Writers about female beauty: 6 images in quotes
We decided to remember our school and student years, namely literature lessons. We have no doubt: you also had to copy tons of books into your notebooks at night in search of the necessary quotes - images of the main characters. Then we talked about morality - “sublime” and “fallen”, “good” and “evil”, “worthy” and “worthless”, today we will do without moralizing and think about the beautiful. We have collected 6 female images that, according to their authors, embodied the ideals of beauty in the context of different times and cultures.
The Swan Princess, “The Tale of Tsar Saltan” (1831), A. S. Pushkin
“During the day it eclipses the light of God, at night it illuminates the earth - the moon shines under the scythe, and the star burns in the forehead. But she herself is majestic, she stands out like a peahen; “He speaks sweetly, as if a river is gurgling,” Pushkin writes about the wonderful Swan Princess in his “The Tale of Tsar Saltan,” referring to the fragile beauty of the bird.
The artist Vrubel depicts her as a very young dark-haired girl with a long braid, dressed in a snow-white veil. The sleeves, embroidered with silver threads, and the folds on her dress resemble lush swan wings. The girl’s delicate features are framed by a crown decorated with stars and pearls. Vrubel tries to capture the magical, somewhat frightening moment of the girl’s transformation into a bird, emphasizing her inhuman nature.
The Snow Queen, "The Snow Queen" (1844), H. H. Andersen
Dying, the father said to Hans: “Here comes the Ice Maiden, and she has come to me.” This is how the mythological Scandinavian image settled in the imagination of the young writer. He soon met perhaps the most famous singer of his time, Jenny Lind, who served as the prototype for the image of the Snow Queen, teaming up with the Ice Maiden.
“Snowflakes fluttered outside the window; one of them, a larger one (...) began to grow, grow, until finally she turned into a woman (...) she was so lovely, so tender, all made of dazzling white ice and yet alive! Her eyes sparkled like stars, but there was neither warmth nor meekness in them. She nodded to the boy and beckoned him with her hand. The boy got scared and jumped off the chair; Something like a white bird flashed past the window. (...) Kai looked at her; she was so beautiful! He could not imagine a more tender, lovely face. Now she didn’t seem icy to him, like that time when she sat outside the window and nodded her head at him; now she seemed perfect to him.”
The Snow Queen is a symbol of a reasonable mind, and her world is built on the concept of absolute perfection and absolute ideas.
Anna Karenina, “Anna Karenina” (1873), L. N. Tolstoy
“She was charming in her simple black dress, charming were her full arms with bracelets, charming was her firm neck with a string of pearls, charming was her curly hair in a disordered hairstyle, charming were the graceful light movements of her small legs and arms, charming was that beautiful face in its animation; but there was something terrible and cruel in her charm. (...) Despite the elegance, everything was so simple, calm and dignified in Anna’s pose, clothes, and movements that nothing could be more natural. (...) by one glance at this lady’s appearance, Vronsky determined that she belonged to high society (...) Levin admired her all the time - her beauty, her intelligence, her education, and at the same time her simplicity and sincerity,” quotes about beauty are scattered throughout the novel , ease and simplicity of Karenina. However, neither her beauty, nor her education, nor her naturalness saved her from a bitter fate.
Becky Thatcher, "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer", M. Twain
Becky Thatcher, Tom Sawyer's classmate and faithful friend, may not have been his first “lady,” but she was the one he considered perfect and loved with all his heart. But what does love mean in the understanding of children?
“Walking past the house where Jeff Thatcher lived, he saw some new girl in the garden - a lovely blue-eyed creature with golden hair braided in two long braids, wearing a white summer dress and embroidered pantaloons. The hero, just crowned with glory, was killed without firing a shot. A certain Emmy Lawrence immediately disappeared from his heart, without leaving even a trace there.”
Nicole Diver, Tender is the Night (1934), F. S. Fitzgerald
Francis Scott Fitzgerald wrote Tender is the Night not in the brightest period of his life: critics wrote that he wasted his talent on primitive magazine reading, Hemingway also did not favor his work, and his beloved wife Zelda was either locked in a mental hospital or attempted suicide. By the way, the image of Nicole Diver was copied from the latter.
“Nicole Diver, her back hanging from a pearl necklace exposed to the sun, was looking in a cookbook for a recipe for Maryland chicken. Rosemary thought she must be twenty-four years old; at first glance it seemed that the common definition of “beautiful woman” was quite enough for her, but if you look closely at her face, a strange impression arose - as if this face was intended to be strong and significant, with large Rodin-like sculpting of features, with that brightness of colors and expression , which inevitably gives rise to the idea of a temperamental, strong-willed character; but during finishing, the sculptor’s chisel whittled it down to ordinary beauty - so much so that just a little more - and it would have become irreparably banal. This duality was especially evident in the drawing of the lips; curved, like a beauty from a magazine cover, they at the same time possessed an elusive originality, inherent in the rest of the features of this face.
Lilian Dunkirk, “A Borrowed Life” (1959), E. M. Remarque
Many of the images in Remarque’s novels are deeply autobiographical: for example, in the young Belgian Lilian, sick with tuberculosis, you can read the writer’s first wife, Jutta Zambona. The sophisticated blonde with Nordic features will remain in the writer’s work for a long time, securing for herself the archetype of female beauty.
“She had a tanned face and very light, transparent eyes,” writes Remarque at the very beginning of the story “Life on Borrow.” Not much has been said about her appearance, but about her sincere - and perhaps only - love for fashion designer Balenciaga - in full. “Lillian went to Balenciaga. (...) Lilian looked at herself in the mirror. Her face seemed more tanned in Paris than in the mountains; my shoulders were also tanned. New dresses emphasized the lines of her figure and the uniqueness of her face. She suddenly became very beautiful, moreover, her transparent eyes, which did not recognize anyone and looked as if through the surrounding objects, gave her a special sad charm and a kind of detachment from everything that touched the heart. She heard the conversations of the women in the neighboring booths, saw how they looked at her as they came out, these tireless warriors for the rights of their sex, but Lillian knew that she had little in common with them. Dresses were not a weapon for her in the fight for a man. Her goal was life and herself.”
