"'To see her in sunlight was to see Marxism die,' Harold Brodkey wrote in a short story, 'Innocence,' about the supernally beautiful Radcliffe girl whom the young narrator is determined to lead down the garden path of sexual awakening. I've always thought this sentence summed up everything there is to be said about the innately undemocratic and capricious reality of those who are born with great looks. It explains the whole unjust gift-of-the-gods quality of beauty (which continues to pertain even in these cosmetically altered times), the sudden swoop of good fortune that lands on those who happen to be so graced."
Daphne Merkin in a 2005 New York Times article explores the mysteries of the jolie laide. (Hat tip to Kevin.)
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