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【作者】：（美）蘇珊·格裏芬著；於是譯
· 【叢編項】：歲月叢林
· 【裝幀項】：平裝 21cm
· 【出版項】：浙江人民出版社 / 2005-1-1
· 【ISBN號】：7213024493 / D750.88
透過現象看本質，這條法則運用在看待效際花的問題上，是絕對確切的指導。從這個角度看等這本書，便有了社會學和歷史分析的意義。作者不厭期煩地告訴你第六一交際花的童年往事，以及19世紀法國的勞工社會狀況，因為這才是本質。作者並不想造就這一批精英女人的形象，這裏所涉及的人物作者都指出她們的弱點、錯誤以及她們命運的不可把握，同樣，她將她們的聰明之處告訴你。有時候，聰明就是和外部環境的抗爭，而男人，只有抗爭途中的敵人和同伴。這種有趣的局面，使得兩性關係暴露在婚姻和感情之外，因而如同將人性中的虛榮和情欲放大了一般，讓人看到金錢背後的人心。
【目錄】
留在藝術品中的女人（譯序）
序言
第一章 時機
舞姿
驚喜
藍裝
調情
第二章 美麗
古代秘方
養眼和樂趣
美和藝術的協作
她的肖像
暗示
第三章 厚顏無禮
威靈頓的屈服
"傲慢無禮的傑作"
無址的提議
吊襪帶
覺醒
第四章 智慧的光彩
肉欲知識
機智
管家
粉紅兔子
誘鉺
第五章 及時行樂
日落大道
她聽到之處
她的秋千
銷魂
第六章 優雅魅力
"野性的呼喚"
癡迷的跳躍
牧神
她優雅的屈膝禮
滿足
第七章 神幻魔力
第八章 藍色天使
尾聲：紅顏命
 The
Book of the Courtesans: A Catalogue of Their Virtues
【Editorial Reviews】
Amazon.com
Poet and writer Susan Griffin is famously provocative, though her
provocation takes very different forms, ranging from her classic
feminist treatise, Women and Nature, which linked patriarchy with
the oppression of women and nature, to her well-received A Chorus
of Stones, which weighed in on the nature of war. But in The Book
of Courtesans, Griffin is downright scintillating. Courtesans, she
writes, were not prostitutes nor even kept women, though certainly
they used their sexuality to financial gain. Rather, they were personages
and celebrities, friends to royalty and the most famous writers
and artists of their time, the subjects of gossip, the charismatic
epicenter of the Second Empire, the Gay Nineties, the Belle Epoche,
"Gay Paree." Their faces were immortalized in paintings
by the Renaissance masters, by Degas, Renoir, and Toulouse-Lautrec,
their lives by Proust, Balzac, Zola, Flaubert. They lived in splendor,
set fashion standards, owned fabulous jewelry collections. And they
were talented authors, poets, actresses, and singers. In a time
of prescribed roles for women, they turned the tables, creating
lives of remarkable intellectual and financial freedom.
Griffin sings the praises of these women and enunciates their virtues,
which, ironically, are the sort popularly thought to be made anachronistic
by feminism. With her impeccable timing, the French dancer Mogador
achieved legendary status the first time she danced on stage and
later became a countess. Harriet Wilson seduced the Duke of Wellington
with her cheek, and delivered him from boredom. Marion Davies' gaiety
enlivened all those who saw her, Madame Pompadour was the embodiment
of grace, and Sarah Bernhardt exuded so much charm she acted her
way straight out of the role of courtesan. Griffin imagines herself
into her subjects lives with sensitivity and sensuality--the rags
to riches stories that characterized them and their creative responses
to often dire circumstances. In the end, she not only immortalizes
these feminist precursors, but reminds us that "the capacity
to take pleasure in life is no less a virtue than any other."
--Lesley Reed --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable
edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Hard on the heels of the film Moulin Rouge comes this idiosyncratic
meditation on that 18th- and 19th-century curiosity, the courtesan,
the woman who, though usually from limited means, parlayed her beauty,
sexuality and talent into a position of luxury and celebrity as
the mistress of one or several men of means. Readers looking for
a sober social history of the world portrayed in the film will not
find it here, for Griffin's approach is almost as kaleidoscopic
as the movie's. In a series of brief chapters, each devoted to a
particular "virtue," that is, a talent central to the
courtesan's success (such as "Gaiety," "Charm,"
"Cheek"), feminist critic, playwright and poet Griffin
(What Her Body Thought; Women and Nature; etc.) mines the memoirs
of her subjects for stories illustrating their ability to vault
beyond the constraints of their age and gender. Some of her courtesans
have slipped into obscurity; some are remembered chiefly for their
associations with artists and eminent men; a few, like Colette and
Chanel, achieved fame in a different endeavor. At least one, Nijinsky,
was not a woman at all. What they all share, however, and what Griffin
admires in them, is the daring to transgress the boundaries of a
rigid code of prudery and hypocrisy and so exchange the poverty
and toil they were condemned to at birth for champagne, diamonds
and extraordinary lingerie. Griffin's writing is lively, and her
stories are engaging. Agent, Katinka Matson. (Sept. 11)Forecast:
An acclaimed writer A Chorus of Stones was a Pulitzer Prize finalist
Griffin should garner respectable review coverage for this subject
of timeless interest.
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