I was browsing through Style.com’s Beauty Icon section. They have the elegant Carolina Herrera, the big-eyed-and-skinny model Gemma Ward and even Prince William’s beau Kate Middleton. They are all mind-blowingly pretty and charming I must say. But I also saw Marilyn Monroe, a tiny black and white picture wedged among the rest.
We are all familiar with Monroe. Like Coca-cola and Levi’s, she is one famous American symbol. There were hundreds of books and documents made about her, she is on postcards, tattoos and Warhol’s silkscreens. Known as the “sexy blonde bombshell”,indeed, this movie star, who graced the cover of the first Playboy magazine, oozes sex appeal. But I think she is more than full lips and cleavages. She died at the age of 36 and appeared in only a handful of movies. What made this woman so iconic?
She is to me, impressively gorgeous. The glassy blonde curls and Technicoloured smiles. People during her time viewed her as a sex symbol and saw her almost only in the seductive light. Only years later, did people start seeing her as art. I was thoroughly mesmorized looking through her pictures (everytime). I think every Monroe moment is a classic. She might be smiling, laughing, giving her famous eyes-half-shut look or simply walking down a street, she is art, alive and kicking (once). Monroe is sexy because she is effortlessly so. She shines because she is confident and ever so comfortable with being herself. “I’m very definitely a woman and I enjoy it,” she says.
There are so many confident and beautiful women out there, why the buzz about Monroe? And for so many years? What we celebrate about Monroe, is not just about her being a celebrity, but her being an icon for women. Sure, many out there can strut the high heels better than her, and may be not have cellulite peaking out from under the bathing suit, but Monroe embraced her identity as a woman and her life.
Monroe led a life full of imprefections behind the limelight. She was orphaned since young and went from foster homes to foster homes. She got married at a 16 because no relative could accommodate her. She then experienced three rocky marriages throughout her life. Although Hollywood brought her fame and stardom, it hardly made her happy. She described Hollywood as “a place where they’ll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul”. But Monroe still gave her hundred and one percent to the camera. She never failed us, in fact. She draped orange chiffon over her body, wore long leopard-print scarves as skirts. She was daringly beautiful. Her confidence and faith made being a woman an ever so wonderful thing.
People were all so blinded by her physical charm, they did not see into her any further. Monroe was a wise woman, as opposed to the “dumb blonde” that she so skillfully portrayed. She had so much to say about women, about life, but people were too busy photographing her to hear her out. One of her husbands once said “She was a poet on a street corner trying to recite to a crowd pulling at her clothes”. People trampled on her inner beauty to get a piece of her.
Monroe is beautiful because she is everything that people thought she was not. She is like a well-stored bottle of wine. When we roll the wine over our tongues, we were pleasantly surprised to find new bursts of flavour and fragrance. Everytime we look, we find out more about her, with each discover making her even more worthy of “beauty icon” title. And when not every Playboy covergirl (none, actually) turns into a beauty icon, we know the Monroe has gone way higher by being the woman of women.
