Valentine’s Day is next week, so now’s the time to brush up on best practices for romance, courtship, marriage, and other mating rituals. Humans, take a lesson from the humble wolf spider: good looks aren’t as important as strong efforts when it comes to attracting the right mate, as researchers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln have shown. Fortunately, Digital Commons repositories are chockfull of resources to support this year’s Valentine recruitment and retention efforts.
Let the Wesleyan Jazz Singers set the mood with their gorgeous rendition of “My Funny Valentine,” recorded in 1963. Then, spoil your sweetheart with sustainably produced chocolates, with help from this Chocolate Company Scorecard at the Cornell ILR School’s Globalization and the Workplace collection. If you happen to find yourself in Poland this February 14, you’ll want to take along Karen Kovic’s poetic guide to the Top 5 Kissing Spots in Warsaw, Poland, published in Butler University’s literary journal, Booth. And if you can’t be with the one you love, why not send a vintage Valentine postcard from the University of Maine’s special collections?
Valentine’s Day is also a good time to get cozy with something good to read. For a laugh, try Rane Arroyo’s “Lucky, the Latin Lover of Lombard, Illinois,” in Providence College’s Prose Poem. The historically minded will enjoy the many love letters in the Bryant Goes to War collection, starting with the hundreds of richly detailed letters between Dorothy and Judson Clark while Judson was serving abroad in the US Air Force from 1943 to 1946. And if romance novels are more your speed, you’ll appreciate Ann Margolis’s defense of romantic fiction in her master’s thesis from Pace University.
However you celebrate, we here at bepress wish you nothing but love this Valentine’s Day!
Postcard from the University of Maine