I remember the day I realized, at age eight, that I might not be the most beautiful girl in the world. Getting out of the bath, catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror, I was so angry at my mother. “But all these years, you said…and I believed you. Look…I’m just a regular girl!” Fuming, I let her wrap me up in the towel she was holding. By the time I became a newspaper columnist for the London Times and a semi-public figure, I had found comfort in having my own look. I drew inspiration from Ellen Barkin and Pam Grier, Silvana Mangano and Eartha Kitt. Weirdos. Self-confident weirdos. By the time I was thirty and writing my fifth novel, I’d become used to mean girls sniping that I was published only because I was attractive.
Context is an interesting thing.
When I began a relationship with a man who is considered a sex symbol, an “Official I Hate Emma” page popped up on the Web with the primary complaint being that I was not attractive enough for him to love.
“She has a huge nose!” or “A hooked nose!”, sometimes merely “an unfortunate nose” (which had me imagining my nose playing marbles, alone in the playground, friendless and ill-dressed). The politest response to a paparazzi shot of us was, “She looks like Dirty Dancing-era Jennifer Grey!”
Bless that commenter because it made me realize what the real problem was: I look Jewish. They’re used to Charlize Theron, and I look like I just came off a boat from Russia, walked over to the Lower East Side of Manhattan and opened a corset shop where I guess your bosom size just from sight.
I look like a Jew. That’s it. And when I realized that’s what it was all about…I felt good about myself again.
Emma Forrest is a journalist and author whose latest book is Cherries in the Snow. www.emmaforrest.com
