I was prepared to thoroughly dislike Ian Kelly’s biography of Beau Brummell. The attendant ballyhoo when it was released was lascivious and sensational — Brummell […]
Category: The Diabolical Monocle
But Knot For Me
The decadent dandy has as his guidebook “Against Nature,” the “poisonous” yellow book redolent of incense that Lord Henry gives to Dorian, the catalyst for […]
Subtlety & Dignity
Lounging nude in a bathtub, George Brummell holds a razor to his throat. Will he remove his stubble, or end his life? This stark suicidal […]
Adventures In Beauty
There is no excitement quite like that of unwrapping books you have just gotten in the mail. Pretensions to maturity and sophistication fly out the […]
Chic Sheik
“Dark Lover,” by Emily W. Leider, is an eminently readable, very sympathetic account of the life and work of Rudolph Valentino. The subject comes across […]
Edge Of Reason
Laren Stover’s “Bohemian Manifesto” is not a manifesto at all. It does not hail the wave-like crash of a mighty new movement against the rocky […]
Romp And Circumstance
Despite doing his best work while wearing no clothes, Giacomo Casanova has been anointed a sort of patron saint of dandies. Stephen Robins, in his […]
Brideshead Relinquished
Outrage against cultural debasement becomes a dandy as much as a good pair of white summer flannels, but the film adaptation of “Brideshead Revisited” stirred […]
Astaire Master
The dandy reveals himself by what he wears. His essence is external display. Photographs, therefore, inherently constitute a better medium to communicate the significance of […]
Interminable Ennui
What Never Dies By Barbey D’Aurevilly, translated by Oscar Wilde (as Sebastian Melmoth) In addition to penning the breviary of dandyism, Barbey D’Aurevilly wrote volumes […]