“
With friends like me, who needs mannequins? My love for you is statuesque. Come, let us dance like we’re made of stone.
”
”
Jarod Kintz (My love can only occupy one person at a time)
“
I’ve only ever looked at Marissa and seen an elegant, statuesque, gorgeous woman. But this morning, I find myself wishing she was a cute, rumpled, fiery brunette instead.
Shit! That’s not good!
”
”
M. Leighton (Down to You (The Bad Boys, #1))
“
There are blondes and blondes and it is almost a joke word nowadays. All blondes have their points, except perhaps the metallic ones who are as blond as a Zulu under the bleach and as to disposition as soft as a sidewalk. There is the small cute blonde who cheeps and twitters, and the big statuesque blonde who straight-arms you with an ice-blue glare. There is the blonde who gives you the up-from-under look and smells lovely and shimmers and hangs on your arm and is always very tired when you take her home. She makes that helpless gesture and has that goddamned headache and you would like to slug her except that you are glad you found out about the headache before you invested too much time and money and hope in her. Because the headache will always be there, a weapon that never wears out and is as deadly as the bravo’s rapier or Lucrezia’s poison vial. There is the soft and willing and alcoholic blonde who doesn’t care what she wears as long as it is mink or where she goes as long as it is the Starlight Roof and there is plenty of dry champagne. There is the small perky blonde who is a little pal and wants to pay her own way and is full of sunshine and common sense and knows judo from the ground up and can toss a truck driver over her shoulder without missing more than one sentence out of the editorial in the Saturday Review. There is the pale, pale blonde with anemia of some non-fatal but incurable type. She is very languid and very shadowy and she speaks softly out of nowhere and you can’t lay a finger on her because in the first place you don’t want to and in the second place she is reading The Waste Land or Dante in the original, or Kafka or Kierkegaard or studying Provençal. She adores music and when the New York Philharmonic is playing Hindemith she can tell you which one of the six bass viols came in a quarter of a beat too late. I hear Toscanini can also. That makes two of them. And lastly there is the gorgeous show piece who will outlast three kingpin racketeers and then marry a couple of millionaires at a million a head and end up with a pale rose villa at Cap Antibes, an Alfa-Romeo town car complete with pilot and co-pilot, and a stable of shopworn aristocrats, all of whom she will treat with the affectionate absent-mindedness of an elderly duke saying goodnight to his butler.
”
”
Raymond Chandler (The Long Goodbye (Philip Marlowe, #6))
“
Meanwhile it's got stormy, the tattered fog even thicker, chasing across my path. Three people are sitting in a glassy tourist cafe between clouds and clouds, protected by glass from all sides. Since I don't see any waiters, it crosses my mind that corpses have been sitting there for weeks, statuesque. All this time the cafe has been unattended, for sure. Just how long have they been sitting here, petrified like this?
”
”
Werner Herzog (Of Walking on Ice)
“
The hardest thing of all to see is what is really there. Books about birds show pictures of the peregrine, and the text is full of information. Large and isolated in the gleaming whiteness of the page, the hawk stares back at you, bold, statuesque, brightly coloured. But when you have shut the book, you will never see that bird again. Compared with the close and static image, the reality will seem dull and disappointing. The living bird will never be so large, so shiny-bright. It will be deep in landscape, and always sinking farther back, always at the point of being lost. Pictures are waxworks beside the passionate mobility of the living bird.
”
”
J.A. Baker (The Peregrine)
“
The Death of Allegory
I am wondering what became of all those tall abstractions
that used to pose, robed and statuesque, in paintings
and parade about on the pages of the Renaissance
displaying their capital letters like license plates.
Truth cantering on a powerful horse,
Chastity, eyes downcast, fluttering with veils.
Each one was marble come to life, a thought in a coat,
Courtesy bowing with one hand always extended,
Villainy sharpening an instrument behind a wall,
Reason with her crown and Constancy alert behind a helm.
They are all retired now, consigned to a Florida for tropes.
Justice is there standing by an open refrigerator.
Valor lies in bed listening to the rain.
Even Death has nothing to do but mend his cloak and hood,
and all their props are locked away in a warehouse,
hourglasses, globes, blindfolds and shackles.
Even if you called them back, there are no places left
for them to go, no Garden of Mirth or Bower of Bliss.
The Valley of Forgiveness is lined with condominiums
and chain saws are howling in the Forest of Despair.
Here on the table near the window is a vase of peonies
and next to it black binoculars and a money clip,
exactly the kind of thing we now prefer,
objects that sit quietly on a line in lower case,
themselves and nothing more, a wheelbarrow,
an empty mailbox, a razor blade resting in a glass ashtray.
As for the others, the great ideas on horseback
and the long-haired virtues in embroidered gowns,
it looks as though they have traveled down
that road you see on the final page of storybooks,
the one that winds up a green hillside and disappears
into an unseen valley where everyone must be fast asleep.
”
”
Billy Collins
“
I think we're the only ones in the building," he says.
"Then no one will mind when I do this!" I jump onto the desk and parade back and forth. St. Clair belts out a song, and I shimmy to the sound of his voice. When he finishes,I bow with a grand flourish.
"Quick!" he says.
"What?" I hop off the desk. Is Nate here? Did he see?
But St. Clair runs to the stairwell. He throws open the door and screams. The ehco makes us both jump, and then together we scream again at the top of our lungs. It's exhilarating. St. Clair chases me to the elevator,and we ride it to the rooftop. He hangs back but laughs as I spit off the side, trying to hit a lingerie advertisement. The wind is fierce,and my aim is off,so I race back down two flights of stairs. Our staircase is wide and steady, so he's only a few feet behind me. We reach his floor.
"Well," he says. Our conversation halts for the first time in hours.
I look past him. "Um.Good night."
"See you tomorrow? Late breakfast at the creperie?"
"That'd be nice."
"Unless-" he cuts himself off.
Unless what? He's hesitant, changed his mind. The moment passes. I give him one more questioning look, but he turns away.
"Okay." It's hard to keep the disappointment out of my voice. "See you in the morning." I take the steps down and glance back.He's staring at me. I lift my hand and wave. He's oddly statuesque. I push through the door to my floor,shaking my head. I don't understand why things always go from perfect to weird with us. It's like we're incapable of normal human interaction. Forget about it,Anna.
The stairwell door bursts open.
My heart stops.
St. Clair looks nervous. "It's been a good day. This was the first good day I've had in ages." He walks slowly toward me. "I don't want it to end. I don't want to be alone right now."
"Uh." I can't breathe.
He stops before me,scanning my face. "Would it be okay if I stayed with you? I don't want to make you uncomfortable-"
"No! I mean..." My head swims. I can hardly think straight. "Yes. Yes, of course,it's okay."
St. Clair is still for a moment. And then he nods.
I pull off my necklace and insert my key into the lock. He waits behind me. My hand shakes as I open the door.
”
”
Stephanie Perkins (Anna and the French Kiss (Anna and the French Kiss, #1))
“
Ash has a huge customized Barbie collection. Aside from Horror Movie Barbie (head lopped halfway off, torn and bloody clothes), Commando Barbie (camouflage bandana, pistol-whipping Ken with toy guns stolen from Josh), there is my personal favorite, Fat Barbie (dressed in a muumuu, sporting extra body girth and a double chin, thanks to the discreet placement of Silly Putty), I think Fat Barbie is genius but Nancy flipped out when she saw her. Our mother, whose statuesque blond Minnesouda beauty makes her look like a Barbie, is a size four on her bloated days.
”
”
Rachel Cohn (Shrimp (Cyd Charisse, #2))
“
Grazing over every part of her statuesque figure, I do give in to her every wish. The sounds that escape her enlighten my senses, becoming aware of her metamorphosis as she becomes even more beautiful to me. Nothing more seems to matter as I lie here being gentle with Nadia, forever determined to please her, always changing and never changing, my love always and forever being her greatest adventure, she being all that I need and love now and forever.
”
”
Luccini Shurod (The Painter)
“
Yet only minutes before, on the roof, a cold Havana between his lips, he had been silent, both he and his wife bundled in winter coats and hats as if about to set out on a journey. Dark against the sky. A statuesque couple. For a while the Brandenburg Gate was only a black mass, scanned off and on by police searchlights. But then the torchlight procession arrived, spreading like a stream of lava which, separated for a short time by the pylons, eventually flowed together again, unremitting, unstoppable, solemn, portentous, lighting up the night, lighting up the Gate to the quadriga of stallions, to the goddess's sign of victory. We too on the roof of Liebermann's house were lit by that fatal glow, even as we were hit with the smoke and stench of a hundred thousand and more torches.
”
”
Günter Grass (My Century)
“
On my drive from Salt Lake City to Moab, Utah, I passed an eighteen-wheeler with mud flaps on the rear tires. The flaps were black and featured the silver silhouette of a very statuesque naked woman. I’m sure you’ve seen this artistic expression in your travels.
I wondered: has this ploy ever worked, like some kind of perverted fishing lure?
”
”
Jim Flynn (Be Sincere Even When You Don't Mean It)
“
The purple haze of the wych elms; the blue flash of a kingfisher’s wings; the statuesque rightness of the milch cows in that green place chomping on the rich flood-grass.
”
”
Ronald Frame (Havisham)
“
statuesque,’” my aunt had
”
”
John Irving (A Prayer for Owen Meany)
“
She had nothing in common with the statuesque, irreverent, and athletic woman in front of her. The goddess-like beauty was like a free, spirited, untameable stallion. Intimidating, unapologetic, and stunning, all strength and power. The security men were staring with large eyes. She was sexy, sexual, and they wanted her despite her evident despise and disdain.
”
”
Jamie Le Fay (Disillusion (Ahe'ey, #3))
“
...a tall, statuesque man with slicked-back hair and reptilian eyes set in a gaunt face. His drooping cheeks sat just above his wormy-looking mustache, and pale, spidery fingers poked out of his black robes...
”
”
Nick Oliveri (The Conjurer (Stories of Shadow and Flame, #2))
“
Writing is a compensatory activity, and literature abounds in cases like his. Borges's pages teem with knives, crimes, and scenes of torture, but the cruelty is kept at a distance by his fine sense of irony and by the cool rationalism of his prose, which never falls into sensationalism or the purely emotional. This lends a statuesque quality to the physical horror, giving it the nature of a work of art set in an unreal world.
”
”
Mario Vargas Llosa
“
She should have looked ridiculous, standing there wet and bedraggled in her silly underwear, but she looked magnificent. Like some kind of mythical goddess rising from the mists of time.
Statuesque, utterly feminine. Breathtaking.
”
”
Sarah Mayberry (All They Need (Porter Siblings #1))
“
Something statuesque is approaching her. It radiates a field of dynamic tension that grows more intense the closer it comes, its shadow lengthening upon the floor. Still, she cannot turn around to see the horror behind her, for at this point she cannot move her body, which is stiff-jointed and rigid. Perhaps she can scream, she thinks, and makes an attempt to do so. But this fails, because by then there is already a firm and tepid hand that has covered her mouth from behind. The fingers on her lips feel like thick, naked crayons.
”
”
Thomas Ligotti (Songs of a Dead Dreamer and Grimscribe)
“
Perhaps science is as yet best known by its capacity for depriving man of enjoyment, and making him colder, more statuesque, and more Stoical. But it might also turn out to be the great pain-bringer!—And then, perhaps, its counteracting force would be discovered simultaneously, its immense capacity for making new sidereal worlds of enjoyment beam forth!
”
”
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs)
“
When we arrived at the wedding at Marlboro Man’s grandparents’ house, I gasped. People were absolutely everywhere: scurrying and mingling and sipping champagne and laughing on the lawn. Marlboro Man’s mother was the first person I saw. She was an elegant, statuesque vision in her brown linen dress, and she immediately greeted and welcomed me. “What a pretty suit,” she said as she gave me a warm hug. Score. Success. I felt better about life.
”
”
Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels)
“
[Lena Lees describes from trance her experience of Kuan Yin]:
“I see Kuan Yin. She is like Venus, statuesque and standing in front of a beautiful pink half-shell. Quickly, she walks in front of me, pointing the way. We are entering the mouth of a cave. It’s so interesting. I see stairs carved out of rock in the cave. We walk up the stairs to a door. I know somehow this is just another entrance, a doorway to another time, place. Perhaps at another historical time monks lived there. Now, I’m seeing a huge image, a beautiful statue of Kuan Yin right at the top of the mountain. There are stairs leading up to her and it is as if I’m right on location, standing alongside a group of worshipers. I feel the potency of her energy. In these places, perhaps China or Vietnam, there is a palpable sense of being immersed in and supported by her presence. There is a need by the people to know more, to pick up and accumulate wisdom.
I’m suddenly feeling a need to be in that kind of energy. Suddenly it is Kuan Yin who is speaking: “Some believe I am in servitude to Buddha. However, Buddha doesn’t see it like that. We’re more like brother and sister. I’m showing, Lena, my abode, a place on earth where humans can visit me and be in my potency. Lena is looking at my statue and then at my form. There’s a difference. I come to people in many forms, forms constructed from people’s own perceptions of how I should come to them. And it is individual spiritual needs that create these unique perceptions. In the end, it does not matter what form I take.”
“Kuan Yin wants me to know that I can have the most divine life imaginable,” whispers Lena, still very deep in trance. “She’ll be here until the last soul passes off the earth. She remains in deity form to assist people in transcending their materialistic nature, to help them attain their highest spiritual level.
”
”
Hope Bradford (Oracle of Compassion: The Living Word of Kuan Yin)
“
In every age a general misdirection of what may be called sexual "taste"... [is] produce[d by the devil and his angels]. This they do bu working through the small circle of artists, dressmakers, actresses, and advertisers who determine the fashionable type. The aim is to guide each sex away from those members of the other with whom spiritually helpful, happy, and fertile marriages are most likely. Thus [they] have now for many centuries triumphed over nature to the extent of making certain secondary characteristics of the male (such as the beard) disagreeable to nearly all the females-and there is more in that than you might suppose. As regards the male taste [they] have varied a good deal. At one time [they] have directed it to the statuesque and aristocratic type of beauty, mixing men's vanity with their desires and encouraging the race to breed chiefly from the most arrogant and prodigal women. At another, [they] have selected an exaggeratedly feminine type, faint and languishing, so that folly and cowardice, and all the general falseness and littleness of mind which go with them, shall be at a premium. At present [they] are on the opposite tack. The age of jazz has succeeded the age of the waltz, and [they] now teach men to like women whose bodies are scarcely distinguishable from those of boys. Since this is a kind of beauty even more transitory than most, [they] thus aggravate the female's chronic horror of growing old (with many [successful] results) and render her less willing and less able to bear children. And that is not all. [They] have engineered a great increase in the license which society allows to the representation of the apparent nude (not the real nude) in art, and its exhibition on the stage or the bathing beach. It is all a fake, or course; the figures in the popular art are falsely drawn; the real women in bathing suits or tights are actually pinched in and propped up to make them to appear firmer and more slender and more boyish than nature allows a full-grown woman to be. Yet at the same time, the modern world is taught to believe that it is being "frank" and "healthy" and getting back to nature. As a result [they] are more and more directing the desires of men to something which does not exist-making the role of the eye in sexuality more and more important and at the same time making its demands more and more impossible.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters)
“
At present ye have still the choice: either the least possible pain, in short painlessness and after all, socialists and politicians of all parties could not honourably promise more to their people, or the greatest possible amount of pain, as the price of the growth of a fullness of refined delights and enjoyments rarely tasted hitherto! If ye decide for the former, if ye therefore want to depress and minimise man's capacity for pain, well, ye must also depress and minimise his capacity for enjoyment. In fact, one can further the one as well as the other goal by science! Perhaps science is as yet best known by its capacity for depriving man of enjoyment, and making him colder, more statuesque, and more Stoical. But it might also turn out to be the great pain-bringer! And then, perhaps, its counteracting force would be discovered simultaneously, its immense capacity for making new sidereal worlds of enjoyment beam forth!
”
”
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs)
“
George Washington was in love with one girl after another during his youth, but for some reason he was unsuccessful in all these early courtships. He was probably shy and awkward in the presence of Tidewater belles. He was never to become a fluent conversationalist, had not been educated in England and, comparatively speaking, was a poor young man. In fact he was not a particularly good "catch"--and the Virginia girls let him realize it.
This made him so miserable that he wrote at least two unhappy love poems in a perfect welter of bad grammar and emotional tumult. These poems make him seem far from the statuesque and wooden figure of the Stuart portraits or of the Weems' fables. In fact, they reveal a most human and even pitiable young man. . . .
[A]mong the other girls he courted, there must have been several who in later years wondered why they had been so cool and calculating in refusing the hand of the young man who was soon to become Virginia's greatest hero.
”
”
Sterling North (George Washington: Frontier Colonel)
“
When we arrived at the wedding at Marlboro Man’s grandparents’ house, I gasped. People were absolutely everywhere: scurrying and mingling and sipping champagne and laughing on the lawn. Marlboro Man’s mother was the first person I saw. She was an elegant, statuesque vision in her brown linen dress, and she immediately greeted and welcomed me. “What a pretty suit,” she said as she gave me a warm hug. Score. Success. I felt better about life. After the ceremony, I’d meet Cousin T., Cousin H., Cousin K., Cousin D., and more aunts, uncles, and acquaintances than I ever could have counted. Each family member was more gracious and welcoming than the one before, and it didn’t take long before I felt right at home. This was going well. This was going really, really well.
It was hot, though, and humid, and suddenly my lightweight wool suit didn’t feel so lightweight anymore. I was deep in conversation with a group of ladies--smiling and laughing and making small talk--when a trickle of perspiration made its way slowly down my back. I tried to ignore it, tried to will the tiny stream of perspiration away, but one trickle soon turned into two, and two turned into four. Concerned, I casually excused myself from the conversation and disappeared into the air-conditioned house. I needed to cool off.
I found an upstairs bathroom away from the party, and under normal circumstances I would have taken time to admire its charming vintage pedestal sinks and pink hexagonal tile. But the sweat profusely dripping from all pores of my body was too distracting. Soon, I feared, my jacket would be drenched. Seeing no other option, I unbuttoned my jacket and removed it, hanging it on the hook on the back of the bathroom door as I frantically looked around the bathroom for an absorbent towel. None existed. I found the air vent on the ceiling, and stood on the toilet to allow the air-conditioning to blast cool air on my face.
Come on, Ree, get a grip, I told myself. Something was going on…this was more than simply a reaction to the August humidity. I was having some kind of nervous psycho sweat attack--think Albert Brooks in Broadcast News--and I was being held captive by my perspiration in the upstairs bathroom of Marlboro Man’s grandmother’s house in the middle of his cousin’s wedding reception. I felt the waistband of my skirt stick to my skin. Oh, God…I was in trouble. Desperate, I stripped off my skirt and the stifling control-top panty hose I’d made the mistake of wearing; they peeled off my legs like a soggy banana skin. And there I stood, naked and clammy, my auburn bangs becoming more waterlogged by the minute. So this is it, I thought. This is hell. I was in the throes of a case of diaphoresis the likes of which I’d never known. And it had to be on the night of my grand entrance into Marlboro Man’s family. Of course, it just had to be. I looked in the mirror, shaking my head as anxiety continued to seep from my pores, taking my makeup and perfumed body cream along with it.
Suddenly, I heard the knock at the bathroom door.
“Yes? Just a minute…yes?” I scrambled and grabbed my wet control tops.
“Hey, you…are you all right in there?”
God help me. It was Marlboro Man.
”
”
Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels)
“
a country with a well-educated middle class and a statuesque, catwalk-ready Facebook generation that embraces African and American fashions to create an elegant and athletic style of bling and beauty.
”
”
Thomas J. Brennan (Shooting Ghosts: A U.S. Marine, a Combat Photographer, and Their Journey Back from War)
“
--Birthday Star Atlas--
"Wildest dream, Miss Emily, Then the coldly dawning suspicion— Always at the loss—come day Large black birds overtaking men who sleep in ditches. A whiff of winter in the air. Sovereign blue, Blue that stands for intellectual clarity Over a street deserted except for a far off dog, A police car, a light at the vanishing point For the children to solve on the blackboard today— Blind children at the school you and I know about. Their gray nightgowns creased by the north wind; Their fingernails bitten from time immemorial. We're in a long line outside a dead letter office. We're dustmice under a conjugal bed carved with exotic fishes and monkeys. We're in a slow drifting coalbarge huddled around the television set Which has a wire coat-hanger for an antenna. A quick view (by satellite) of the polar regions Maternally tucked in for the long night. Then some sort of interference—parallel lines Like the ivory-boned needles of your grandmother knitting our fates together. All things ambigious and lovely in their ambiguity, Like the nebulae in my new star atlas— Pale ovals where the ancestral portraits have been taken down. The gods with their goatees and their faint smiles In company of their bombshell spouses, Naked and statuesque as if entering a death camp. They smile, too, stroke the Triton wrapped around the mantle clock When they are not showing the whites of their eyes in theatrical ecstasy. Nostalgias for the theological vaudeville. A false springtime cleverly painted on cardboard For the couple in the last row to sigh over While holding hands which unknown to them Flutter like bird-shaped scissors . . . Emily, the birthday atlas! I kept turning its pages awed And delighted by the size of the unimaginable; The great nowhere, the everlasting nothing— Pure and serene doggedness For the hell of it—and love, Our nightly stroll the color of silence and time.
”
”
Charles Simic (Unending Blues)
“
Then, a pea shoot and foie gras wheel with a small butter knife. Michael Saltz and I stared at it, confounded by how it worked. It stood on its side like an ancient monument, with various crinkly and crackly things at its base.
"Just cut it," the waiter said kindly. He looked like Pascal Lite, not as exotic or statuesque, but with a bit of Pascal's twinkle and good-boy-with-a-lot-of-tattoos edge.
I slid the knife down. At first nothing happened. The foie gras clung to itself, until it peeled apart sleepily and a green, milky liquid bled out.
"Wow," I said.
"Wow," Michael Saltz said.
I took a soft forkful of foie gras and dragged it through the pea shoot sauce and the brown crumbles and white flakes. I rubbed the foie gras against the roof of my mouth, and it stuck there with a sticky stubbornness, then melted away. The taste coursed through my body, a slippery, moody, gutsy smoothness that slithered and pushed and screamed down my throat.
Oh, Pascal, I thought. If I couldn't be with him, this came close. I flashed back to three nights ago and the pleasure cascaded through me once more.
”
”
Jessica Tom (Food Whore)
“
I looked out upon the workers. A tall statuesque buck was among them. He was stripped to the waist, his lean body glistening with sweat." "Who's he?" I asked. "That's Mason, Master. Your pa had bought him just last month from the Tatums." "Have him come with you. Tell him I'll make it worth his while.
”
”
Gideon Rathbone (The Masters of Willowhurst - Part I (Willowhurst, #1.1))
“
Not of you, obviously. Putting up a statue to someone who tried to stop a war is not very, um, statuesque. Of course, if you had butchered five hundred of your own men out of arrogant carelessness, we’d be melting the bronze already.
”
”
Terry Pratchett (Jingo (Discworld, #21))
“
In a somewhat simplified way, this question is determined by spirits much lower in the hierarchy than you and I. Their role is to influence what might be called sexual “preferences” in each era. They achieve this by working through a small circle of influential figures such as popular artists, dressmakers, actresses, and advertisers, who set the prevailing standards of beauty. Their aim is to steer each sex away from individuals of the opposite sex with whom spiritually beneficial, happy, and fertile marriages are most likely. Over many centuries, we have succeeded in making certain secondary male characteristics, like beards, unattractive to nearly all females—and there’s more to that than you might think. As for male preferences, we’ve shifted them quite a bit. At times, we’ve directed them towards a statuesque and aristocratic type of beauty, feeding men’s vanity and desires while encouraging breeding with the most arrogant and extravagant women. At other times, we’ve favored an excessively feminine type, appearing faint and delicate, fostering folly, cowardice, and all the associated pettiness and dishonesty. Currently, we’re taking the opposite approach. The era of jazz has supplanted the waltz, and we now encourage men to find women whose bodies are barely distinguishable from those of boys. Since this type of beauty is even more transient than most, we intensify women’s chronic fear of growing old (with excellent results) and make them less willing and less capable of bearing children. But that’s not all. We’ve orchestrated a significant increase in society’s tolerance for the depiction of apparent nudity (not actual nudity) in art and its display on stage or at the beach. Of course, it’s all an illusion. The figures in popular art are drawn inaccurately, and the real women in bathing suits or tights are squeezed and propped up to make them appear firmer, slimmer, and more boyish than nature allows a fully grown woman to be. Yet, at the same time, the modern world is convinced that it’s being “honest” and “healthy,” returning to nature. As a result, we’re redirecting men’s desires more and more toward something that doesn’t exist, making the role of visual appeal in sexuality increasingly crucial and simultaneously making its demands more and more unattainable. You can easily predict the consequences.
”
”
David Harrison (C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters in Everyday English: An easy to read version of a C.S. Lewis classic.)
Khushwant Singh (Malicious Gossip)
“
Maternity is a totally ungracious thing, beneath the sentimentality heaped upon it. Only once have I seen it made beautiful for an instant, by a chance grouping of a woman's thick white thigh, statuesque in its rigidity, and the new-born child lying in the arch made by her raised knee, with its arm thrown back above its head, and the strangest expression of peace that I have ever seen on the face of a living child. The cord was not yet cut, stretching in an arc between them. For a second I was staggered by such unexpected loveliness as they showed together, and then I bent over them to help her, and the scene changed back instantly to a normal birth, which is generally uglier than death, only so much pleasanter to witness than one rarely realizes it.
”
”
E. Arnot Robertson (Four Frightened People)
“
contemplative as she scans hundreds of amber eyes focused on her. Statuesque as they stand on the red hills surrounding the meadow,
”
”
B.C. Powell (Krymzyn (The Journals of Krymzyn, #1))
“
One of the locals, a woman with a statuesque build and very hard eyes, nodded, her weapon not quite aimed in his direction. That was fair. After all, his rifle wasn’t quite aimed at them.
”
”
Evan Currie (Into the Black (Odyssey One, #1))
“
Holly Berries
A Confederate Christmas Story
by Refugitta
There was, first, behind the clear crystal pane, a mammoth turkey, so fat that it must have submitted to be killed from sheer inability to eat and move, hung all around with sausage balls and embowered in crisp white celery with its feathered tops. Many a belated housekeeper or father of a family, passing by, cast loving glances at the monster bird, and turned away with their hands on depleted purses and arms full of brown paper parcels. Then there were straw baskets of eggs, white and shining with the delightful prospect of translation into future eggnogs; pale yellow butter stamped with ears of corn, bee hives, and statuesque cows with their tails in an attitude. But these were all substantials, and the principal attraction was the opposition window, where great pyramids of golden oranges, scaly brown pineapples, festoons of bananas, boxes of figs and raisins with their covers thrown temptingly aside, foreign sauces and pickles, cheeses, and gilded walnuts were arranged in picturesque regularity, jut, as it seemed, almost within reach of one’s olfactories and mouth, until a closer proximity realized the fact of that thick plate glass between. Inside it was just the same: there were barrels and boxes in a perfect wilderness; curious old foreign packages and chests, savory of rare teas and rarer jellies; cinnamon odors like gales from Araby meeting you at every turn; but yet everything, from the shining mahogany counter under the brilliant gaslight, up to the broad, clean, round face of the jolly grocer Pin, was so neat and orderly and inviting that you felt inclined to believe yourself requested to come in and take off things by the pocketful, without paying a solitary cent.
I acknowledge that it was an unreasonable distribution of favors for Mr. Pin to own, all to himself, this abundance of good things. Now, in my opinion, little children ought to be the shop keepers when there are apples and oranges to be sold, and I know they will all agree with me, for I well remember my earliest ambition was that my papa would turn confectioner, and then I could eat my way right through the store. But our friend John Pin was an appreciative person, and not by any means forgetful of his benefits. All day long and throughout the short afternoon, his domain had been thronged with busy buyers, old and young, and himself and his assistant (a meager-looking young man of about the dimensions of a knitting needle) constantly employed in supplying their demands.
From the Southern Illustrated News.
”
”
Philip van Doren Stern (The Civil War Christmas Album)
“
For generations, the Stafford men had been known throughout the ton for their appearance—the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome. Alex’s father was a mere six feet tall, and was teased relentlessly by his brothers and cousins as “the diminutive duke.” His sons did not suffer the same fate—all standing taller than six feet, four inches, proving that the next crop of Staffords would reclaim their statuesque heritage. The sons in question—William, twenty-three, Nicholas, twenty-one, and Christopher, nineteen—shared other familial qualities with their father, however: They were devilishly handsome, with the dark-as-midnight hair, strong jaws, regal noses, and full lips that had made the Staffords legendary since the early days of the kingdom. But it wasn’t their good looks that stopped women in their tracks. It was the famous Stafford eyes. For as long as anyone could remember, Stafford men had been blessed with eyes the color of clearest emeralds. One could get lost in those eyes—they were windows on emotion, glittering with humor, flashing with anger, fiery with passion. These were eyes that wreaked havoc on the women around them—unless the woman in question was a sister. In which case, they served to simply exasperate.
”
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Sarah MacLean (The Season)
“
Eleanor looked like her mother through a fish tank. Rounder and softer. Slurred. Where her mother was statuesque, Eleanor was heavy. Where her mother was finely drawn, Eleanor was smudged.
”
”
Rainbow Rowell (Eleanor & Park)
“
The best way to describe the Italian ladies was statuesque. They were tall, golden skinned, and absolutely beautiful. As if that wasn’t enough, they were all so good-natured. It was like they carried the sun inside their souls and let it shine out on everything around them.
”
”
Kiera Cass (The Elite (The Selection, #2))
“
NOW AND FOREVER
Grazing over every part of her statuesque figure I do give in to her every wish. The sounds that escape her enlighten my senses, becoming aware of her metamorphosis as she becomes even more beautiful to me. Nothing more seems to matter as I lie here being gentle with her, forever determined to please her, always changing and never changing, my love always and forever being her greatest adventure, she being all that I need and love now and forever.
”
”
Luccini Shurod
“
When assuredness of life is conventional and extremely independent, there will be a symmetric reach of complacent methods that have statuesque power and svelte energy. Shapely, you are related to the versatility of ethereal template, queerness, and sanctified gravity in deceased veriations; you have grasped supernal activities in non-delusion and disbalance. It penetrates grandiose and cheery expressions in your physical and mental imposing texture, and you descry beyond your difficulty. You are not guessing for other imagains, that is, wordly reliance. Goodly, you will have solemn strength, which is comely, impressive, and rarebit penned for your master.
”
”
Viraaj Sisodiya
“
And she was bigger. When a beautiful woman is statuesque her beauty is magnified.
”
”
Mark Helprin (The Oceans and the Stars: A Sea Story, A War Story, A Love Story (A Novel))
“
Don’t bother, I’ll announce myself.” A statuesque blonde swept in like she owned the place. The vein in my temple pulsed harder. “Princess Bridget of Eldorra, here to see Asshole—I mean, Alex Volkov.” Her smile came off both polite and menacing.
I was impressed, if not annoyed.
”
”
Ana Huang (Twisted Love (Twisted, #1))
“
With her spun-gold hair, cerulean eyes, and statuesque body, she was what I imagined Aphrodite would look like had she been a real person. But there was something hard about her expression that made her not attractive at all.
”
”
Ana Huang (Twisted Love (Twisted, #1))
“
The Birnam Oak by Stewart Stafford
Medieval guardian, limpet oak,
Reinforced branches, sunlit soak,
Gnarled limbs in supplicant pose,
A statuesque deity in thorny repose.
Set up tent 'neath a canopy deep,
Where my pilgrim forbears sleep,
Midges swarming campfire's glow,
And drowsy me, to slumber go.
May roots prosper far from sight,
Defying storm, flame, chainsaw's bite,
Give verdant breath to creation's plan.
Until Earth falls from human hand.
© 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
“
If Time Never Flew by Stewart Stafford
If a horologist froze time at dusk,
And there was no day or night,
Or days, months, and years,
What then for Earth’s masters?
Winged time stilled in a bell jar,
A castaway preserved in aspic,
Or stickily-entombed in amber,
Statuesque life an infinite daymare.
Boredom creeping up slowly,
A lockdown without progress,
The horologist would thaw time,
Freeing reality’s ebb and flow.
© Stewart Stafford, 2022. All rights reserved.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
“
Ilf Time Never Flew by Stewart Stafford
If a horologist froze time at dusk,
And there was no day or night,
Or days, months, and years,
What then for Earth’s masters?
Winged time stilled in a bell jar,
A castaway preserved in aspic,
Or stickily-entombed in amber,
Statuesque life an infinite daymare.
Boredom creeping up slowly,
A lockdown without progress,
The horologist would thaw time,
Freeing reality’s ebb and flow.
© Stewart Stafford, 2022. All rights reserved.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
“
He closed his eyes against his pounding headache, but the blackness engulfed him again. A familiar vision materialized—the statuesque, veiled woman with the amulet and silver hair in ringlets. As before, she was on the banks of a bloodred river and surrounded by writhing bodies. She spoke to Langdon, her voice pleading. Seek and ye shall find! Langdon was overcome with the feeling that he had to save her … save them all. The half-buried, upside-down legs were falling limp … one by one. Who are you!? he called out in silence. What do you want?! Her luxuriant silver hair began fluttering in a hot wind. Our time grows short, she whispered, touching her amulet necklace. Then, without warning, she erupted in a blinding pillar of fire, which billowed across the river, engulfing them both. Langdon shouted, his eyes flying open. Dr. Brooks eyed him with concern. “What is it?” “I keep hallucinating!” Langdon exclaimed. “The same scene.” “The silver-haired woman? And all the dead bodies?” Langdon nodded, perspiration beading on his brow. “You’ll be okay,” she assured him, despite sounding shaky herself. “Recurring visions are common with amnesia. The brain function that sorts and catalogs your memories has been temporarily shaken up, and so it throws everything into one picture.” “Not a very nice picture,” he managed. “I know, but until you heal, your memories will be muddled and uncataloged—past, present, and imagination all mixed together. The same thing happens in dreams.
”
”
Dan Brown (Inferno (Robert Langdon, #4))
“
In her dreams Barbara was strong and powerful. She did not see herself as a slim, limpid beauty, but a statuesque valkyrie, who stalked a wild landscape, making things happen and having Experiences. Barbara’s imagination was fecund. She did not read most of her fantasies to the other members of her writing group.
”
”
Storm Constantine (Stalking Tender Prey (The Grigori Trilogy, #1))
“
M-dog!” the dwarf exclaimed as we stepped into line behind a statuesque brunette elf. The stranger turned to give us a disapproving stare at Kalista’s loud exclamation, and I just smiled at her apologetically. “I’m not a rapper,
”
”
Logan Jacobs (Blood Mage 3 (Blood Mage, #3))
“
He had everything packed when she came into the bunker and started taking off her clothes. “Might as well get in one more,” she said as she undid her bra. “I don’t know…” “What if immunity is transmitted sexually? You could be saving my ass.” “It is a nice ass to save.” “Damn right. Get undressed soldier, I promise to be quick.” He wanted to get moving, but given the odds he may not survive, decided he could go one more round with the statuesque soldier he shared the bunker with.
”
”
Damon Hunter (The Smell (The Rot, #1))
“
There are blondes and blondes and it is almost a joke word nowadays. All blondes have their points, except perhaps the metallic ones who are as blond as a Zulu under the bleach and as to disposition as soft as a sidewalk. There is the small cute blonde who cheeps and twitters, and the big statuesque blonde who straight-arms you with an ice-blue glare. There is the blonde who gives you the up-from-under look and smells lovely and shimmers and hangs on your arm and is always very very tired when you take her home. She makes that helpless gesture and has that goddamned headache and you would like to slug her except that you are glad you found out about the headache before you invested too much time and money and hope in her. Because the headache will always be there, a weapon that never wears out and is as deadly as the bravo’s rapier or Lucrezia’s poison vial. There is the soft and willing and alcoholic blonde who doesn’t care what she wears as long as it is mink or where she goes as long as it is the Starlight Roof and there is plenty of dry champagne. There is the small perky blonde who is a little pal and wants to pay her own way and is full of sunshine and common sense and knows judo from the ground up and can toss a truck driver over her shoulder without missing more than one sentence out of the editorial in the Saturday Review. There is the pale, pale blonde with anemia
”
”
Raymond Chandler (The Long Goodbye (Philip Marlowe, #6))
“
Freeze Frame, with Forsynthia
You will bind me
in my aquarelle, my skin
blue as Canterbury bells. Call me
mademoiselle before you execute, like the hand-
tinted photo of the dancer, Margarete Gertrude Zelle, arms
scissoring the air, fending bullets and flowers as she pirouettes.
You will find me
in the zero hour sipping
a whiskey sour with a cherry, my hair
yellow, not sallowed or frizzed like the Bishop's flower.
In a bell-shaped dress trimmed in snow-white florets, I smell
of fever, soil as I pose in the doorcase. You refer to me as daughter
of gnawed bones
I am property of _______.
A profile in the slanted rain. I am
versatile. You call me Lily of the Nile, fingering
umbels as you scour the floor in search of my shadow. Hours
sift and flow and form a canted frame where you lean one elbow
statuesque as a window
sash. You've captured me,
you say, mid-bloom, in your eye
frame, in the process of photograph and pose
and polyphonic prose, the kitchen lit by my ante-
bellum skirt, the yellow spikes of forsythia going up in flame.
Simone Muench, Notebook. Knife. Mentholatum. (New Michigan Press 2003)
”
”
Simone Muench (Notebook. Knife. Mentholatum.)
“
Despite the fact that she was probably nearer forty than thirty, her radiance and beauty outshone that of the prettiest wahine. Statuesque, her golden skin was unblemished, and beneath the colourful cape that hung from her graceful shoulders her body was, in Nicholas’s opinion, perfection personified.
”
”
Lance Morcan (New Zealand)