“ when a face has grown familiar it comes to possess a certain beauty that is taken for granted. ”
Honoré de Balzac, Lost Illusions (1843). copy citation
| Author | Honoré de Balzac |
|---|---|
| Source | Lost Illusions |
| Topic | beauty face |
| Date | 1843 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Ellen Marriage |
| Weblink | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/13159/pg13159.html |
Context
“That way of arranging her hair, so bewitching in Angouleme, looked frightfully ugly here among the daintily devised coiffures which he saw in every direction.
"Will she always look like that?" said he to himself, ignorant that the morning had been spent in preparing a transformation.
In the provinces comparison and choice are out of the question; when a face has grown familiar it comes to possess a certain beauty that is taken for granted. But transport the pretty woman of the provinces to Paris, and no one takes the slightest notice of her; her prettiness is of the comparative degree illustrated by the saying that among the blind the one-eyed are kings.”
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