Literary Fashion Madness

I was in a Barnes and Noble bookstore with my mother recently and was surprised at the latest trend in "chick lit." With the popularity of The Devil Wears Prada (both the book and the film), it seems that the cool fictional book for women these days involves New York City nightlife, fashion, designer shoes, and other shallow pursuits of so-called high society.

The covers for these books are adorned with stylized cartoon images of women carrying an expensive handbag, wearing a mini-skirt, and having skinny legs the length of the Titanic.

I'm I just completely out of touch? Because I don't relate to these women whatsoever...

Stephanie Brail

Comments

[MT]

Hi Stephanie,

Your post got me thinking a lot about Chick Lit and how I feel about the modern fairy tale that we see in a lot of novels today. I wrote up a post on my thoughts at Girl Trip and thought you might want to take a look, since I quoted you. I enjoyed your post and thank you for the inspiration :)

-MT
www.girltrip.org

[Pat Gundry]

Maybe it's because we don't identify with the environment or characters that they are popular. Maybe it's because it's interesting to observe people who live a way we wouldn't want to, at a safe distance--as in fairy tales.

[Deirdre]

Maybe it's because these films are made and books are written in New York and LA, which is where the people who do look like that and act like that congregate. In New York, there is a high proportion of women who do live this life.

I have to respectfully disagree that a high fashion life is necessarily a shallow life. Many of the types of women portrayed in these films are highly intelligent, highly educated, and highly informed, and they often use these blessings in their careers and communities.

Spending a lot of money on a pair of shoes is not necessarily shallow, either. Would you consider investing in a piece of beautiful art shallow? What about supporting small businesses and skilled craftsmen instead of huge sweatshops in China where the workers are badly treated? These beautiful shoes are like pieces of art, and the money that is spent on them goes to support high quality materials and highly skilled work done by many respected people. The shoes that most of us can afford is spent on shoes made in sweatshops. If I could afford high-quality shoes made by small designers, I would buy them and consider it like buying local and organic food. Buying expensive shoes might just be a political statement.