A cheeky reference to heroines of Victorian operas and novels, who frequently became ill -- but not so ill they can't remain both romantically tragic and, above all, beautiful. Usually they have tuberculosis (TB), which allows for dramatic coughing up of blood, tender goodbyes with devastated lovers, and a ROBUST aria right before she perishes. Somehow the fact that she's dying of an airborne disease never deters anyone from seeking out her intimate company. She's got this charming pink glow to her fevered cheeks that no gentleman can resist...
Authors of these stories love to wax rhapsodic about the heroine's "milky" or "alabaster" skin, and the sicker she gets the more exquisitely white she becomes! While modern readers may wonder why anyone would want to make love to a woman the same color as chalk, bleach, or the cliffs of Dover, the Victorians were very turned on by these connotations of racial purity. Nowadays such descriptions are considered
purple prose, and if not outright racist then certainly in very poor taste.
The phrase "pale and
interesting" is an oxymoron that mocks both the silliness and melodrama of this trope. You may feel
sick as a dog, but hey, some uptight people with weird hang-ups around sex find that
attractive! Lucky you!
See TVTropes.com's "Victorian Novel Disease" for a detailed
description of the source material.
"I'm still nauseas, I'm just going to lie on this couch looking pale and
interesting and hope hot person comes to talk to me."
"You definitely have a fever, but
on the bright side you're looking very pale and
interesting draped across that bed."
"This isn't a swoon, my arms and legs feel like wet noodles."
"Sexy."
