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My Secret Life: Marian Keyes

My parents were ... lovely people. Very much a product of post-independence Ireland; devout, hard-working, very big on their children getting an education.

The house/flat I grew up in ... was a three-bedroom semi in Cork City, where the Dads went out to work and the Mums stayed home and baked Victoria Sponge.

When I was a child I wanted to be ... happy.

A moment that changed me forever ... was having my first drink, aged 14. I was instantly in thrall.

If I could change one thing about myself ... I'd catastrophise a little less often.

You wouldn't know it but I'm very good at ... disentangling delicate gold chains.

You may not know it but I'm no good at ... small talk. I'd rather dig a ditch than go to a dinner party with people I don't know.

At night I dream of ... being back in my old job in an accounts office. Even 13 years later, it feels like I could step right back into it now and it'd be as if I'd never left.

What I see when I look in the mirror ... A short, nondescript woman with nice hair. I don't hate myself as much now as I used to.

My favourite item of clothing ... is a teal hoodie. I like hoodies. They just make me feel safe.

The shop I can't walk past ... I'm fond of them all but I really love a good chemist – I'm especially interested in new forms of Savlon. I'm the only person I know who actually browses in chemists.

I drive ... regrettably, a Mercedes. I used to have a lime-green Beetle; other drivers were always lovely and would let me out of side-turnings and sometimes even give me a cheery wave. Then my husband got a fancy new car and I inherited his old Merc. Now drivers hate me and I spend disproportionate amounts of my time trying to get out of turnings while other drivers sneer and shout.

My home is ... a terraced Georgian house in Dun Laoghaire, a suburb of Dublin, by the sea. It's an old, stone-walled, north-facing place with all kinds of quirky, peculiar-shaped rooms. And it's exceptionally cold, except that it isn't, because I spend a fortune on warming it. Apart from gas bills, I also seem to spend a phenomenal amount on blueberries.

My favourite work of art ... is a big, vibrant oil painting of a vase of flowers, by an Irish artist called Lucy Doyle and I'm lucky enough to own it.

My favourite building ... is St Basil's in Moscow. Who says Moscow is grey? This is psychedelic!

A book that changed me ... was 'The Beauty Myth' by Naomi Wolf.

Movie heaven ... is anything written by the Coen brothers or starring Audrey Hepburn.

The last album I bought ... I'm tempted to lie and say Robert Plant or Leonard Cohen. Actually it's Christina Aguilera. And it's not even a proper album – it's her greatest hits.

My secret crush ... is Claudia Winkleman.

My real-life villain ... I'm not keen on the leaders of most organised religions, but being a recovering Catholic, I'll choose one and go for the Pope.

My greatest regret ... is admitting to a national newspaper that I bought Christina Aguilera's greatest hits.

My five-year plan ... I find it hard enough to get through the day.

My life in six words ... shame/guilt (hey, I'm Irish), defiance, depression, writing, connection, hope.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/my-secret-life-marian-keyes-author-46-1832701.html

The Beauty Myth is still relevant

Thinking females in their forties will be aware of Naomi Wolf. Back in 1986, when shoulders were padded and lipstick was bright red, she produced a very good book called The Beauty Myth, which identified the many ways in which women were crimping, cutting, dyeing and starving themselves to fit a tyrannical notion of beauty. Feminism was in eclipse, according to Wolf, because women were too busy agonising about their big bums to worry about empowerment. Society, as a whole, was using the myth of Beauty to keep the sisters under control.

Twenty years on, The Beauty Myth is still relevant (if you doubt it, look at the depressing numbers of girls who think happiness lies in new breasts). Wolf, however, seems to have run out of meaningful things to say to anyone who is not a monied, middle-class American liberal. Her latest outpouring is a good example of what happens to someone who believes she has a message for the planet, and hasn’t yet twigged that nobody gives a hoot.

When you or I see a picturesque country house, we might think something along the lines of, “Damn, I can’t afford a place like that; I wish my life were nicer.” When Wolf found a tumbledown cottage in upstate New York, she realised her life as a political pundit and sound-bite artist was shallow and superficial. She needed a retreat, where she could get in touch with blah-blah-blah, away from her high-profile existence in Manhattan, so she bought the cottage. Fair enough — I’d do the same, given a few quid. But I like to think I would have the sense not to write a book about it, unless I was prepared to invite comparison with Marie Antoinette. Wolf’s daughter, Rosa, fancied a Petit Trianon — sorry, treehouse — and Wolf enlisted her father, who is good at carpentry. In doing so, she saw she had lost touch with his wonderful, unworldly brand of wisdom. So she asked him to dig out his teaching notes (he is a teacher of poetry and creative writing), and has boiled down his aperçus into 12 “lessons” for the benefit of Wolf in particular, and mankind in general. Each lesson has a snappy heading — Be Still and Listen, Destroy the Box, Your Only Wage Will be Joy.

Leonard Wolf (not to be confused with the solemn praying mantis who married Virginia Woolf) is pictured with Naomi on the book’s cover. She describes him as “a wild old visionary poet. He believes that the heart’s creative wisdom has a more important message than anything else”. While learning the creative joy of building something with her own hands, Naomi ponders the distance she has travelled since first she drank at Leonard’s fountain. “I had turned my face away from the grace of the imagination,” she declares, in the hollow, portentous tone that prevails throughout.

Leonard believes “no amount of money or recognition can compensate you if you are not doing your life’s passionate, creative work”. This is perfectly true. We all need to stay in touch with our dreams. We all need the nourishment of silent contemplation, simply to look at clouds or listen to the birds. But this is about as far as it goes, and it is incredibly tedious to read. A writer has to be very brilliant and very important to get away with such Fotherington-Thomas waffle. The Wolfs are not geniuses, and their musings are most unlikely to change any lives. Just like those old French peasants, I get a little tetchy when advised to eat cake.

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/non-fiction/article787049.ece

British politician attacks Kate Moss for encouraging anorexia

After Moss publicly declared in an interview that "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels,"Lembit Opik -- a member of the British Parliament -- has lashed out at the topmodel, telling UK paper The Sun this statement was "everything that is wrong with the fashion world."

The model's quote from a recent interview with Women's Wear Daily had been posted as credo on several pro-anorexia sites, causing concern among help organizations such as Beat.

The Sun reported November 20 that Opik was planning on mentioning Moss's statement as part of his parliament address dealing with his Say No To Size Zero campaign, fronted by model Katie Green who got fired from her agency for refusing to loose weight.

"It is madness to have an industry that promotes being dangerously underweight as a positive and eating disorders as a good fashion statement," Opik told the paper.

Kate Moss is widely 'blamed' for starting the 1990s 'waif look,' a grunge-coinciding counterreaction to the healthy-looking supermodels of the era, including Cindy Crawford and Elle Macpherson.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/fashion/news/british-politician-attacks-kate-moss-for-encouraging-anorexia-1825171.html

19 out of 20 young women 'would change bodies'

Girls as young as seven would like to change something about their appearance and half of 16 to 21-year-olds would consider surgery to achieve their perfect body, a study has revealed.

The research, carried out by Girlguiding UK, shows that 95 per cent of 16 to 21-year-olds would change their bodies, with 33 per cent saying they wanted to be thinner and around a quarter of 16 to 21-year-olds said they would consider resorting to cosmetic surgery.

“We all compare ourselves to our peers, whoever they may be and for girls and young women, their peers are usually other young women,” said Dr Kerry O’Brien, a Psychologist at the University of Manchester.

“For them, as with others it is about finding their place in the world and wanting to compare favourably. Unfortunately, considering the approach of the media, that is often not the case.

“Many girls try to measure up to an image which is not a true reflection and can feel that they are coming up short,” he added.

A further 12 per cent of 11 to 16-year-olds would consider having a gastric band or plastic surgery and five per cent would think about Botox to achieve the body image they wanted.

Weight is less of an issue for younger girls, with only five per cent of seven to nine-year-olds wanting to get slimmer. But the figure rose to 12 per cent of 10 to 11-year-olds, and 27 per cent of 11 to 16-year-olds. Among 7 to 11-year-olds, 72 per cent said they would change something about themselves, the most common complaint being their teeth.

Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson, whose party wants to ban airbsrushing pictures, blamed the pressure young girls find themselves under on an “unrealistic idea of what is beautiful means.”

“This report highlights the worrying number of teenage girls who are going on extreme diets or even considering cosmetic surgery because they're unhappy with the way they look,” she said, adding: “Airbrushing means that adverts now contain completely unattainable images that no-one can live up to in real life.

“Girls shouldn't constantly feel the need to measure up to a very narrow range of digitally manipulated images.”

Girguiding UK quizzed 1,109 girls on topics including binge drinking, eating disorders, plastic surgery, sexual health and body image. The study also showed that more than a quarter of girls aged 11 to 16 had drunk so much that they had been sick or lost control.

Chief Guide, Liz Burnley said: “Political debate is constantly grappling for solutions to these issues, under the intense scrutiny of the media spotlight, but the one group whose views are not sought are the young women they affect.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/19-out-of-20-young-women-would-change-bodies-1813551.html