Beauty: Male Beauty

BEAUTY: MALE BEAUTY 3 9

The little priest was not an interesting man to look at, having stubbly brown hair and a round and stolid face. But if he had been as splendid as Apollo no one would have looked at him at that moment,

Endymion Endymion was a beautiful young man in Greek mythology who was loved by the moon goddess Selene. According to one version of his story, Zeus caused him to sleep forever so that he would remain eternally young and handsome.

Ganymede In Greek mythology, Ganymede (or Ganymedes) was a Trojan youth who was so beautiful that he was carried off by an eagle to be Zeus's cup-bearer. He is the archetype of a youth of extraordinary beauty.

Her chair being a far more comfortable one than his she still slept on inside his great-coat, looking warm as a new bun and boyish as Ganymedes.

THOMAS HARDY Jude the Obscure, 1895

Now listen: were it by any chance the case that Oliver's radiant sexuality occasionally put aside the workaday, and were his heliotropic gaze to turn towards Stoke Newington's unlikely Ganymede, then, to enlist a vernacular which my accuser herself will be able to grasp, / wouldn't have any trouble there, mate

JULIAN BARNES Talking It Over, 1991

Heathcliff Heathcliff is the passionate gipsy hero of Emily Bronte's romantic novel Wuthering Heights (1847). He has long dark hair and a rugged, wild attractiveness.

She had grown agreeably used to breakfast with Ken Gracknell, who looked this morning, with his dark hair and smouldering eyes, like a young Heathcliff of the legal aid system.

JOHN MORTIMER Rumpole's Return, 1980

Dominic, as always, had positioned himself slightly back from the family group, his black suit and darkly brooding eyes giving him a touch of Heathcliff.

LAUREN HENDERSON The Black Rubber Dress, 1997

Michelangelo Michelangelo (1475-1564, full name Michelangelo Buonarroti) was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet. A leading figure during the High Renaissance, he established his reputation in Rome with sculptures such as the Pietà (c.1497-1500) and then in Florence with his marble David (1501-4). In his portrayal of the nude, Michelangelo depicted the beauty and strength of the human body. He is probably best known for painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome (1508-12).

I have seldom seen a more splendid young fellow. He was naked to the waist and of a build that one day might be over-corpulent. But now he could stand as a model to Michelangelo!

WILLIAM GOLDiNG Rites of Passage, 1980

At twenty, he had the body of Michelangelo's David, now he resembles an entire family group by Henry Moore.

MINETTE WALTERS The Scold's Bridle, 1994

Narcissus In Greek mythology, Narcissus was a youth of extraordinary beauty

4 0 BETRAYAL

who cruelly spurned many admirers, including the nymph Echo. On bending down to a pool one day to drink, he fell in love with his own reflection. Narcissus is alluded to as an example of excessive physical vanity, and his name has given us the word 'narcissism'.

Betrayal

By far the most frequently used archetype of treachery is JUDAS. Other

figures commonly mentioned in this context are BRUTUS (betrayer of a

friend), DELILAH (betrayer of a lover), and BENEDICT ARNOLD (betrayer of

one's country). Of the allusions covered below, only URIAH is a victim

rather than a perpetrator of treachery.

Benedict Arnold Benedict Arnold ( 1741-1801 ) was an American general in the American Revolution, chiefly remembered as a traitor who in 1780 plotted, with the British army major John André, to betray the American post at West Point to the British. When the plot was discovered, Arnold escaped and later fought on the side of the British.

He had carried Mark O'Meara's clubs in the 1997 matches before switching to the young Spaniard. On an alcoholic high after his country's win, a burly American fan no doubt saw him as a golfing Benedict Arnold.

The Guardian, 1999

I hold the glass for Beth, bending the straw to her lips. 'You were lucky Lyle was there. To explain!

'That Benedict Arnold?' She takes a couple of sips. 'He told them. Betrayed my confidence.'

SUSAN SUSSMAN with SARAJANE AviDON Audition for Murder, 1999

Ascalaphus m Greek mythology, Ascalaphus, the son of Acheron, was an inhabitant of the underworld. After Persephone had been abducted by Hades to be his queen in the underworld, she was granted the opportunity to return to the earth on condition that she had eaten nothing in the underworld. However, she had eaten some pomegranate seeds from a tree, and this fact was revealed by Ascalaphus. Persephone was ordered by Zeus to remain six months with Hades and to spend the rest of the year on the earth with her mother Demeter. Persephone turned Ascalaphus into an owl for his act of betrayal.

BmtUS Marcus Junius Brutus (85-42 BC) was a Roman senator who, with Cassius, was a leader of the conspirators who assassinated Julius Caesar in AD 44. Caesar's dying words as he was stabbed by his friend Brutus are supposed to have been: 'Et tu, Brute?' ('You too, Brutus?'). Brutus subsequently committed suicide after being defeated by Antony and Octavian at Philippi.

I rose to my feet with some of the emotions of a man who has just taken the Cornish Express in the small of the back. She was standing looking at me with her hands on