Read the text, answer the questions after it

You’re gorgeous!

For many in the 2010s superstar Angelina Jolie is the perfect dream girl: slim, tanned (загорелая) and natural-looking (естественно-выглядящая), with long, shiny hair. She could be described (может быть описана) as “The Face of the Decade”.

But people have not always had the same (одинаковые) ideas about beauty. Until 1920s, suntans (загар) were for poor people, “ladies” stayed outof (избегали) the sun to keep their faces as pale as possible. In the times of the Queen Elizabeth I of England, fashionable ladies even painted their faces with poisonous lead!

And people in the eighteenth century would not have thought (не могли бы и подумать) of Angelina Jolie’s hair! Ladies those days never went out without their wigs, which were so enormous (and dirty) that it was quite common (довольно обычным) to find mice living in them. As for the “perfect beauties” painted by Rubens in the seventeenth century, if they wanted to be supermodels today, they would need to spend months on a diet!

Ideas of beauty can be very different according to (согласно) where you live in the world, too. For the Paduang tribe in the South East Asia, traditionally, the most important sign of female beauty was a long neck. So at the age of five or six, girls received (получали) their first neck ring, and each year they added (добавляли) new rings. By the time (к тому времени когда) they were old enough to (достаточно взрослые для того чтобы) marry; their necks were about twenty-five centimeters long!

And what about (а что насчет) the ideal man? If you name an attractive man today, it will be someone like Brad Pitt or Dmitry Dyuzhev: someone tall and athletic, brave and “manly”.

In the eighteenth century however (однако), “manliness” was very different from what it is today. As well as wearing wigs, perfume and lots of make up, a true gentleman showed that he had feelings by crying frequently in public. According to one story, when the British Prime Minister, Lord Spenser Percival, came to give King George IV some bad news, both men sat down and cried!

And even now, James Bond might not find it so easy (могут найти не простым) to attract women if he visited the Dinka tribe of Sudan. They have always believed (они всегда верили) in the saying that “big is beautiful”. Traditionally, each year, men compete to win the title of “the fattest man”. The winner is sure to find (обязательно найдет) a wife quickly: for a Dinka woman, if the man is fat, it is also a sign that he is rich and powerful!

8. Which of the statements are true? Explain your answers

1. Pale skin was more popular than tanned skin until the twentieth century.

2. Elizabethan make-up was not very safe.

3. In the eighteen century most fashionable ladies liked mice.

4. Ladies in Rubens’ times probably never went on diets.

5. If Paduang women didn’t have a long neck, they couldn’t get married.

6. People in the eighteenth century thought that it was OK for men to cry.

7. Dinka women from Sudan think that thin men are very ugly.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14