SOURCE: Theodoulou, Maxine S. Review of The Beauty Myth, by Naomi Wolf. ETC: A Review of General Semantics 49, no. 2 (summer 1992): 251–52.

In the following review, Theodoulou concludes that The Beauty Myth is undermined by Wolf's narrow thesis and “pedestrian style,” but that the work offers useful insight.

Women's preoccupation with beauty [in The Beauty Myth] fuels a billion-dollar industry. The “standards” of beauty constantly change, leaving women with closets of outdated clothes and, in the worst case, outdated bodies. To meet the current standards of feminine beauty women diet, exercise, and undertake dangerous and costly surgical procedures. Those who deviate from the latest “norm” meet up with both overt and covert discrimination.

Naomi Wolf contends that the myth of female beauty has replaced religion and that it mimics a medieval torture instrument dubbed “The Iron Maiden.” Whether they meet the current standards or not, Wolf theorizes that the “beauty...