A Manifesto for Beauty

I don't find too many references for lipstick in literature, though there are often references to make-up, nail varnish and coquetry in general. In Tad Williams's The Dragonbone Chair, the fantasy world of Osten Ard has no lipstick but lip-paint, applied by the lady Vorzheva with a lip-brush.

Coquetry fares so and so in literature. In classic novels, coquettes get a bad press, though in Victorian era novels the coquettish girl is often used as the carrier of serious themes -- choice in marriage, failed marriage, marital abuse, and a woman's right to sexuality.

Some writers have wisely created coquettes who are also central and interesting characters in their own right -- see Bela and Ada in Charles Dickens's Our Mutual Friend and Bleak House respectively, lovely Dora in David Copperfield, Rosamond in George Eliot's Middlemarch, Rosalie Murray in Anne Bronte's otherwise dull novel Agnes Grey and, the coquettish character par excellence, the inimitable Ginevra Fanshawe in Charlotte Bronte's Villette.

In popular literature I am sorry to say that the coquette fares badly. She is usually a step towards the male protagonist's road to maturity-- he must learn not to appreciate pretty, sexy and usually blonde girls before he can move to the serious and sultry "real" heroine. This only continues the distinction between woman the beautiful and woman the useful/clever, a false distinction used by men to create prejudice against women, especially beautiful women.

I think that beauty is every woman's right and a source of happiness for women. I think that you can look both beautiful/sexy and clever. I have four university degrees, including a PhD, and I take care of my beauty as much as I possibly can. When I gave a public speech about a month ago, I went to my beautician to give me a professional make-up. When/If I ever have more money, I will spend more on beauty. 

Okay, we cannot all look like Scarlett Johansson or Beyonce, or Diane Kruger who is so beautiful she even advertises a perfume called, um, Beauty...

... and who also played Helen of Troy in the film  Troy. We cannot all look like this, and should not be made to think that we should all look like this! But we can all look good, confident, energetic and strong. This is beauty and sexiness, or its personal equivalent!

Finally, I wouldn't mind if men followed my advice. This entry is not only about women. 

Though I think men can skip the make-up bit. But only if they want to...

The Red Lipstick Map

In the Fifty Shades trilogy, Ana draws a map with red lipstick on Christian's body. The map tells her which parts are out of reach: having suffered physical abuse as a child, Christian has issues with being touched.

I find the red lipstick map a great idea, though I think that Ana is a bit insensitive when she insists to touch Christian even at the parts he feels uncomfortable with. 

Maps and cartography are found often in books. The cartographer protagonist par excellence is probably Count Almasy in The English Patient, played brilliantly by Ralph Fiennes.

Then there is the map in Treasure Island and, of course, the lovely maps of unknown lands in the beloved fantasy books: The Lord of the Rings, Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, the Dragon Star and Dragon Prince trilogies and so on and so forth into fantasy book eternity.  

Let's not forget the maps in The Odyssey: though Odysseus travels famously without a map, he is often given directions by beings and creatures he meets on his journey -- witches, goddesses, gods and others. The directions are always correct. If Odysseus deviates an iota, disaster follows.

The book which inspired me to write on maps tonight is this lovely monograph:

I love all maps, modern and historical, old and new! But my favorite map remains the Ana Steele red lipstick map. On Christian Grey's lovely body! Yes!

Fifty Shades of Fashion

One of my favorite pictures is The Travelling Companions by Augustus Egg (1862). That the two girls in the painting are identical is immediately obvious.

I read the painting as a metaphor for living -- here we are, ourself and ourself, alone in the compartment of life. Our destination is unknown, but we are comfortable and calm, as indeed we should be.

The color grey in Victorian fashion is sometimes seen as the color of simplicity and even puritanism. However, there are more positive readings, which present grey women's clothes in the 19th century as a symbol of "correct" femininity, "correct" meaning (in those days) marriageable, orderly and attractive. 

There is support for this in literature -- beautiful Dorothea Brooke wears grey in George Eliot's Middlemarch; Jane Eyre tells us that, though she is plain, she likes to look nice, and often wears her silk grey dress with lace and a brooch. Plain Lucy Snowe wears grey in Villette, but so does sexy and exuberant Ginevra Fanshawe. Because of their similar dress the two girls are mistaken for each other from afar.

This year, the color grey looks more glamorous than ever in the luminous creations of Valentin Yudeshkin. Grey never looked so brilliant before!

As for Rachel Zoe, she makes grey appear a shade of white in her spring collection for 2014.

Sean O'Pry, number one male model (and my ideal for male beauty) is as beautiful as ever in this lovely color.








I suppose all shades of grey have a beauty of their own...

In Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre baking and cakes are always associated with happiness and warmth. The scene where Jane and her friend Ellen share tea, toast and seed cake in front of the fire with their teacher Miss Temple is one of the most memorable scenes in the book, perhaps in all Victorian literature. Here is a picture of Jane-Eyre-inspired tea sandwiches I found in the Huffington Post.

Jane bakes when she is happy -- puddings, cakes, creams; as a child, we know how miserable she is with her evil cousins and Aunt when she is unable to eat the pastry inside her favorite plate with the blue bird design. Similarly, the emotionally starved Lucy Snowe from Charlotte Bronte's Villette and Catherine Earnshaw from Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, neither bake nor cook. Despite the abundant food around them, their unhappy fate makes the poor young women unable to share in the beauty of food.

Baking in literature is not always positive. In George Eliot's Middlemarch it is associated with scenes of repression, and the same goes for Colleen McCullough's Thornbirds. Fiona Cleary is exhausted by tough housework by the time the family comes in for lunch; in fact, roly-poly is the only dish she can enjoy, because it is the last dish and she won't have to worry about needing to rise and serve the next dish to the family.

Baking in literature shows all the complexity of (a woman's) life. It is never all about a picture of saccharine bliss, but is about hope and hard work. In Anne of Green Gables, Marilla's cakes and cordials show not only her housekeeping skills, but also her eager and well-ordered mind. Even Fiona Cleary finds an understanding with her well-meaning husband towards the end.

And I would love to have some of that roly-poly she bakes for Sunday table!

From Mirror with Love

The relationship between a woman and her mirror is supposed to be problematic. The mirror is said to show us that we age and lose our beauty; it is also supposed to show us that we are not as beautiful as beauty ideals want us to be. This is why it is also said that the mirror contains a male voice, telling us about our defects (see the Snow White Fairy Tale).

All this is to a great extent true. Yet things have changed since Snow White was put out, and can change still more. In literature the mirror is sometimes (but not always) negative. For instance, in Fifty Shades of Grey Ana is inspired when she looks at herself and Christian standing side by side in front of the mirror. In Charlotte Bronte's Villette, the mirror shows Ginevra how beautiful she is; Ginevra and protagonist Lucy Snowe have a cat fight and an excellent reconciliation in front of the mirror too!

Esther Summerson in Dickens's Bleak House comes to accept that she has lost her beauty after an illness by looking at herself determinedly in the mirror. The mirror in Jane Eyre hides a terrible secret one night, and is even darker in Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea. The mirror image becomes lethal in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights.

Yet it is people's unjust actions that actually bring misery in Heights, Wide Sargasso Sea and Jane Eyre, not the mirror itself.

The mirror is an instrument of the goddess Aphrodite and therefore sacred and an instrument of beauty. For me, the mirror is indispensable because it shows me who I am and where I am each day. I feel confident when I look in the mirror. Some writers say that one day we must feel ready to turn our backs on our mirrors. I don't agree with this.

To an extent, the mirror shows me who I am, and how I can look better, if I want to. 

I agree with this Clinique ad!!!!!!

The Fair Sex

When they put a picture of actor James Franco in the computer to make him look more beautiful, the computer printed it back exactly as it was. You can read all about the experiment in The New York Times.

As for Sean O'Pry, my guess is that, in his case, the computer would break down altogether.

In Mortal Instruments, Jace Wayland, the protagonist, is a Shadowhunter, part angel and used to date a fairy.

Jamie Cambell Bower's other-worldly beauty sums it all well, I think. Also, Jamie Dornan is more than perfect for Christian Grey.

I will write more on male beauty in later posts. I mean, there is just so much, from Robert Pattinson to James Preston and back to Jamie Cambell Bower and Jamie Dornan. Not to forget the male models, for instance those for Abercrombie and Fitch.

When I first saw pictures from Abercrombie and Fitch ads, I experienced an inferiority complex attack. "Oh no!" I thought. "It is MEN who are the fair sex, not us!!!!!!!!!" My inner goddess packed her bags to depart. Gradually, I have come to accept the possibility that male beauty may be as striking as our own, but it may take me a while to totally reconcile myself with the fact. 

Not that I complain that there are beautiful men, of course...

A Little Princess is a novel full of references to fashion and dolls. Sarah chooses her doll Emily very carefully and treats her like a real person; Emily even has a full wardrobe of specially made clothes. Dolls in A Little Princess raise questions about a girl's identity and role in life.

In Dickens's Our Mutual Friend, doll-maker Jenny Wren is mysterious and enigmatic. Jenny is a pretty blonde with magical golden hair and a deformed body, who has the amazing ability to make dolls look like real women.

Going out into the dangerous London night, Jenny memorizes the gowns and capes worn by the ladies of the London elite and makes exact copies for her own dolls.

At the same time, Jenny is able in the end to make her own destiny and move away from a painful life to independence and romance. In Byatt's Possession, the doll in Christabel La Motte's room holds a powerful secret for 150 years.

For me, one of the most beautiful descriptions of a doll in literature is in Colleen McCullough's Thorn Birds, for Meggie's doll Agnes. The doll is first destroyed and then made up again, perhaps like Meggie herself. As for Esther Summerson's buried doll in Dickens's Bleak House, she is a symbol of poor Esther's childhood pain.

Dolls in books share the painful reality of their owners. Given the chance, would they come alive and share our world? This is a question Sarah the little princess also tries to answer ... ;-)

The Picture of Christian Grey

Beauty in the Fifty Shades trilogy is not only a major theme, but a magical quality all of its own. Christian's beautiful appearance somehow manages to convey all of the fifty shades of his personality: attraction, power, passion, danger,  vulnerability, sex.

Christian reminds me of another character in literature who is also beautiful and dangerous at the same time, and this is Dorian Gray, from Oscar Wilde's famous (and only) novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Like Dorian, Christian is also extremely beautiful, dangerous and sexually aggressive. Both men feel that they are cursed and damned beyond all hope. The scenes where Dorian plays the piano in Wilde's novel are haunting, mysterious, beautifully and irretrievably sad -- the same goes for parallel scenes in Fifty Shades.

However, unlike Dorian, Christian does not close the door to love: he lets love come into his life and heal his soul. Dorian also met one woman who loved him but, in destroying her, he also destroyed his own soul. 

Beauty paints a picture in the Fifty Shades trilogy, and it is a picture of hope, salvation and love.

Beauty's Paper (Art with Fabriano)

I am currently reading On Paper, by Nicholas A. Basbanes, a well-written book about the cultural history of paper. It has things about hand paper-making, record keeping, rare manuscripts and library vaults filled with priceless scripts.

The problem with this book is that it has only one mention for Fabriano, Italy! I found this annoying. Fabriano is not only my favourite paper: In most paper histories, the year when paper mills were first established in Fabriano (1276) is commemorated as a milestone in the history of paper, paper-making and paper art.

Here is lovely artwork made by Deepanjana Pal with Fabriano paper!

The First Gentleman in Europe

For writer James Joyce, Odysseus in Homer's Odyssey is the first gentleman in Europe. This is because Odysseus has honour and perfect manners, and does not want to appear naked in front of the princess Nausicaa and her ladies-in-waiting.

It is right after a shipwreck, and Odysseus grabs branches and leaves, managing to appear before Nausicaa as dignified as a lord in Parliament.

For me, Odysseus is a gentleman for another reason: he does not hide his grief when his faithful dog dies. Odysseus spares a tear for Argus the hound, whom the women had left unkempt on the dung.

Homer's epics are full of beautiful women (and men). Homer's descriptions of women's beauty, hair and lovely skin are unforgettable. However, Homer does not shy away from the ugly or puzzling realities of the lives of those women -- some are slaves, widows of war, witches, Goddesses or mermaids.

Homer's epics are also full of beauty and cooking advice. 

Both women and men love a hot bath with essential oils. Massage with essential oils is a must. Meat is cooked over a roasting spit and served with a large portion of bread. The ideal breakfast is a large bowl of wheat mixed with wine and honey! Boiled milk is a must too. (This last from mythology. Zeus and Hermes drink a whole cooking pot of fresh boiled milk while guesting with a couple down on earth).

The message is clear. With these beauty and cooking rituals, you end up looking beautiful like a goddess or god, and feeling strong like a warrior!

Have It Your Way

Sandro Botticelli's Madonna of the Magnificat is one of the few paintings showing the Madonna in the act of writing.

The Madonna with pens, paper and writing is not a very popular subject. As Virginia Woolf rightly pointed out, women meet with difficulties when they love letters, writing and books.

Nowadays, this is gradually less true. After all, beauty is a form of writing.

I think that we use beauty rituals and tools to write our own beauty, to make our face even more beautiful than it is. I agree with the poet Charles Baudelaire, who said that make-up helps women achieve perfection, and even add my own adage: "make up helps women reach their own idea of perfection"! Yes!

This amazing photo by Carrie Mae Weems (from the Kitchen Table series) shows that beauty is a legacy going from one woman to another. The picture features three persons, not two: the mother, daughter, and the spectator, expected to take the third chair -- you, me, all women, Every Woman. 

I am not saying that all women should use make-up: I don't use any myself ("maybe that's why you admire the women who do so much!" my inner goddess whispers). What I am saying is that beauty is special for us all and something which can be fun for us all. As the poet John Keats has famously said, "beauty is truth, truth beauty".

Like the poet's saying, beauty can be viewed in many ways. And each woman can have her own! Her own way!

An A-Ha Moment

I saw this picture on a website the other day, and I loved it so much I just had to share! I saved the picture, naming it "Blonde Light".

As a friend said once, we are so fascinated by blonde hair because it resembles light around the face. Here is Kate Hudson, for me the prettiest woman on the planet.

In the Victorian era, the blonde woman was associated with female industry; the golden hair itself with the female arts of combing and weaving, ultimately with the art of story-telling itself.

Blonde hair continues to impress even when it is dyed.

A friend told me that, years ago, she had her hair dyed blonde -- a woman had been so impressed that she had asked to touch it. 
-"While your hair is the colour you have now". I answered. "Chestnut".
My friend is years older than me; I could be her daughter.
"No". She replied. "My hair now is white. I dye it chestnut".

I stared at her for a while. It was the first time I thought of our age difference, and that her hair might be white. She is right, I thought, her hair is white.

That was an a-ha moment for me. I realized that life has no age, and no colour, either. You can look younger, older, blonder, darker.

Praise be to the Goddess of Beauty for this! (Oh, and the Beauty Industry, too)...