positive "star-crossed"

[Laurence Horn]

On Feb 5, 2012, at 11:33 AM, Nancy Friedman wrote:

> I've recently come across several instances of "star-crossed" used favorably
> (e.g., from a planetarium in Auckland: "Calling all star-crossed lovers .
> this Valentine's Day, love is in the stars at Stardome"). I'm looking for:
>
> .        Additional examples, especially in advertising copy.
>
> .        Theories about why and when the semantic shift occurred (I have a
> few ideas, but unlike most of you I'm no academic).
>
>
>
I'm not sure what being an academic has to do with it, but I'll venture a guess.  One variant of "star-crossed lovers" appears (as I just google-confirmed) as "star-kissed lovers", which does refer to the Romeo-and-Juliet situation, but lends itself more easily than "star-crossed" to a reinterpretation as a simple positive, i.e. that the pair is blessed by the stars rather than cursed by them.  So then if "star-crossed" is understood to be interchangeable with "star-kissed", all bets are off.  This will be confirmed if we can find us a can of "Starcrost Tuna".

LH

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