True Beauty -vs- Photoshopped Perfection

myShakespeare is a project of World Shakespeare Project.org.   It's a space for people to post how Shakespeare's work affects their personal lives today.   This week, a beautiful post by Tom Harrison was featured.   Here's an excerpt from the link which features a short essay and his beautiful recorded musical version of Shakespeare's Sonnet 130.  Take a few minutes to read and listen!

 

 Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130 is as relevant today as it ever was. In 2012, in a world of high-definition and glossy magazines with Photoshopped models telling us what we should be attracted to and striving for, I think it’s important to remember to look for inner beauty first and foremost.--Tom Harrison


SONNET 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
   And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
   As any she belied with false compare.

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