How do power and beauty join forces to determine who is considered ugly? What role does that ugliness play in fomenting hatred? Moshtari Hilal, an Afghan-born author and artist who lives in Germany, has written a touching, intimate, and highly political book. Dense body hair, crooked teeth, and big Hilal uses a broad cultural lens to question norms of appearance—ostensibly her own, but in fact, everyone’s. She writes about beauty salons in Kabul as a backdrop to the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, Darwin’s theory of evolution, Kim Kardashian, and a utopian place in the shadow of her nose. With a profound mix of essay, poetry, her own drawings, and cultural and social history of the body, Hilal explores notions of repulsion and attraction, taking the reader into the most personal of realms to put self-image to thetest. Why are we afraid of ugliness?

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Moshtari Hilal is a visual artist, writer, and curator based in Hamburg and Berlin. Born in Afghanistan, she pursued Islamic studies and political science in Hamburg, Berlin, and London. 

Elisabeth Lauffer is the recipient of the 2014 Gutekunst Translation Prize. After graduating from Wesleyan University, she lived in Berlin and then obtained a master’s in education from Harvard.