H04015 CLASSICAL NORM OF BEAUTY" 2/19/04 HARDY FORUM ARCHIVES
From: schweikr@localnet.com
Subject: Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 19, 2004 9:32:24 AM PST
made reference to a classical norm of beauty as '7 heads tall'--
or some such phrase? I remember it, but can't recall the novel.
Bob Schweik
Robert Schweik
University Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus
Department of English
State University of New York
Fredonia, NY 14063
USA
schweik@fredonia.edu
schweikr@localnet.com
From: kgwilson@uottawa.ca
Subject: Re: Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 19, 2004 10:39:59 AM PST
Hi Bob,
I think you are remembering Far From the Madding Crowd, Chapter III. "It may have been observed by persons who go about the shires with eyes for beauty that in English women a classically formed face is seldom found united with a figure of the same pattern, the highly finished features being generally too large for the remainder of the frame; that a graceful and proportionate figure of eight heads usually goes off into random facial curves."
All the best,
Keith
From: srogers@sju.edu
Subject: Re: Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 19, 2004 10:46:53 AM PST
Dear Bob,
Could you be thinking of Ch 3 of FFMC where Gabriel first glimpses
Bathsheba and is struck by her height?
Cheers,
Shannon
From: jwwhipple1@comcast.net
Subject: Re: Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 19, 2004 12:49:29 PM PST
Dear Bob,
Using Google and Alltheweb, then scanning through some books, I could not locate the phrase in Hardy, though I was amused to find, among the allusions to classical art, several references to this standard in the popular Japanese form known as "anime". Michiko will be amused to note a connection between "Princess Mononoke" and Hardy! I guess he might have used it anywhere, even in his non-fiction or perhaps in notes about his sketches and renderings, of which I hope someday to see and learn more.
Hoping to see you in Dorchester,
Julian
Julian W. Whipple
145 Raleigh Way
Portsmouth,
From: rosemarie.morgan@yale.edu
Subject: Re: Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 19, 2004 5:41:04 PM PST
Perhaps Hardy's reference to a "figure of eight heads" -- which sounds
rather
grotesque -- should be clarified for the uninitiated.
Hardy is referring here to the classical system of artistic proportions (or
proportions of perfect beauty). Vasari -- the greatest "Renaissance" promoter
of artistic style -- was influenced by the ideas of Roman architect Vitruvius
who suggested that the basic unit of measurement for a figure should be the
foot or head of the figure and that a man's height should be six of his
head or
foot measurement and a woman's eight "feet." Renaissance artists rarely
departed from this rule although there were slight variations. The artist
chooses one unit of measrement (the head or foot) and calculates the heights,
depth etc of the rest of the figure as multiples of this one unit. The
structure is thus governed by a ratio so that the perfection of the arm, say,
should always be, three units of measurement.
Cheers.
Rosemarie
From: Simonagraziosi@libero.it
Subject: Re:Classical Norm of Beauty
Date: February 20, 2004 11:56:03 AM PST
"It may have been observed by persons who go about the shires with eyes for beauty that in English women a classically formed face is seldom found united with a figure of the same pattern, the highly-finished features being generally too large for the remainder of the frame; that a graceful and proportionate figure of eight heads usually goes off into random facial curves."
From "Far from the madding crowd", chapter III
The ancient Greeks believed that Physical perfection consisted of the body being eight times the lenght of its head. It's a concept very similar to the Omero's"Kalokagathìa".
All the best.