Endless Loves - famous couples

Do you believe in true love? Do you believe in love at first sight? Do you believe in love lasting forever? These immortal love stories, both factual and fictional, may very well renew or reinforce your faith in love... Shared from Amolife, they are considered by many to be the top twenty most famous love stories in history and literature. There are also a few of my own thrown in post hoc.

Endless

1.Romeo and Juliet - This is probably the most famous lovers ever. This couple has become a synonym for love itself. Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. Their love story is very tragic. The tale of two teenagers from two feuding families who fall in love at first sight and then marry, become true lovers and then risk it all for their love. To take your own life for your husband or wife is definitely a sign of true love. Their "untimely deaths" ultimately unite their feuding households.

2.Cleopatra and Mark Antony - The true love story of Antony and Cleopatra is one of the most memorable, intriguing and moving of all times. The story of these two historical characters had later been dramatized by William Shakespeare and is still staged all over the world. The relationship of Antony and Cleopatra is a true test of love. They fell in love at first sight. The relationship between these two powerful people put the country of Egypt in a powerful position. But their love affair outraged the Romans who were wary of the growing powers of the Egyptians. Despite all the threats, Anthony and Cleopatra got married. It is said that while fighting a battle against Romans, Antony got false news of Cleopatra's death. Shattered, he fell on his sword. When Cleopatra learned about Antony 's death, she was shocked. And she took her own life. Great love demands great sacrifices.

Loves

3.Lancelot and Guinevere - The tragic love story of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere is probably one of the best-known stories of Arthurian Legend. Lancelot fall in love with Queen Guinevere, King Arthur's wife. Their love grew slowly, as Guinevere kept Lancelot away from her. Eventually, however, her love and passion overpowered her and the pair became lovers. One night, Sir Agravain and Sir Modred, King Arthur's nephew, led a band of 12 knights to Guinevere's chamber where they burst in upon the lovers. Discovered, Sir Lancelot made a fighting escape, but poor Guinevere was not so lucky. She was seized and condemned to burn to death for her adultery. Fear not. Sir Lancelot returned several days later to rescue his beloved Guinevere from the fire. This whole sad affair divided the Knights of the Round Table and weakened Arthur's kingdom. Poor Lancelot ended his days as a lowly hermit and Guinevere became a nun at Amesbury where she died.

4.Tristan and Isolde - The tragic love story of Tristan and Isolde has been told and retold through various stories and manuscripts. It takes place during medieval times during the reign of King Arthur.

Isolde of Ireland was the daughter of the King of

Ireland. She was betrothed to King Mark of Cornwall.

King Mark sent his nephew, Tristan, to Ireland to escort Isolde back to Cornwall. During the voyage,

Isolde and Tristan fell forever in love. Isolde did marry Mark of Cornwall, but could not help but love

Tristan. The love affair continued after the marriage.

When King Mark finally learned of the affair, he forgave Isolde, but Tristan was banned from Cornwall.

Tristan went to Brittany. There he met Iseult of

Brittany. He was attracted to her because of the similarity of her name to his true love. He married her, but did not consummate the marriage because of his love for the "true" Isolde. After falling ill, he sent for Isolde in hopes that she would be able to cure him. If she agreed to come, the returning ship's sails would be white, or the sails would be black if she did not agree. Iseult, seeing the white sails, lied to Tristan and told him that the sails were black. He died of grief before Isolde could reach him. Isolde died soon after of a broken heart.

5. Paris and Helena - Recounted in Homer's

Iliad, the story of Helen of Troy and the

Trojan War is a Greek heroic legend, combining fact and fiction. Helen of Troy is considered one the most beautiful women in all literature. She was married to Menelaus, king of Sparta. Paris, son of King Priam of

Troy, fell in love with Helen and abducted her, taking her back to Troy. The Greeks assembled a great army, led by Menelaus's brother, Agamemnon, to retrieve Helen.

Troy was destroyed. Helen returned safely to Sparta, where she lived happily with

Menelaus for the rest of her life.

6. Orpheus and Eurydice - Orpheus and

Eurydice story is an ancient greek tale of desperate love. Orpheus fell deeply in love with and married Eurydice, a beautiful nymph. They were very much in love and very happy together. Aristaeus, a Greek god of the land and agriculture, became quite fond of Eurydice, and actively pursued her.

While fleeing from Aristaeus, Eurydice ran into a nest of snakes which bit her fatally on her legs. Distraught, Orpheus played such sad songs and sang so mournfully that all the nymphs and gods wept. On their advice,

Orpheus traveled to the underworld and by his music softened the hearts of Hades and

Persephone (he was the only person ever to do so), who agreed to allow Eurydice to return with him to earth on one condition: he should walk in front of her and not look back until they both had reached the upper world.

In his anxiety he forgot that both needed to be in the upper world, and he turned to look at her, and she vanished for the second time, but now forever.

7. Napoleon and Josephine - A marriage of convenience, at age 26 Napoleon took a fancy to Josephine. An older, prominent, and most importantly wealthy woman. As time drew on,Napoleon fell deeply in love with Josephine, and she with him, but that didn't deter the adultery on both sides-their mutual respect for one another kept them together, and their burning passion between them didn't falter, and was genuine. They eventually split, as Napoleon deeply required something Josephine could not give him, an heir. Sadly they parted ways, both bearing the love and passion in their hearts, for all eternity.

8. Odysseus and Penelope - Few couples understand sacrifice quite like this Greek pair. After being torn apart, they wait twenty long years to be reunited. War takes Odysseus away shortly after his marriage to Penelope. Although she has little hope of his return, she resists the 108 suitors who are anxious to replace her husband. Odysseus is equally devoted, refusing a beautiful sorceress's offer of everlasting love and eternal youth, so that he might return home to his wife and son.

This Valentine's Day, take a cue from

Homer, and remember that true love is worth waiting for.

9. Paolo and Francesca - Paolo and

Francesca are made famous by the

Dante's masterpiece "Divine Comedy". It is a true story: Francesca is married with

Gianciotto Malatesta an awful person, but she has Gianciotto's brother, Paolo, as lover. The love between them grows when they read together a book (according to

Dante) about Lancelot and Guinevere.

When the two lovers are discovered they are killed by Gianciotto.

10.Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler - "Gone with the wind" can be identified as one of the immortal pieces of literary works in this world. Margaret Mitchell's famous work has chronicled the love and hate relationship between Scarlett O'Hara and

Rhett Butler. Proving that timing is everything, Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett

Butler never seem to be quite in synch.

Throughout the epic story, this tempestuous twosome experience passion but not permanence, and their stormy marriage reflects the surrounding Civil War battles. The flirtatious, promiscuous, and perpetually pursued Scarlett can't make up her mind between her many suitors. When she finally decides to settle on being happy with Rhett, her fickle nature has already driven him away. Hope springs eternal in our devious heroine, however, and the novel ends with Scarlett proclaiming, "Tomorrow is another day."

11.Jane Eyre and Rochester - In Charlotte

Bronte's famous tale, friendless characters find a cure for loneliness in each other's company. Jane is an abused orphan employed as a governess to the charge of an abrasive, but very rich Edward

Rochester. The improbable pair grow close as Rochester reveals a tender heart beneath his gruff exterior. He does not, however, reveal his penchant for polygamy - on their wedding day, a horrified Jane discovers he is already married. Heartbroken, Jane runs away, but later returns after a dreadful fire has destroyed Rochester's mansion, killed his wife, and left him blind. Love triumphs, and the two reunite and live out their days in shared bliss.

12.Layla and Majnun - A leading medieval poet of Iran, Nizami of Ganje is known especially for his romantic poem Layla and

Majnun Inspired by an Arab legend, Layla and Majnun is a tragic tale about unattainable love. It had been told and retold for centuries, and depicted in manuscripts and other media such as ceramics for nearly as long as the poem has been penned. Layla and Qays fall in love while at school. Their love is observed and they are soon prevented from seeing one another. In misery, Qays banishes himself to the desert to live among and be consoled by animals. He neglects to eat and becomes emaciated.

Due to his eccentric behavior, he becomes known as Majnun (madman). There he befriends an elderly Bedouin who promises to win him Layla’s hand through warfare. Layla’s tribe is defeated, but her father continues to refuse her marriage to

Majnun because of his mad behavior, and she is married to another. After the death of Layla’s husband, the old Bedouin facilitates a meeting between Layla and

Majnun, but they are never fully reconciled in life. Upon death, they are buried side by side. The story is often interpreted as an allegory of the soul’s yearning to be united with the divine.

13.Eloise and Abelard - This is a story of a monk and a nun whose love letters became world famous. Around 1100, Peter Abelard went to

Paris to study at the school of Notre Dame. He gained a reputation as an outstanding philosopher. Fulbert, the canon of Notre Dame, hired Abelard to tutor his niece, Heloise. Abelard and the scholarly Heloise fell deeply in love, conceived a child, and were secretly married.

But Fulbert was furious, so Abelard sent Heloise to safety in a convent. Thinking that he intended to abandon Heloise, Fulbert had his servants castrate Abelard while he slept. Abelard became a monk and devoted his life to learning. The heartbroken Heloise became a nun. Despite their separations and tribulations, Abelard and

Heloise remained in love. Their poignant love letters were later published.

14. Pyramus and Thisbe - A very touching love story that is sure to move anyone who reads it is that of Pyramus and Thisbe. Theirs was a selfless love and they made sure that even in death, they were together. Pyramus was the most handsome man and was childhood friend of

Thisbe, the fairest maiden in Babylonia. They both lived in neighboring homes and fell in love with each other as they grew up together.

However, their parents were dead against them marrying each other. So one night just before the crack of dawn, while everyone was asleep, they decided to slip out of their homes and meet in the nearby fields near a mulberry tree. Thisbe reached there first. As she waited under the tree, she saw a lion coming near the spring close by to quench its thirst. Its jaws were bloody. When

Thisbe saw this horrifying sight, she panicked and ran to hide in some hollow rocks nearby. As she was running, she dropped her veil. The lion came near and picked up the veil in his bloody jaws. At that moment, Pyramus reaches near the mulberry tree and sees Thisbe's veil in the jaws of the lion. He is completely devastated.

Shattered, he pierces his chest with his own sword. Unknown to what just happened, Thisbe is still hiding in the rocks due to the fear of the lion. When she comes out after sometime, she sees what her lover did to himself. She is totally shattered when she sees the sword piercing right through her lover's chest. She also takes the sword and kills herself.

15.Elizabeth Bennett and Darcy - Actually

Jane Austen has personified two attributes of human nature, pride and prejudice in Darcy and Elizabeth. Darcy comes from a very high social hierarchy and Pemberley. He typifies the educated aristocracy while on the other hand, Elizabeth is the second daughter of a gentleman of modest means. Mr. Bennett has five daughters who have been allowed to grow up the way they wanted, there has been no school education for them, nor has there been any governess at home.

Elizabeth’s very indulgent mother and irresponsible father never gave any thought to the future of the daughters, it is always taken for granted, that they will do well for themselves. To a woman of Mrs. Bennett's understanding, doing well exclusively means finding a rich, well to do husband. For a man of Darcy's social stature, these were very serious failings of the family and totally unacceptable to his polished, educated and refined mind. Darcy adores Pemberley, and the future mistress of that estate can only be just as polished and refined and from an equally prestigious family. He falls in love with Elizabeth only to be refused by her initially, and then much later she realized that she can love no one but Darcy. How they become united and understand the love for each other makes very interesting study.

16.Salim and Anarkali - The love story of

Salim and Anarkali is a story that every lover knows. The son of the great Mughal emperor

Akbar, Salim, fell in love with an ordinary but beautiful courtesan Anarkali. He was mesmerized by her beauty and fell in love as soon as he saw her. But the emperor could not digest the fact that his son was in love with an ordinary courtesan. He started pressurizing Anarkali and devised all sorts of tactics o make her fall in the eyes of the young, love smitten prince. When Salim came to know of this, he declared a war against his own father. But the mighty emperor's gigantic army is too much for the young prince to handle. He gets defeated and is sentenced to death. This is when

Anarkali intervenes and renounces her love to save her beloved from the jaws of death.

She is entombed alive in a brick wall right in front of her lover's eyes.

17.Pocahontas and John Smith - This love story is a famous legend in the history of

America. Pocahontas, an Indian Princess was the daughter of Powhatan. Powhatan was the powerful chief of the Algonquian Indians in the

Tidewater region of Virginia. Pocahontas for the first time in her life saw Englishmen in May 1607. She found John Smith most attractive and developed a liking for him. Smith was taken to the official residence of Powhattan and he was tortured. It was Pocahontas who saved his life from the attack of the Indians.

Pocahontas then helped Smith to stand on his feet and Powhattan adopted Smith as his son.

This incident helped Pocahontas and Smith to become friends with each other. Pocahontas after this incident made frequent visits to the

Jamestown and passed on to the Indians messages of her father. John Smith after getting badly injured due to gunpowder explosion, returned to England. When

Pocahontas made a visit to the fort, she was informed that Smith was dead. Sometime after, Pocahontas was taken prisoner by Sir

Samuel Argall. Argall hoped to use

Pocahontas as abargaining chip with her father Powhatan in effort to get English prisoners returned. During her captivity, she decided to become a Christian, taking the name “Rebecca” when she was baptized. A year later, she married John Rolfe. She made a visit to London, where he met his friend

John Smith after eight long years and it was their last meeting.

18.Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal - In 1612, a teenage girl, Arjumand Banu, married 15-yearold Shah Jahan, ruler of the Mughal Empire.

Renamed Mumtaz Mahal, she bore Shah

Jahan 14 children and became his favorite wife. After Mumtaz died in 1629, the grieving emperor resolved to create a fitting monument. It took 20,000 workers and 1,000 elephants nearly 20 years to complete this monument - the Taj Mahal. Shah Jahan was never able to complete a black marble mausoleum he planned for himself. Deposed by his son, Shah Jahan was imprisoned in the

Red Fort of Agra, and spent lonely hours staring across the Jamuna River at the monument to his beloved queen. He was eventually buried beside her in the Taj Mahal.

19.Marie and Pierre Curie - This is a story about partners in love and science. Unable to continue her studies in Poland because universities did not admit women, Maria

Sklodowska Curie traveled to Paris in 1891 to attend the Sorbonne. Known by the

French "Marie," she spent every spare hour reading in the library or in the laboratory. The industrious student caught the eye of Pierre

Curie, director one of the laboratories where

Marie worked. Curie ardently wooed Marie and made several marriage proposals. They were finally married in 1895 and began their famous partnership. In 1898 they discovered polonium and radium. The Curies and scientist Henri Becquerel won a Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 for discovering radioactivity. When Curie died in 1904, Marie pledged to carry on their work. She took his place at the Sorbonne, becoming the school's first female teacher. In 1911 she became the first person to win a second

Nobel Prize, this time for chemistry. She continued to experiment and lecture until her death of leukemia in 1934, driven by the memory of the man she loved.

20.Queen Victoria and Prince Albert - This love story is about English royalty who mourned her husband's deathfor 40 years.

Victoria was a lively, cheerful girl, fond of drawing and painting. She ascended the throne of England in 1837 after the death of her uncle, King William IV. In 1840, she married her first cousin, Prince Albert of

Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. While at first Prince

Albert was unpopular in some circles because he was German, he came to be admired for his honesty, diligence, and his devotion to his family. The couple had nine children. Victoria loved her husband deeply.

She relied on his advice in matters of state, especially in diplomacy. When Albert died in 1861, Victoria was devastated. She did not appear in public for three years. Her extended seclusion generated considerable public criticism. Several attempts were made on Victoria's life. However, under the influence of Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli,

Victoria resumed public life, opening

Parliament in 1866. But Victoria never stopped mourning her beloved prince, wearing black until her death in 1901. During her reign, the longest in English history,

Britain became a world power on which "the sun never set."

Honorable Mentions

Buttercup & Westley (the Princess Bride) “As you wish.”

Noah & Allie (The Notebook)

Harry & Sally (And when they met!)

❤ Carrie & Big Jack & Rose Ross & Rachel Ron & Hermione Superman & Lois Lane

My own true love,Words seem so trite, so hackneyed and inadequate in comparison to how my heart sings for you, and my soul longs for you. Yet words are all I have to give you.

Words of Love

Ernest Hemingway to Marlene Dietrich

I can’t say how every time I ever put my arms around you I felt that I was home. [Source]

Frida Kahlo to Diego Rivera

Nothing compares to your hands, nothing like the green-gold of your eyes. My body is filled with you for days and days. You are the mirror of the night. The violent flash of lightning. The dampness of the earth. The hollow of your armpits is my shelter. My fingers touch your blood. All my joy is to feel life spring from your flower-fountain that mine keeps to fill all the paths of my nerves which are yours. [Source]

Georgia O’Keeffe to Alfred Stieglitz

Dearest — my body is simply crazy with wanting you — If you don’t come tomorrow — I don’t see how I can wait for you — I wonder if your body wants mine the way mine wants yours — the kisses — the hotness — the wetness — all melting together — the being held so tight that it hurts — the strangle and the struggle. [Source]

Oscar Wilde to Lord Alfred Douglas

Everyone is furious with me for going back to you, but they don’t understand us. I feel that it is only with you that I can do anything at all. Do remake my ruined life for me, and then our friendship and love will have a different meaning to the world. I wish that when we met at Rouen we had not parted at all. There are such wide abysses now of space and land between us. But we love each

other. [Source]

- and -

My Own Boy, Your sonnet is quite lovely, and it is a marvel that those red-roseleaf lips of yours should be made no less for the madness of music and song than for the madness of kissing. Your slim gilt soul walks between passion and poetry. I know Hyacinthus, whom Apollo loved so madly, was you in Greek days. Why are you alone in London, and when do you go to Salisbury? Do go there to cool your hands in the grey twilight of Gothic things, and come here whenever you like. It is a lovely place and lacks only you; but go to Salisbury first. Always, with undying love, Yours, Oscar

Henry VII to Anne Boleyn

But if you please to do the office of a true loyal mistress and friend, and to give up yourself body and heart to me, who will be, and have been, your most loyal servant, (if your rigour does not forbid me) I promise you that not only the name shall be given you, but also that I will take you for my only mistress, casting off all others besides you out of my thoughts and affections, and serve you only. I beseech you to give an entire answer to this my rude letter, that I may know on what and how far I may depend. And if it does not please you to answer me in writing, appoint some place where I may have it by word of mouth, and I will go thither with all my heart. No more, for fear of tiring you. [Source]

Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf

But oh my dear, I can’t be clever and stand-offish with you: I love you too much for that. Too truly. You have no idea how stand-offish I can be with people I don’t love. I have brought it to a fine art. But you have broken down my defenses. And I don’t really resent it.

Virginia Woolf to Vita Sackville-West

Look Here Vita — throw over your man, and we’ll go to Hampton Court and dine on the river together and walk in the garden in the moonlight and come home late and have a bottle of wine and get tipsy, and I’ll tell you all the things I have in my head, millions, myriads — They won’t stir by day, only by dark on the river. Think of that. Throw over your man, I say, and come.

From Gustave Flaubert to Louise Colet

I will cover you with love when next I see you, with caresses, with ecstasy. I want to gorge yu [sic] with all the joys of the flesh, so that you faint and die. I want you to be amazed by me, and to confess to yourself that you had never even dreamed of such transports… When you are old, I want you to recall those few hours, I want your dry bones to quiver with joy when you think of them.

Franz Kafka to Milen Jesensk

No, Milen, I beg you once again to invent another possibility for my writing to you. You mustn’t go to the post office in vain, even your little postman — who is he? — mustn’t do it, nor should even the postmistress be asked unnecessarily. If you can find no other possibility, then one must put up with it, but at least make a little effort to find one. Last night I dreamed about you. What happened in detail I can hardly remember, all I know is that we kept merging into one another. I was you, you were me. Finally you somehow caught fire. Remembering that one extinguished fire with clothing, I took an old coat and beat you with it.

But again the transmutations began and it went so far that you were no longer even there, instead it was I who was on fire and it was also I who beat the fire with the coat. But the beating didn’t help and it only confirmed my old fear that such things can’t extinguish a fire. In the meantime, however, the fire brigade arrived and somehow you were saved. But you were different from before, spectral, as though drawn with chalk against the dark, and you fell, lifeless or perhaps having fainted from joy at having been saved, into my arms. But here too the uncertainty of trans mutability entered, perhaps it was I who fell into someone’s arms.

From Edith Wharton to W. Morton Fullerton

There would have been the making of an accomplished flirt in me, because my lucidity shows me each move of the game – but that, in the same instant, a reaction of contempt makes me sweep all the counters off the board and cry out: – “Take them all – I don’t want to win – I want to lose everything to you!”

Ernest Hemingway to Mary Welsh

Dearest Pickle, So now I’m going out on the boat with Paxthe and Don Andres and Gregorio and stay out all day and then come in and will be sure there will be letters or a letter. And maybe there will be. If there aren’t I’ll be a sad s.o.a.b. But you know how you handle that of course? You last through until the next morning. I suppose I’d better figure on there being nothing until tomorrow night and then it won’t be so bad tonight. Please write me Pickle. If it were a job you had to do you’d do it. It’s tough as hell without you and I’m doing it straight but I miss you so [I] could die. If anything happened to you I’d die the way an animal will die in the Zoo if something happens to his mate. Much love my dearest Mary and know I’m not impatient. I’m just desperate. Ernest

Frida Kahlo to her husband Diego Rivera

Diego, my love, Remember that once you finish the fresco we will be together forever once and for all, without arguments or anything, only to love one another. Behave yourself and do everything that Emmy Lou tells you. I adore you more than ever. Your girl, Frida (Write me)

Jimi Hendrix to a girlfriend

little girl….. happiness is within you….so unlock the chains from your heart and let yourself grow— like the sweet flower you are….. I know the answer— Just spread your wings and set yourself FREE Love to you forever Jimi Hendrix