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‘Such gaudy tulips raised from dung’: Cosmetics, Disease and Morality in Jonathan Swift's Dressing‐Room Poetry
Author(s) -
Aske Katherine
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal for eighteenth‐century studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.129
H-Index - 11
eISSN - 1754-0208
pISSN - 1754-0194
DOI - 10.1111/1754-0208.12509
Subject(s) - swift , beauty , cosmetics , morality , poetry , art , aesthetics , art history , literature , law , medicine , political science , pathology , computer science , programming language
Abstract While enabling women to embody fashionable trends and the idealised beauty of the period, cosmetics also offered a disguise, not only for ugly and ageing faces but for disease also. Taking examples from advertisements, cosmetic commentaries and Jonathan Swift's dressing‐room poetry, this article demonstrates that, in the eighteenth century, cosmetics, fashion and disease are intimately linked to beauty and issues of morality by cultural factors.