"I use my body the same way a nurse uses her hat..."

Do These Sparrows Make the Spring?

For over ten years I've been reading about how the fashion industry is about to turn to models larger than size 0. There was Sophie Dahl for a bit* and the supposed breakthrough was being welcomed and almost announced in women's press for years -- with no effects, as far as I could tell.

Until this year, it seems, when for the first time in history I saw in a magazine a belly that resembled mine. Later in the summer I had the good fortune to go to Canada and, as one of the many souvenirs from that trip, I brought back a copy of Canadian Elle with a beautiful Frida Kahlo-inspired fashion shoot featuring Crystal Renn.

Does this mean that the runway, too, has finally ceased to be off limits for sizes larger than nothing?

It would be great.

And I'd love it if the next move was to confront the age question. I'm sick of looking at 13-year-olds showing off clothes for 30-year-olds (and bodies that are impossible for most of that audience without plastic surgery). These girls should be in school.

* I vaguely remember reading an interview in which Dahl complained that the larger girl image was imposed on her and had nothing to do with her natural weight or the image she had wanted for herself.

Made Up, Unmade Up

Last night we watched a few episodes of Kasia i Tomek and I realized that if I were living in Poland, I would be buying and wearing more make up.

As a friend of mine said (referring to academic projects, however): once one has such a realization, what does one do with it?

Add Zombies

I'm not sure I understand why.

I also don't understand why I am intrigued by the idea. But I am. Maybe it's the simplicity of the title, which doesn't purport that zombies are somehow implicated in the story but just adds them. Obviously, I can't answer the big question posed by NY Times -- I don't know what exactly zombies add to the plot. Exercise? A dash of female agency as Elizabeth Bennet gets to run around with a dagger rather than sit in a parlor with her mother and sisters?

Or not.

I found an excerpt and illustration (there are illustrations! the book is scoring points with me) here. Any thoughts?

I Could Read This All Day

if I had all day for sipping coffee and loafing around à la Whitman.

Godey's Lady's Book: the major discovery of my class in the Rare Books Library. It has everything one wants from a magazine: from short stories and poems, through articles on more or less current events, to fashion and... cottage floor plans.

It seems more worthwhile to click over to the University of Rochester website and check on what Godey's was writing about in 1850 than waste money on a contemporary women's mag. I say this with bitter conviction, having recently thrown $4 out the window on a copy of Elle a bunch of ads.

One other thing I recommend doing is reading about women's press. Literally, there's more text in magazine reviews, not to mention more insight and humor.*

It seems you'd be more entertained by an imaginary conversation with an eggplant than by a women's magazine these days. I might be cynical,** but I'd really appreciate some content for a change.

* No, the order of links is not meant to be telling but purely accidental ;-)
** and repetitive

PS: Also, Paltrow's GOOP in collision with Lydia Maria Child's The Frugal Housewife. Reality bites!

"Kariera czy rodzina?" / "Career or family?"

Disclaimer: I've been meaning to do a double Polish-English post but, obviously, that didn't happen till now. I don't like repeating myself and so, the following post will repeat certain things and then the parts will go wherever they want to go.

This is Marta Żmuda-Trzebiatowska, a Polish actress in her early twenties who just won Viva! magazine's ranking of the famous and beautiful.

Here's what I find striking about the cover:

the enormous letters dominating over Trzebiatowska's face and silhouette in both versions say KARIERA CZY RODZINA?," that is, CAREER OR FAMILY?"

Because, you know, as a woman, you are not allowed to have both. You work, maybe become popular, and one day you win this major beauty thing for celebs only to have huge letters sprawled over your frame like a court verdict.

Feminism's place in Polish culture is, unfortunately, still very much in the pipe dream territory.

The titillation of absurdly final choices takes center stage. Either you're "Mother Pole" whose fertile womb breeds whole parishes of kids, or you're "that woman who chose career and is now paying a high price for it." Or so the papers say.

Images are supposed to be worth more than thousands of words:


I suppose the main idea of this photo shoot was to speed-age her by means of make up so that she looks like a 40-something-year-old worn out by fame. In case she might have been thinking she could have it both ways, the photos serve as a reminder that being a woman is all about sacrifice.

Try to picture a photo of a successful man with the same threat in block letters. Impossible? Why of course. In Viva! offices in Warsaw the crowd that came up with this lame story and photo shoot are thinking that sexual equality would just steal all the drama. Feminism just doesn't sell. Remember.

Is there any chance someone will finally give Polish women a break?

------------------------------------------

Marta Żmuda-Trzebiatowska wygrała plebiscyt "Najpiękniejsi" pisma Viva! i w nagrodę dostała szyderczą okładkę w tymże piśmie. Polski feminizm, jak wiadomo, przez szersze społeczeństwo i towarzystwo wydające czasopisma uważany jest za twór bajkowy.

Jeśli już miałaś pecha urodzić się jako kobieta w Polsce, tak jak pani Trzebiatowska, twoje życie będzie pasmem ostatecznych i bolesnych wyborów. Gigantyczne litery na obydwu wersjach okładki krzyczą KARIERA CZY RODZINA? Jeśli łudziłaś się, droga niewiasto, że w XXI w. dane Ci będzie bezczelnie cieszyć się obydwiema opcjami, Viva! rozwieje twoje rojenia.

Trudno sobie wyobrazić zdjęcie mężczyzny opatrzone podobną groźbą. Jak wiadomo, facet może mieć wszystko w świecie kolorowych magazynów i prawicowej polityki. Ale kobiety należy straszyć.

Najlepiej za pomocą zdjęć, które postarzają je na oko o jakieś 20 lat. Specjalnie dla zwyciężczyni, styliści pisma stworzyli moralne ostrzeżenie: jak nie nakręcisz zaraz biologicznego budzika, obudzisz się samotna, zgorzkniała, z natapirowaną grzywą i wielkimi literami na piersi, obwieszczającymi światu, że zawiodłaś w twej kobiecej misji.

Warto pamiętać, że te egzystencjalne dramaty rzekomej "odwiecznej natury kobiecej" nakręcają kolorową prasę, dla której feminizm jest nieatrakcyjnym tematem.

[Zdjęcia pochodzą stąd.]