Fashion victims

Years ago, and well into my seventh month of pregnancy in New York City, it occurred to me one day that, as I would be unable to run from a fast predator, I was lucky not to run into an urban panther. These weekly blogs will consider women's lives from the perspective of one who is now older.

Some years ago, I saw an exhibit on the corset. It was fascinating and awful. An early style was a wooden board, six inches wide and rounded at the top, worn from under the breasts to the pubic bone by women and girls, quite young. Styles progressed to stays and whalebone (a genuine breakthrough in comfort), curves became wildly emphasized, bodies became deformed. It remained the style for women for hundreds of years. 

Upstairs in the same museum, I came upon a painting done in 1890 by Julius Leblanc Stewart, On the Yacht “Namaouna.” There are five figures in the foreground, two men and three women, and the women all seem to be posed seductively. One is standing and holding onto a brass rail behind her; two are sitting in chairs, both are leaning into the back -- one has her arms raised to hold the top of the chair, the other is tilted to one side coquettishly.

At first glance, the postures seem very come-hitherish. But with my mind still filled with the garments that squeezed lungs and squashed intestines, I saw these women’s postures for what they were: attempts to somehow escape their confinement, to find some comfortable position. They had hour-glass figures and tiny waists; they were pale and languid; they could not breathe.

With their restrictive undergarments and draped with long skirts and tight bodices, one assumes a woman so dressed could not run or even raise an arm, and certainly needed help getting out of her outfit. Her clothing impeded her, provided no defenses (except perhaps for a well-aimed hatpin), and actually rendered her close to helpless. But if a woman wanted success and marriage, she had no choice but to corset herself.

The ideal size of a bound foot in China was three inches. It, too, became essential for attractiveness and marriageability. Started on girls by the age of five, binding broke the toes, deformed the foot, hampered movement for life. Infections were common, flesh became necrotic. Foot-binding in China lasted for one thousand years.

Are we insane?