victoria and is still friends with Robin. Now, Ted initially was in love with Robin, who did not return Ted’s affection at first. When Ted meets and starts dating Victoria, a little baker in New York, Robin realizes that she has feelings for Ted, but chooses to ignore them so that he may be happy. Then Victoria moves to Europe, and Ted finds out that Robin has feelings for him. In the End, Ted eventually gets together with Robin, but only after going through an awkward breakup and interaction with Robin as friends.

Another example of this is the Relationship between Robin and Barney. Barney initially only sees Robin as a target for intercourse, which luckily Robin doesn’t return. When Barney becomes in love with Robin, he tries and tries to understand his feelings while trying to get Robin to see how he feels. They wind up together, but it ends badly and the two go through one of the rockiest break-ups seen on television. Eventually, they try dating other people, only to hoo0ok up once more and end badly, with Robin choosing someone else over Barney, and Barney left with nothing.

Series like How I Met Your Mother are hilarious, but often times leave us with reflections on how things like Love Triangles can really affect those involved and those around you. So it begs the question:” is it ever a good idea, really?”