Introduction -- The "pen is the tongue of the absent": reading and writing nineteenth-century love letters -- Falling in love: individualism and the romantic self -- "Lie still and think of the empire": sexuality in Victorian courtship and marriage -- Secrecy, sin and sexual enticement: the integration of public and private life worlds -- Blurring separate spheres: sex-role boundaries and behavior -- Testing romantic love: Victorian courtship rituals and the dramas of private life -- Husbands and wives: duty-bound roles and unaccountable love -- Not for God only: patriarchy, religion, and romantic love.