Actually, one mathematician: Ben Orlin, of Math With Bad Drawings: Mathematical Plot Devices.
He made me laugh with this one:
Technically this should be called a “love angle,” and “love triangle” should be reserved for situations where the two suitors are also in love with each other.
And that’s why I laughed. Of course he’s right! Unless you add the bottom line, you don’t have a TRIANGLE! All you have is an ANGLE! I’m still laughing. It almost makes me want to write a story with an ACTUAL love triangle.
If you’ve got a minute, click through and admire the other plot structures reimagined in mathematical terms.
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This may miss the point, because it’s true that it’s an angle, but… if the bottom two are also in love with each other, there is no uncertainty, really. That is, isn’t it just a sloppy metaphor? But the underlying point is this sort of tension where you need to choose one but there’s more than one choice. If the two choices are okay cooperating, then there’s no triangle and really it’s a circle. :)
I just read The Naturalist Society by Carrie Vaughn – that one probably qualifies as a triangle. It has a bird watching based magic system
Rivalry is a relationship. Perhaps that is the bottom line.
I read one. One story with an actual love triangle. And I hated it vehemently, mostly because the central conflict was between duty and love, and the author dissolved the boundaries between the two in such a lazy and obnoxious way that I spent the last eight pages of the book trying not to hurl the library copy I was reading across the room.
Good point, Reena, but I hereby agree with Mary Catelli — rivalry is a relationship and boom! Triangle!