By Joyce Lamb, USA TODAY
You know what’s ugly? The word “ugly.” Eloisa James, whose The ugly Duchess came out today, shares her thoughts on beauty:
Eloisa: I grew up with the conviction that I was ugly. One day a teenage boy compared me to a canine; after school my mother assured me that he was wrong. “Your eyelids have a very sexy fold,” she said. No boy I’d ever heard of spent his time checking out people’s eyelids. Obviously, I would never have a boyfriend, get married, or even be considered pretty … except maybe by a plastic surgeon.
Five years later I was recruited by a modeling agency and spent a year modeling in Paris. Boys made themselves available for dates. I’m married.
You’re probably thinking that my mother should have been less precise in her assessment. But she was an intellectual who despised judgments based on mere appearance: To her, eyes were truly the windows to the soul.
My latest novel is a version of Hans Christian Andersen’s The ugly Duckling, a romance called The ugly Duchess. I shaped the plot around the fact that people’s standards of beauty — a teenager’s, my mother’s, a Parisian modeling agency’s — are all radically different.
We can never be beautiful to everyone. all we can do is learn to be beautiful to ourselves, and realize that “ugly” is a word that exists to wound, and never to describe. The ugly Duchess pairs an “ugly duckling” with a particularly beautiful pirate. It’s a novel written for everyone who has feared the word — and fought it.
I am very happy to say that The ugly Duchess has received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and Booklist. Library Journal described it as “a joyful work of art,” with “fast-paced, witty dialogue, flawless plotting, exquisite sensuality, and a delectable dusting of humor.”
The joy I put in this novel was hard-won. I hope that my tale of Theo and her pirate brings all my readers the satisfaction of realizing that no one, not a teenager or even your mother, should be allowed to shape one’s self-image. Beauty is not in anyone’s eyes (or even eyelids): It comes from the heart.
To find out more about Eloisa James and her books, you can visit her website, EloisaJames.com.
So, readers, was there a time in your life when people were rude about your looks? how have you learned to protect yourself against that sort of unkindness?
‘The Ugly Duchess’ author Eloisa James on the meaning of beauty
Vanessa Bryant, 28, has been stalking Kim Kardashian. more specifically, Kardashian’s plastic surgeon. After being spotted at the Olympics, looking like Joan Rivers long lost Latina daughter, she’s had to address facts rumors about plastic surgery. her reps were quick to squash rumors that nooooooooooooo, she didn’t have any surgery. She’s always looked like a younger version of the
So as
long as Kobe is winning championships, he has permission to bang all them white chicks on the side. It’s just Kobe’s way of saying he doesn’t like Vanessa’s hair color. He’d be banging you mrs. Bryant, if only you had lighter hair and some highlights. he just doesn’t like jet black hair. Sad face. she has to go back to her pre-gold digging ways when she looked like a regular human female.
