Beauty

The title of the story identifies Mrs. Morse in terms of her physical appearance and highlights the significance of this issue. The narrator in no place describes her as beautiful. To the contrary, many descriptions of her body, such as her "flabby white arms splattered with pale tan spots," are negative. However, she does meet a certain standard of attractiveness. When she was in her twenties she worked as a model. "It was still the day of the big woman, and she was then prettily colored and erect and high-breasted." This suggests that she once conformed to a certain ideal of feminine beauty, an ideal that changed as she grew older.

Mrs. Morse's physical attractiveness defines her as a type as opposed to an individual. People, especially men, see her and form expectations of her personality based on her appearance, especially her blonde hair. In the first paragraph...