My first Venus was the Frankie Avalon 1958ish rendition. There was this American Bandstand thing (Dick Clark) and most every city has its own version - usually on late Saturday afternoons. My brother and I went with female friends who could dance - it wasn't a date, I was 11 or so and Francis Walters who sat in front of me in class and with whom I danced during our noontime dance times (we actually did that!). We didn't win but we got an honorable mention and a free record - the winnings were Venus sung by Frankie...
Sometime later I had to write a doctoral paper in my elective minor (art history) and my "drawn from out of a hat" subject was the Botticelli "Birth of Venus". I thought the picture looked like Salvidor Dali and wrote a paper that I delivered to the graduate seminars saying just that. NO NO NO Mr. House.(you nitwit). Stop. Rethink. Come back in a week.
I came back in a week and gave my paper on the Frankie Avalon "Venus" - imploring the gods to give him a girl that he could thrill - as opposed to having this luscious beauty just hatched from a scallop shell (obviously a pearl reference) and therefore (I'm not saying how) a goddess not attainable by mere men. A++++++ like Ralphie in "A Christmas Story".
Sometime later I had to write a doctoral paper in my elective minor (art history) and my "drawn from out of a hat" subject was the Botticelli "Birth of Venus". I thought the picture looked like Salvidor Dali and wrote a paper that I delivered to the graduate seminars saying just that. NO NO NO Mr. House.(you nitwit). Stop. Rethink. Come back in a week.
I came back in a week and gave my paper on the Frankie Avalon "Venus" - imploring the gods to give him a girl that he could thrill - as opposed to having this luscious beauty just hatched from a scallop shell (obviously a pearl reference) and therefore (I'm not saying how) a goddess not attainable by mere men. A++++++ like Ralphie in "A Christmas Story".
My reaction was not "funny, interesting or cool." It was an appreciation of your post and of the different forms of art and and beauty therein.
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