Jane Doe

I recently learned of a famous death mask that still has importance today. L’Inconnue de la Seine, “The unknown woman of the Seine,” is the death mask of a young woman, estimated at around 16 years of age, whose body was pulled from the Seine river along the Quai du Louvre in the late 1880s. There were no signs of violence, and the final cause of death was attributed to suicide by drowning.  Her beauty so inspired the pathologist doing her autopsy that he made a death mask. Her body was put on public display in the morgue, in hopes that someone could identify her, but no one stepped forward with a name.

The death mask was widely reproduced and many famous artists, including Camus, were known to have reproductions of her face in their homes and studios, her ethereal beauty serving as a muse to inspire them. Many compared her mysterious smile with that of the Mona Lisa, residing within the Louvre that abuts the site of her death, and it is said that for a generation after her death young German girls tried to emulate her look until she was finally surpassed by Greta Garbo as the paragon of beauty.

Many writers in various countries have attempted stories or poems where she is the principal character, or is referred to in some way. The first attempt was by Richard Le Gallienne’s 1900 novella, The Worshipper of the Image, which involves an English poet who becomes obsessed with the mask, resulting in his daughter’s death and his wife’s suicide. The most recent reference was by Caitlin R. Kiernan in her 2012 novel, The Drowning Girl. A ballet was choreographed about her in 1963 and it did so well that it was featured in the American Ballet Theater in 1965.

All artists have struggled to fully describe her wisp of pathos, mixed with a quiet joy. I believe her expression is the epitome of the word, “ineffable.”

One American case has had a similar visual impact, that of the suicide of Evelyn McHale in 1947. Miss McHale took her life by leaping from the observation deck of the Empire State Building on May the first, and a photograph was taken four minutes afterwards by photography student Robert Wiles (you can see a reproduction of the photograph on this Wikipedia page). The figure of the woman has been described as resting, or napping, rather than dead, and appears to be daydreaming of her fiancé whom she was engaged to marry the following month.

Per McHale’s wishes in the suicide note she left at the platform, her body was cremated and no service was held for her. Her fiancé lived to a ripe old age, and never married.

In 1958 two Americans, Surgeon Peter Safar and rubber-toy maker Asmand Laerdal, were collaborating on the creation of a training mannequin for teaching Cardio Pulmonary Resucitation, and Laerdal chose the death mask of L’ Inconnue as the model for the face of the doll, saying that its expression would so affect the student that they would have an innate impulse to rescue her. Thus was born the mannequin we know today as Recusi Anne, and her image has become the most-kissed face in history.