Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls - Excerpt

VENUS

In the life of every girl I know, at one time or another, in school, in a museum, she's shown a replica of the Venus de Milo. For some girls, Venus is a translucent projection, for some a plaster doll. The girl stands near the statue with her best friend, and somebody is explaining how Venus is so beautiful, and how, to this very day, she's the most beautiful woman in myth and history combined, that she is beauty and love. Then the grown-ups wander away and the girls look together. The girl's friend has a long blond braid like Rapunzel, and the girl loves her friend's braid. Sometimes she imagines climbing the braid up a stone wall to her friend, and sometimes she imagines her friend chopping off the braid, securing it to the iron leg of the potbellied stove in her tower, and climbing down to her.

The replica of Venus glows before them. They're a little bored, and the girl's friend is wrapping her braid around her neck. It's hard to see if Venus has nipples.

"Someone's knocked off her arms," the girl says to her friend.

"I could do that," says Rapunzel.