Hankir provides an engaging, colorful study while relating her own cross-cultural story.
An exploration of the mystery, beauty, and potency of eyeliner.
At first blush, a book about eyeliner would seem to be so esoteric that it would appeal only to fashion addicts, but it turns out to be an absorbing piece of work. Lebanese-British journalist Hankir, editor of Our Women on the Ground, mixes her personal experiences with the social history of eyeliner. Eyeliner reached its first peak in ancient Egypt, with paintings of the era showing women and men adorned with eyeliner. Hankir has always been mesmerized by the famous bust of Nefertiti, which shows eyeliner in all its glory, with “wings” flowing from the sides of the eyes. The bust had a critical impact on the author, helping her to overcome her adolescent insecurities and accept living between two cultures. Nefertiti leads her to an examination of eyeliner in the Middle East, India, and Japan, and she digs through the complex cultural and historical layers. Interestingly, in Islamic countries, religious authorities frown on most cosmetics but accept eyeliner, perhaps because Muhammad used a form of it “to protect his eyes.” In the West, eyeliner is not usually used by men, although there have been plenty of exceptions in the creative industries and within the queer community. There is no shortage of types and styles for women, pushed along by celebrities and social media. The latest trend is to wear only eyeliner, rejecting other makeup and accepting skin blemishes. Hankir also examines eyeliner in the context of women of color reclaiming their heritage, and she asks readers to appreciate that beauty has many roots. “To wear eyeliner and to learn about its origins is to bring not only ourselves,” she concludes, “but also some of the world’s most fascinating cultures, into focus.”
Hankir provides an engaging, colorful study while relating her own cross-cultural story.Pub Date: Nov. 14, 2023
ISBN: 9780143137092
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
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