What if how one looks, and the purposeful alteration of one’s appearance in order to be seen as “beautiful,” was not a personal desire but an economic necessity? The question is perhaps more relevant than not in an age where everyone from romantic partners to employers expect to see what you look like before they decide whether or not they want to meet you. For the women at the center of Frances Cha‘s novel, If I Had Your Face, the question is part of the much larger issue of how to capitalize on one’s body and make up for the ways in which society views one’s body as failing to meet expectations.
Shortly after graduating college, while working at a high end restaurant and lounge known for it edgy-chic tone, I become very aware of the fact that everyone who worked at the front of the house, from the servers to the barbacks, were attractive in a deliciously-edgy, hipster way (think off-duty musician with knuckle tattoos, flawless afros, and the types of bodies that make aprons look sexy) that made the preppy, downtown patrons spend more (and drink more) in order to feel at ease. I, young, insecure, and still uncomfortable with the label of “grown-up,” felt horribly out of place and spent much of my time there seating guests and studying the clothes and mannerisms of my more mature co-workers. I preferred to arrive early for my shift, when the restaurant was still closed and the staff would be seated at a high top by the bar, running through huge stacks of flash cards and binders filled with detailed ingredients lists, rushing to memorize the night’s specials and rotating cocktail list. During when of these quiet moments, a bartender who had recently moved to the city in order to study law, told me about working at the clubs in Miami. She only worked once a week, usually going home with well over a thousand dollars in tips. Despite the cut in pay, she said she preferred working at our “little” restaurant because it “hadn’t asked for my measurements and head shots” when she applied. Seeing the look on my face, she had laughed. That was normal, she explained, the clubs in Miami wouldn’t even consider your application if you weren’t a certain size or “look.”
That evening, as I walked about the floor seating guests and counting place settings, I kept thinking about what the bartender had said about there versus here. And I couldn’t help but look around me and wonder if it really was all that different here versus there? Perhaps it wasn’t as direct, but as I studied my co-workers, their carefully crafted smiles, their sculpted cheekbones, their neat-yet-messy man buns, I couldn’t help but think that one of the primary reasons they were hired was the desire they created in others. Whether it was a desire to be with them or be them, their physical attractiveness couldn’t be denied. And if that’s the case, then isn’t their body another form of inherited currency alongside trust funds and surnames? Except that now, this supposed inheritance can be faked; or rather it can be remade via a strange repositioning in which the unnatural becomes the “real.” What does this new, unnatural “realness” mean for the valuation of bodies in a globalized society that continues to determine human worth according to flawed hierarchies and not equitable meritocracies?
Although the question of plastic surgery is critically examined in Frances Cha’s If I Had Your Face, it’s not the central focus. At first, it may appear to be the central focus due to the intensity of its presence in the reader’s mind in relation to how relevant and common a topic it has come in the real world. Plastic surgery is fascinating, to put it simply, a relatively new and seemingly easy way of altering who we are by radically altering what we look like. Whether it’s perceived as grotesque, necessary, or beautiful it has become ubiquitous in some societies such as South Korea, where the book takes place and where it’s estimated that about 1 out of every 3 people has at least one surgery before they reach the age of 30. So the pressure to “improve” one’s outward appearance, through impermanent and permanent means, is real for the women in Cha’s novel. However it is only one way in which they are navigating the economic and gender biases which weighs them down. There is more happening below the surface of these constant changes to hair, nails, and jaws. Like seeing past the smile pasted on the face of a pretty server, Cha maps the expectations and limits of the women’s publicly displayed bodies as well as the secrets and pain of their intimate, inner selves.
It’s the body as a whole that is being looked at this book. The questions being asked are about the role of one’s body and how it determines the course of one’s life. By the whole body, I mean all of the labels and process afixed to body: gender and gender roles, skills and talents, physical and mental abilities, and, of course, appearance. If one’s body is female and not male, as all of the central characters in the story are, then one has a heavier burden to bear in a society that still privileges men over women. If one’s body has been hurt and been disabled in some way, then what happens to one? If one is able to do something, like create art that appeals to the mainstream buyer, then how does this skill play into the opportunities one gains access to? Each of the characters’ bodies become emblematic of the realities one most contend with in a nation that faces aggressive economic and gender disparity.
Reading this story feels like cutting through flesh and muscle in order to reach the organs that thrum inside of the characters
So what about the body? For each one of the characters, the body is shown to be a functioning vessel and one whose outward impression often has nothing to do with the person living within it. For example, Ara must deal with a body that has lost one of the functions deemed necessary by society; after being beaten with a bat by a classmate as a teenager, she has lost the ability to speak. Suddenly, she faces a world that depends on phones, idolizes k-pop singers and actresses with melodious voices, and sees a bodily “failure” such as hers as sign of low intelligence. Perhaps worst of all, it’s seen as a reason to pity and avoid her. Over time, Ara has become withdrawn and relies on her bestfriend to act as her protector, both socially but also emotionally, translating her moods and speaking for her in the world outside their shared apartment. At the same time, Ara works as a hairstylist, a livelihood which rests on her ability to transform the body of the women who sit in her chair with dyes, chemicals, heat, and shears. She relies on women’s belief that “perfecting” their body will improve their lives, to financially sustain her own life. Her muteness becomes a tool; clients enjoy her silent acquiesce to their needs and the pity of the salon owner protects her when she makes mistakes. At one point, when mistaken for a call girl, Ara’s muteness is seen by the men paying for female attention as attractive. I can’t help but wonder if this is because of what they imagine she offers: a female body that is empty of any voice but their own?
The story offers the same layered observations of the lives of five women who reside in the same apartment building in Seoul. It’s narrated by four of the women, the chapters rotating between like water slowly circling down a drain. Each piece of the story brings the reader a little closer to the truth of who these women are and what they hope for from life. It is their story, from start to finish. It is clearly a woman’s world being painted by Cha, not in the sense that the society they live in belongs equally to the women living in it, but in the perspectives that we, the reader, are directed to gaze through. That doesn’t mean the way in which the characters are shown to interact with each other reveals a feminine interior based solely on mutual affection or respect. This would be unrealistic and harmful in it’s delusional take on the state of being female and on female friendships. Instead, the daily decisions the women face and the relationships they choose to pursue reveal the toll an economically stratified, sexist, and image obsessed society takes on them. The book slowly peels back layer after layer of their seemingly inconsequential speech and behavior in order to reveal the pain they are in, the dreams they hold close, and why they care for each other despite all their differences.
Reading this story feels like cutting through flesh and muscle in order to reach the organs that thrum inside of the characters. These organs cannot be altered with injections or stitches, so they’re able to hold the unaltered truth of the women’s lives, to keep the truth of who they are safe until society is willing to create space for the “real” them. Whatever the real them looks like.
Teresa Diviacchi 