The Beauty Myth

In the struggle for women's equality, there is one subject still shrouded in silence - women's compulsive pursuit of beauty. The myth of female beauty challenges every woman, every day of her life. Naomi Wolf exposes the tyranny of the beauty myth through the ages and its oppressive function today, in the home and at work, in literature and the media, in relationships between men and women, between women and women. With pertinent and intelligent examples, she confronts the beauty industry and its advertising and uncovers the reasons why women are consumed by this destructive obsession.

The bestselling classic that redefined our view of the relationship between beauty and female identity .

Every day, women around the world are confronted with a dilemma - how to look. In a society embroiled in a cult of female beauty and youthfulness, pressure on women to conform physically is constant and all-pervading. In this iconic, gripping and frank exposé, Naomi Wolf exposes the tyranny of the beauty myth through the ages and its oppressive function today, in the home and at work, in literature and the media, in relationships between men and women, between women and women. With pertinent and intelligent examples, she confronts the beauty industry and its advertising and uncovers the reasons why women are consumed by this destructive obsession.

'Essential reading' Guardian

'A smart, angry, insightful book, and a clarion call to freedom. Every woman should read it' Gloria Steinem

Préface
Provocative, punchy and important, this is one of the essential classics of modern feminist literature.

Auteur

Naomi Wolf

Texte du rabat

'A brilliant, bracing book...this remains essential reading' Guardian

The struggle for gender equality has played out alongside the unchanging belief that women must be beautiful. In this groundbreaking work of feminism, Naomi Wolf argues that our all-pervading emphasis on the importance of female beauty entraps women in the ceaseless pursuit of a physical ideal and colours perceptions of women at home, at work, in the media and in public life. With razor sharp insight and fascinating examples, Wolf exposes the tyranny of the beauty myth, its oppressive function and the destructive obsession in engenders.

See also: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman