Little is known about Valentine, whose name symbolizes romantic love. Chet Raymo draws on the tradition that Valentine was a physician in love with the blind Julia to thread his way through the fabric of romance while illuminating the world of the Roman Empire of Claudius II-a time when Christian deaths provided public entertainment. The ideas in Valentine are startlingly relevant to our own times: globalization vs. fundamentalism, reason vs. superstition, the subversion of virtue by wealth-and the power of passionate love to overcome all obstacles to its consummation.