* Baucis and Philemon, classic Greek couple famed for constancy in old age

* Odysseus and Penelope: faithful couple reunited after decades of travel and travail

* Rama and Sita: a world-conquering hero defeats demons to save his beloved

* Victoria and Albert: after nine children, devotion was unblinking Tragic consequences

* Bonnie and Clyde: killers obsessed with each other

* Heloise and Abelard: a tutor castrated for falling in love with his pupil

* Hero and Leander: a Greek youth drowned in the sea while swimming to meet beloved

* Lancelot and Guinevere: a knight could never be happy in adulterous love of his queen

* Orpheus and Eurydice: despite venturing into the Underworld, the musician could not save his beloved

* Tristan and Isolde: a misread signal doomed these lovers to suicide Legendary affairs of the heart

* Anna Karenina (Tolstoy) 19th-century Russia

* Antony and Cleopatra (Shakespeare) Imperial Rome

* Divine Comedy (Dante) 13th-century Italy

* Elective Affinities (Goethe) 18th-century Germany

* Madame Bovary (Flaubert) 19th-century France

* Madam Butterfly (Puccini) 20th-century Japan

* Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare) 15th-century Verona

* Wuthering Heights (Emily Bront ) Victorian England

The romantic muse

Almost all arias in operas by Verdi, Puccini, Donizetti

Sonnets (to Laura) by Petrarch, 14th-century France and Italy

Catullus: famous Roman love poet

Cheek to Cheek: Irving Berlin dances elegantly

I’m a Fool to Want You: Billie Holiday sings the blues

I’ve Got You Under My Skin: Cole Porter tingles

I Will Always Love You: Whitney Houston in all-time bestseller

John Keats: romantic - and Romantic - poet

Kangding Ballad: most famous love song in China today and for past 50 years

Love Me Tender: Elvis Presley struts his stuff

WB Yeats: Irish romantic poet

Sappho:famous classical Greek lesbian poet

Whales: don’t miss the record of their singing

Thomas Wyatt: Elizabethan love poet