Book of Indian Beauty. Mulk Raj Anand
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PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION |
THIS BOOK has been a joy to write, for the hours which we have sat through eliciting information from our friends about the potions and perfumes and necklaces and stones which decked them from the tips of their heads to their painted feet are fresh in our minds. We recall the jokes and the pleasantries which greeted our first inquiries about the formulas of beauty, and the amazement which lit up the atmosphere when we pressed for details of closely guarded secrets.
If, then, this book gives the reader any of the joy we have had in writing it, our gratitude must go to the various Indian women who have helped in its making. For, without the great pains they took to be helpful by collecting recipes and dictating them to us, this book could never have been composed, as in our country the knowledge of sringar, the laws of health, and the rules of personal hygiene, have been handed down verbally from generation to generation and have been adopted as customs and conventions, and very seldom written about since our ancient culture fell into decay. We feel that the appreciation of the well-being of the body is integral to any conception of civilization. True that sometimes the emphasis on mere adornment and delectable food has been the sign of the decadence of a society, but this has only happened when a society has become obsessed with fine living for its own sake. We, therefore, offer no apologies for bringing philosophy from the study to the woman's boudoir, as to the kitchen in Mulk Raj Anand's Indian cookery book, for the concept of beauty and the good life is essential to the very idea of human dignity.
We are indebted to Lt. Col, Hem Raj Anand, I.M.S., and Mr. Homi Cooper for advice on the Latin names of various Indian medicinal plants, and to the various art collectors who have allowed us to reproduce plates in their possession.
Most of the prescriptions in this book can be dispensed at any chemist or herbalist. It may be advisable, in the case of the ancient Indian recipes, to consult a qualified doctor or chemist before making up a prescription.
MULK RAJ ANAND
KRISHNA NEHRU HUTHEESING
Bombay
December 1946
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PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION |
THE FIRST edition of this book, entitled The Bride's Book of Beauty, was issued by Messrs. Kutub Publishers in 1947. The edition rapidly sold out, and the original publishing house lapsed soon after, becoming Kutub Popular Ltd. But quite a few people all over the world have been asking for this essay in practical aesthetics which I had published, inspired by the enthusiasm of the late Krishna Nehru Hutheesing.
The revised version is going to press more or less in the original form of the book. Only the discursive preliminary essay "The Bride" has been re-edited by me and the more didactic material omitted. Also, the main illustrations have been changed for similar paintings from the National Museum of India, New Delhi, grateful acknowledgment to which is hereby made for the courtesy of permission to reproduce the plates. For granting permission to reproduce Figure 22, my gratitude goes to Marg Publications of Bombay.
I wish to thank Pandit Shiv Sharma, the famous Ayurvedic physician, for checking the names of medicinal plants. I owe much to Suruchi Chand for the preparation of the manuscript; to Dolly Sahiar, Lance Dane, and Amrik Singh for photography and collection of illustrations; to Kewal Anand for proof corrections. To the various women in the villages and small towns all over India, I extend my gratitude for their invaluable help.
The verse quotations were mostly culled from published and unpublished popular literature. The recipes, taken from all kinds of sources, are sometimes hundreds of years old. Some may be inconsistent with current medical practice. Therefore, readers are requested to check with a good pharmacist or doctor before using them.
—MULK RAJ ANAND
Khandala
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DEDICATORY LETTER to the late Krishna Nehru Hutheesing |
THE MEMORIES of your charm and grace and intelligence come to me as I send this little decorative aside of ours to the press for a new edition. I recall how you brushed away my fears that the neo-Brahmins would laugh at this extravaganza. Apart from some of the formulas you and other women friends gave me from your cupboard, I had collected most of the beauty-aid prescriptions from the old Hindu and Buddhist texts, the authors of which, while prohibiting the use of oils and creams and potions, delighted in listing them in footnotes.
You had just then announced that you were giving up wearing the thick homespuns of the days when you used to go to jail in the freedom movement, and were going to put on saris of finer homespun silks and encourage your friends to do the same. I then gave you the manuscript to edit and to add to wherever you felt necessary and append your signature, in order to save me from the objections of our womenfolk to my knowledge of their secret lives. You agreed because, I think, you were one of the few Indian women who were beginning to react against the prejudices of the Aryan male against women. You had recognized Desire, linked it to memories of innocent expression in women; you possessed the desire for Desire, the conscious ness of yourself as a woman beyond slavery to man's wishes; and you sanctioned my confirmation of the "metonymy of desire," the autonomy of woman, the equal of man, but different. To the love of the ever-expanding freedom that you expressed · in your life and writings, I dedicate this book.
—MULK RAJ ANAND
Good looks, good qualities, youth, and grace are the chief and most natural means of making a person agreeable in the eyes of others. But in the absence of these a man or a woman should have resort to artificial means, to art.
—VATSYAYANA
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1. THE BRIDE |
Thy well-combed hair, thy splendid eyes with their arches curved almost to thine ear, thy rows of teeth entirely pure and regular, thy breasts adorned with beautiful flowers. . . .
Thy body anointed with saffron and thy waist belt that puts the swans to shame.
Moon-faced, elephant-hipped,