Two beautiful and significant quotes from the book ‘Memoirs of a Geisha’, by Arthur Golden:
“Remember, Chiyo, geisha are not courtesans. And we are not wives. We sell our skills, not our bodies. We create another secret world, a place onlyof beauty. The very word “geisha” means artist and to be a geisha is to be judged as a moving work of art.”
“If you aren’t the woman I think you are, then this isn’t the world I thought it was.”
The book as well as the function of the geisha, and definitely when portrayed in this story, is very much about the Muse. The desire to be bemused by a vision, a feminine creature and all the riches she – and only she – has to offer.
I often speak of yin and yang, masculine and feminine and how they interact with each other in a dance of push and pull. The geisha symbolizes the yin and the desire for an oasis of beauty and thus, yin, in this yang world.
Such Splendor.
Les Arts Féminins 