Park bench asks: will you marry me?

This is just lovely.

Dubliners taking a stroll through Dublin's Merrion Square yesterday had their eye caught by one of those park bench dedication plaques, for two reasons:

Because it was brand, brand new, and stood out from the rest; and because it contained a very special message for someone called Clare.

If you're not too pleased with the idea that a prospective husband doesn't need to understand women, the context is an Oscar Wilde quotation.

In The Sphinx Without a Secret, the protagonist meets an old college friend, Lord Murchison, in a very anxious way over his marriage prospects:

'I don't understand women well enough,' he answered.

'My dear Gerald,' I said, 'women are meant to be loved, not to be understood.'

'I cannot love where I cannot trust,' he replied.

That Oscar Wilde - clever chap.

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From Aidan Kelly on Twitter.