FAIRIES AND BEAUTIFUL MEN

AFTER mermaids, I can only write a post on fairies, and here it is!

Fairies have a central place in fairy-tales, but the fairy-world is not always benevolent. In my book of Greek folk tales, fairies are sometimes good, but sometimes they are slightly sinister. In Germanic lore, Frau Hulda is a blonde fairy who rewards hard-working girls; in the Grimm fairy-tales there is an old lady who is a cross between a fairy and a witch, and who is neither evil nor really good.

For William Shakespeare in A Midsummer Night's Dream, fairies are beautiful, powerful and magical, but also weird and odd.

In fantasy literature, the fairy-folk are sometimes confused with the Elves, as in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and Tad Williams's trilogy Memory, Sorrow and Thorn. In Raymond Feist's Faerie Tale, the fairies are positively evil.

To tell you the truth, I don't like to read about evil fairies! One of the most interesting portrayals of a fairy which I have found recently is in City of Bones, the first part of Cassandra Clare's The Mortal Instruments. This is a fairy called Kaelie, who used to date Jace Wayland, the novel's protagonist.

Kaelie is blonde, pretty and fashionable; she is loyal to the Faerie Queen, and also hard-working -- she is a waitress at a magic cafe during day-time.

Though she is still in love with Jace, I am sorry to say that Kaelie stands no chance! The love of Jace's life is Clary Fray, a human and the novel's central character.

Jace Wayland's past with the fairies adds him fascination and mystery. Generally he is an interesting character, and very beautiful he is too. More about beautiful men in another post!

MODELS AND MERMAIDS

ONE of the most beautiful mermaids in literature is probably the mermaid in "The Fisherman and his Soul," a fairy-tale by Oscar Wilde. Check out this amazing description! "Her hair was a wet fleece of gold ... and her tail was of silver and pearl ... her lips were like sea-coral ... So beautiful was she..."

The ending of the fairy-tale is unacceptable, however. Mermaids have unhappy endings in literature as in, famously, Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid".

If you are interested in mermaid stories with a happier ending, I totally recommend Alice Hoffman's Aquamarine and Indigo, two novellas found in her collection with the title Water Tales!

One of the best paintings with mermaids is, for me, the painting I have here by the Pre-Raphaelite artist John William Waterhouse.

It's so true to life, that I wonder if he somehow persuaded a real mermaid to model for him!

I also love it that the mermaid combs her hair and has her little box of jewelry, spending time to take care of her beauty like all of us women -- human or not!!!!!!!

LIPSTICK FUN

IT was the perfect start to the Friday night: a brand new lipstick in a lovely shade! I am talking about the Nyx 24 Jumbo Lip Pencil, in the most amazing shade of fuchsia and pink!

The new lipstick was recommended to me by Mike Orphanides, a dear friend, and the no 1 make-up artist in Cyprus! It belongs to a new line for summer and spring, and it is not only lovely on the face but also on the skin; it is light, moist and lasting!

Nyx cosmetics are named after Nyx, the Greek Goddess of Night, and the mother of Dreams!

All the Greek Goddesses were renowned for their beauty, and the Greeks took beauty very seriously. They believed that a well-cared-for body produces a good mind --in Greek, νους υγιής εν σώματι υγιή. The Iliad and the Odyssey, the sacred books of classic Greece, are full of beauty advice (more about this in a later post).

Lipstick adds a touch of fantasy to everyday life. It is special to women, and women make it special!

The new lipstick is a star in my collection, and makes any night more glamorous, more exciting, and more fun!

BEAUTY BOOKS

A BEAUTY book I really love is Karen Homer's Things a Woman Should Know About Beauty. I have a large collection of beauty books, and they are all lovely -- you will hear more about them in later posts!

I love Karen Homer's book because it is written in an accessible manner and it is full of useful advice. Plus, it doesn't obsess with weight, and doesn't equate extra pounds with a need to diet! The one problem with the book is that it uses only pictures of classic Hollywood beauties. But contemporary women are beautiful too! Bar Rafaeli, for instance, is the Goddess of Beauty reincarnated.

Beauty manuals have always existed -- Homer (not the above mentioned Karen Homer, but the Greek poet) contains beauty advice in the Iliad and Odyssey. However, they became especially popular from the 19th century onward, because more and more people were educated, and books themselves became cheaper.

I will write more about 19th century beauty manuals at a later post, but a favorite is Mary Haweis's The Art of Beauty. Haweis was a highly skilled and educated woman, who was even good at typography and book-binding!

LIPSTICK LAND

ADVENTURES in lipstick land continue! Last week I bought another perfect little tube, the Clinique FR Spanish Rose! It is the most romantic of lipsticks -- exotic and dark, but not too dark, deep red but bright! The Spanish Rose carries with it all the mystery of black lace, Spain and the flamenco!

I notice that all of the above paragraph is in exclamation marks. Yet I cannot help it. The Clinique Spanish Rose is perfect!

This is why I think beauty is part of who we are, and why we love lipsticks, perfumes and cosmetics. They tell a story about themselves, and we use them to tell a story about who we are. This story is what we want it to be, and that is why beauty and cosmetics give us confidence, optimism and strength!

Now, I am not advocating buying cosmetics all day or even using them if we don't want to. Personally, I only wear lipstick and no other make-up whatsoever. However, I think that make-up and beauty are a skill and an art, and can give us confidence and appeal! 

The Spanish Rose brings with it the color of Spain and the touch of black lace against the beautiful music of Spain and the Mediterranean!

BREAD, BEAUTY, BABIES

IN Ancient Greece, a wonderful custom after a baby's birth was the Fates table. This was a special table laid to placate the three fates (Clotho, who weaves the thread of life, Lachesis who spins it and Atropos who cuts). 

The third night after a baby's birth they laid the table with sweet bread, milk and honey,figs and raisins. They placed a ball of yarn on the table, which symbolized a long life. They put nothing on the table with which the yarn could be cut: so no knives, scissors or a razor.

The special bread was made with honey and cinnamon and was decorated with flowers and grapes. Because the custom survived in Christianity (as the Virgin Mary table) you can put a little silver or golden cross at the center of the bread.

Sometimes doughnuts were also baked to accompany the feast.

The three Fates are goddesses of childbirth, too, like Hera and Artemis.

I think all pregnant women are beautiful. A pregnant belly is feminine and lovely. But, for me, the most beautiful pregnant woman I have ever seen is Kate Hudson!

BEAUTY'S WRITING(The 10th of the Muses)

THE Ancient Greeks had a number of explanations on the origins of writing, including a legend from Egypt involving the God Thoth (Θευθ in Greek) and an old story involving the Greek king Kadmos.

But I agree with the expert typographer Jerome Peignot, that the best explanation is that Writing (Γραφή, in Greek) is the tenth of the muses, daughter of Apollo, Sun God and God of the Arts. The muse Γραφή is a twin sister of Cleo, while the mother of all the muses is Mnemosyne (Memory).

For me, it is very right that Writing is a woman and a daughter of memory and art. Women and writing have had a long and special relationship through the millenia -- writing gave women a voice!

Beauty is also writing, in my view. We write our own beauty with the lipstick, brushes and pencils. They are all writing instruments, after all!

But I also mean that there is so much lovely writing on beauty -- advice and beauty manuals, fashion manuals and in the novels themselves.

Women write better about beauty than men (of course). Yet men can write about beauty very well, and without objectifying the woman (as some male writers do). I am talking about Charles Dickens's beautiful heroines -- more about those in another post!

THE LIPSTICK PAPERS

NEW name, same cool blog!

I thought that the new name goes better with the spirit of the blog; the content is, of course, still the same -- lots on fashion, beauty, books, and the beauty of books!

A SPECIAL LIPSTICK
IN Rosamunde Pilcher's Coming Home, there is an important scene where a sixteen-year old Judith is preparing to go to a Christmas party. That party will be a rite of passage for Judith, for there she is going to have her first kiss, from Edward, her first love!

Importantly, Judith prepares for the party wearing mascara for the first time, and a special lipstick she calls "Coral Rose". The lipstick, mascara and perfume make Judith feel like an adult, and make her (again perhaps for the first time) realize that she is, in fact, beautiful.

Despite its many failings, Coming Home is valuable because it shows how beauty and fashion are not only central in a woman's life, but are also joyful and empowering.

When a woman starts to use lipstick or wear make-up she is entering into a long tradition of female knowledge and female art. Women have been making their own cosmetics since time immemorial.

Make-up was frowned upon by moralists for years; in the Victorian times it was tolerated so long as it was discreet and home-made. Commercial make-up production began exactly in the time of the Victorians: the use of make-up was popularized and eventually made to triumph by Hollywood.

The word make-up was first used by Max Factor himself, to replace the older word "cosmetics". Make-up has a long history and is a great art. More on the liberating effect of make-up later!

BEAUTY'S WORDS

READING Margaret Oliphant's Hester, I found one of the most beautiful descriptions of a blonde girl. Hester, the eponymous heroine, we read, wasn't "like [her distant cousin] Ellen Vernon, with her lovely fairness, her look of wax and confectionery"!

I am not so far into the book yet to know if Ellen will turn out to be good or bad, though I turned some pages and I think she will be good. At the moment, she has hurt Hester, who admired her, by never going to visit. Poor Hester!

Blonde women's hair had antithetical meanings for the Victorians. It could signify angelic femininity, female virtue, but also deceptive brightness and a snare.

The Victorians were obsessed with blonde hair, and I will come back to blonde Victorian heroines in later posts. 

What I do notice, however, is that writers exert themselves when they are going to describe beauty -- beauty's words can draw portraits that are better than any picture!

THE GLORY OF LIPSTICK

IT was love at first sight. The moment I saw it on the cosmetics counter of Beauty Line last night, I knew I had to have it!

I am talking about the Fuchsia Fever 60 Estee Lauder lipstick. Everything about it is beautiful! The cool, funky colour. The lovely name. The light it gives to the face. The pretty package!

The lipstick tube appeared in 1915, but the lipstick is as old as humankind. It is the best-selling cosmetic in the world and rightly so. A slash of lipstick on the lips brightens any day and, according to some research (I heard this on the BBC), good quality lipstick protects the lips from lip cancer!

The morning was full of beauty as well. I saw the Valentin Yudashkin Spring 2014 collection, with the phantasmagoric white and gold gowns.

I don't have any money to buy designer, and my budget is tiny in relation to everything (let alone designer). But I try to make life beautiful. Thank the Goddess of Beauty: there are many cheap ways, like the collages with fashion and make up which are everywhere in my house. 

As John Keats has said, "a thing of beauty is a joy forever; it will never slid into nothingness"!