HELLO and welcome to The Lipstick Papers Weekend Review! This week we got The Body Shop Book: Skin, Hair and Body Care, published in 1994 by Little, Brown and Company.
The book is a collection of advice, know-how, how-to and tips from the Body Shop, with an Introduction by the late Anita Roddick.
It is a lovely volume, with practical information and advice, as well as historical and useful material on beauty, aromatherapy, fragrances, and health. Interestingly, the book devotes space for men's beauty as well. There is a section for massage too, a step-by-step guide to make up, a section on Sun (tanning safely, keeping your living space cool, keeping your skin healthy in the sun) and finally a section on aging -- which becomes more and more valuable to me as the years go by!
I bought this volume when it came out in 1994, and I believe that it is now a collectors item. It was a bit expensive, and my means were as limited as always but, at the same time, I always have a tiny budget for books!
Now I am happy I bought this book rather than saving the money it cost. Anita Roddick has died and the Body Shop has been sold.
Inside the volume I have kept some clippings from magazines on skin care, equally valuable today! One day's ephemera is the next day's memento.
I hope you are all enjoying a great Sunday, always with beauty and a book! xxx
THIS weekend I watched Mockingjay part one, which is the third film to come out of the Hunger Games saga! I liked the film, especially the haunting tune sang by Jennifer Lawrence in a scene on the river bank. I normally don't love it when film characters break into song, but this scene is a marvelous exception to the rule!
As a fashion addict, I particularly love the character Effie, brilliantly played by Elizabeth Banks. Though Katniss is not an enthusiast for fashion and beauty practices, generally these are presented positively, and as a glamorous addition to life.
Also, I sometimes use Hunger Games for my lectures on gender and eating habits, as a good example of a book with a healthy attitude to food. Food is shown as something life-giving, valuable and essential; while most book heroines shun food, Katniss absolutely loves it, thus setting a good example.
What I found to criticize in the Hunger Games books is something which the film has not shown. This is the insistence that Katniss is so much like her father, and nothing like her mother. Katniss got her rebellion and spirit from her dad. It often happens in real life, of course, to get your free spirit directly and exclusively from one parent; however, fiction is not real life. The implication is that Katniss is so powerful because she took this from a man.
Personally, I prefer Prim, Katniss's more feminine sister, and their mother. I prefer the mother/Prim dyad, because they embody female knowledge and energy.
Other than this, I find that the Hunger Games saga depicts women and gender quite well, and certainly much better than other popular franchises!
Have a good evening and see you again soon! xxx
HELLO and welcome to The Lipstick Papers Weekend Review! Today we got the book Compacts and Cosmetics: Beauty from Victorian Times to the Present Day. The book is from Madeleine Marsh, and was published by Pen and Sword Press for the Women with Style Series in 2009.
Compacts and Cosmetics is, as the title suggests, about the history of beauty and cosmetics, all in relation to the material culture of the beauty industry: advertisements, product packaging, art and design as well as promotion of products through celebrities.
I use information from this book for my teaching and for writing in The Lipstick Papers!
The volume is lovely visually -- quality paper, attractive design and, most of all, excellent photographic material: Advertisements, photographs and cosmetics, vintage at first, closer to our own era as the chapters progress.
A drawback for this book is that it does not avoid misogyny. Maybe it was unintentional but, for example, mockery of women who used cosmetics (in the 18th century) is laid out in annoying detail without critical comment. Also, the name "Jezebel", applied up until the early 20th century to criticize women who used cosmetics, is used over and over, as if it is a brilliant descriptive term. I completely disagree with this. "Jezebel" is a patriarchal, misogynist term. A book may mention it to explain what it was, but not employ it afterwards itself.
Other than that, I recommend Compacts and Cosmetics to anyone interested in beauty and beauty's history!
Have a great Sunday afternoon, always with beauty and a book! xxx
WHEN times get difficult, I often turn to books but, I have to say, I most often turn to beauty!
Pictures of fashion, lipstick, magazines, art, World Fashion TV -- all these make me feel better!
Of course, I don't underestimate the power of books. A good fiction piece, like Fifty Shades of Grey, Great Expectations, or even the first Twilight, are excellent to lift the mood. Thank goodness we got Christian (Grey).
Non-fiction is also excellent for the mood. For me, nothing beats a good history, art, or book history volume. But my favorites are again books about beauty, fashion and cosmetics!
I would also recommend a lovely memoir by Haruki Murakami, which I read in excellent Greek translation by Vasilis Kimoulis (Βασίλης Κιμούλης, Oceanida Publishers). The title is What I talk about when I talk about running, and it is absolutely wonderful.
I transcribe what is, for me, the best passage in the book (my translation, from Greek):
"In other words, we have to face it: life is basically unfair. Yet, even in an unfair situation, I believe it's possible to seek out a form of justice. Of course, this will take time and effort. And it might seem that it is not even worth to try. Whether you will eventually try, is entirely up to you".
Sometimes things get bad -- but I always think of Murakami's words, and decide that it is, eventually, worth to try. And I think that this is by itself beautiful.
YOU will probably know from earlier posts how much I love spiders! I admire them and their work and never destroy their spider-nets.
Arachne, which means spider in Greek, was a young gifted weaver from Athens, who bragged that she was better at weaving than the Goddess Athene. Athene became so angry she transformed the young woman into the insect we all know and love. Athene is the Greek Goddess of wisdom, weaving and embroidery. She is also a warrior Goddess.
Though the ancient Greeks were not that great on the issue of gender equality (but this again depended in which city-state you lived) they were wise enough to recognize that a woman could be the patron Goddess of things so antithetical such as books, war and the home.
Athene is probably the original Domestic Goddess -- and a warrior Goddess at that!
So how about manuals and advise books which tell us, women, that we should be domestic goddesses and that this is great? Is this liberating, or should we toss those manuals into the bin?
I say we have perfect freedom to be domestic goddesses and there is nothing wrong with it, provided we bear in mind three things. (a) This should be our choice, and not because we have to. (b) We must remember that there was never a romantic, golden age where the woman baked cookies, was deified and ruled the home: the woman was a prisoner in the home, and that's all there is to it. If you are not allowed, by law and/ or custom, to go to University and follow a profession, if as a married woman you are not allowed to own property and all your property belongs to your husband, then you are a prisoner. Finally, (c) we must keep in mind that the home is not solely our responsibility. Men (at least good men) care for their home too, and love to share.
Have a great mid-week, with beauty always with you! xxx
HELLO and welcome to The Lipstick Papers Weekend Review! This week we have Paul Morand's The Allure of Chanel, Chanel's autobiographical account to French author Paul Morand. I didn't love this book too much, but it also has strong points, so I will try to give you a fair overview.
I read this book in excellent Greek translation (by Βάνα Χαρζάκη, from Agra Publishing House), but you can also find it in English.
This book is incredibly honest and unadulterated Chanel: we learn about Coco Chanel in her own no-nonsense and idiosyncratic voice.
Based on conversations with the author, the book is quite complete as an autobiography, following Chanel from a troubled childhood to young adulthood and finally to fame through hard work and determination.
One of the best features in the book are original illustrations by none other than Karl Lagerfeld! I am sure you will love the illustrations as much as I did.
A bad thing about the book is that sometimes Chanel comes out as too weird, too idiosyncratic. Her tone is very pessimistic and has things to say about women (and even about Chanel's own life) which sound too repressed.
I am not sure if I would recommend the book. It is not pleasant to read, and can be annoying. However, it is very useful for anyone interested/ being involved in fashion and fashion studies.
Have a great Sunday evening, always with beauty and a book! xxx
THE MORE you read about the history of lipstick, the more you love it!
I was reading the other day that, during the Second World War, lipstick cases were adapted and equipped with accessories such as emergency flashlights in case of blackout. Max Factor developed a long-lasting lipstick; Gala of London offered a refillable lipstick. Local pharmacies made their own from simple ingredients!
As for the US government, it declared the production of lipstick a wartime necessity. Make-up and hairstyles balanced the difficulty in getting new clothes (because of the war). In 1944, the British government classified beauty products as necessities. Looking good was an act of defiance.
This is about the past. What does the future hold for lipstick? I am convinced that lipstick will go on being woman's best friend, and will accompany humanity to the next frontier, which is, of course, space.
What I wouldn't give to see a lipstick case adapted for space travel!
xxx
P.S. I got the information about wartime lipstick from the book Beauty Imagined, by Geoffrey Jones.
IF you have been reading this blog for a while, you will know that I am much in favor of body size acceptance, and try to talk about the relationship between beauty and weight.
Recently, I have stopped reading a book which was sort of autobiographical, and had to do with a young woman's exploits in fashion. I stopped reading it because I found her obsession with her weight and with male approval to be disturbing and worrying.
Though happily married now, the writer could only think of how she has always been big, and no boy ever dated her at school. She started wearing corsets because they made her look less big.
I stopped reading the book, so I can't really say whether it improves later. The spirit was so repressed that I doubt it, yet I don't know.
Male approval is good and important for women; however, we must not let it define us. Of course we want men to like us, but this must have nothing to do with our self-esteem and our definition of what is beautiful!
Also, there is nothing wrong with being so-called "big". As long as we are healthy and fit, kilos do not matter. This book sent a dangerous message to big girls, telling them in advance that no boy would ever date them.
Beauty is our own and no-one else's. And there are more things to beauty than a number on the scales!
ONE of the most beautiful romantic associations I found in literature is in Oscar Wilde's short story The Canterville Ghost, between 15-year old Virginia Otis and the young Duke of Cheshire, also a teenager.
The boy falls in love with Virginia one day when he sees her horse-riding in Hyde Park. Virginia is a "wonderful amazon", and wins a race twice: the young Duke proposes to her on the spot. Unluckily, his guardians are also there, and pack him immediately off to Eton "in floods of tears".
You can't get more romantic or tender than that!
Of course, true love prevails, and Cecil (that's the name of the boy) seeks Virginia again, they stick together through happiness and trouble, and eventually marry when he comes of age. They live happily ever after.
I love the fact that it is Virginia's litheness and agility that won the heart of her "boy-lover", and I think the "amazon" metaphor is very successful, because an Amazon evokes female power and strength.
Women were often kept away from physical exercise, for a number of prudish reasons, all of them wrong (prudishness is always wrong). Though ancient Athens promoted sports and had physical education among the basic courses in the school curriculum, this was only for boys, not girls. Girls received little education. Sparta, Athens's rival, was somewhat better in the treatment of women, and girls were trained in sports as well as boys.
A book with a history of physical education for women (concentrating on France, however) is Mary Lynn Stewart's Physical Culture for French Women 1880s-1930s.
I wish you all a great Sunday! xxx
IT IS one of my beliefs that buying new lipstick is among the best things in life! Yesterday I bought a new lipstick from Guerlain in a lovely pink shade and in a magnificent aerodynamic case, as you can see:
You probably know this already, but in a war or an economic crisis there is the so-called "lipstick effect". Sales of lipstick rise significantly rather than drop. This is because lipstick is affordable luxury, which brightens times of trouble! My own personal dream is to live in the Lipstick building, a skyscraper in the shape of lipstick in New York!
I don't find lipstick too often in fiction, except as a general mention concerning color. Lipstick is of course much more than this!
Lipstick is often mentioned in Rosamunde Pilcher's Coming Home. This is a novel which I read years ago and which I recently tried to read again. The second time I stopped reading. I love the way the book presents beauty and beautiful women, but this time I couldn't stand the class snobbery, some gender issues and the division of women into bitter old maids and women who have sex.
Women studies today promote a woman's right to virginity as as well as a woman's right to sexuality. What a woman does with her body (or her bed for that matter) is her right and absolutely no-one else's.
Have we strayed too far from lipstick? I don't think so. Lipstick, beauty and body are all a woman's business!
I wish you a great Friday evening! xxx
I ALWAYS say that make-up and beauty are among the greatest things in life, and now I can prove it!
Today I booked a free make-up session at Beauty Line here in Cyprus, and got a free makeover by Mike Orphanides.
Mike is not only ultra-talented, ultra-famous and make-up artist to the stars, he can transform every woman into a star too! His work is amazing, and his touch is gentle, but also firm and strong. He treats you like a star too. I very much enjoyed the make-up session!
In the end, I came out looking like a model. In the picture with Mike here, we look as if we are at the Oscars red carpet!!!
When I left Beauty Line, people stared at me admiringly on the street. Make-up is a wonderful experience!
I have been reading many books about the history of make-up, where people in the past tried to restrain women from using it, or from enjoying make-up and their own beauty. Luckily, all these ideas are out of fashion now.
Beauty is every woman's right. Yes!
CURRENTLY re-reading Lord Arthur Savile's Crime, I have only one regret: that Oscar Wilde did not write more novels!
Lord Arthur Savile's Crime is a short story by Oscar Wilde. It may also be called a novella, as it has chapters of its own and is larger than your average short story.
Wilde famously wrote only one novel, The Picture of Dorian Grey. The novella I am (re)reading now, Lord Arthur Savile's Crime is, intriguingly, a re-telling of The Picture of Dorian Grey. You can tell the moment you start reading: Arthur Savile is exactly like Dorian Grey, and his fiancee Sybil Merton is Dorian's fiancee, Sybil Vane. In both works, there is an evil prediction or fate hanging over the young male protagonist.
Unlike Dorian Grey, Crime has a happy ending! :-) This is great for me, coz I only like happy endings.
To get back to Wilde's writing. I honestly think he is an absolute master of language. I don't think I have read more wonderful and sensitive descriptions of beauty than in Wilde. The "dawn's delicate loveliness", the "days that break in beauty", the water "glimmering like a moonstone" and, an amazing description, the vegetables in the London morning market looking "like masses of jade against the morning sky, like masses of green jade against the pink petals of some marvellous rose".
I also enjoyed Sybil Merton's description, especially the "there was a touch of Greek grace in her pose and attitude"!
What I love about Wilde also, is that he understood one thing: if the public enjoys beautiful female heroines, they are going to enjoy beautiful male protagonists too. You can trust Wilde on that, and you know how I insist that giving beauty only to the female protagonist is sexist (the woman needs to be beautiful in fiction, but the man doesn't).
Have a great Sunday wherever you are! xxx
