Dandysme

Nigel Rodgers’ new book on dandyism “The Dandy – Peacock or Enigma?” traces the history of dandyism up to today. The information given in the first part of the book offers nothing new to the adepts of dandyism – it has been covered in a variety of studies on the topic. What marks Rodgers’ title is his look at modern and contemporary dandyism which often goes unnoticed by scholars though it pulsates online and in fashion. We have heard of the Sapeurs recently and the dandyism of the 1920s has been mentioned here and there, but comprehensive studies are missing. Most of the writing on modern dandyism focuses on fashion, but a look at the practiced ideology of dandyism, as cultured by the London Chaps for example, is only now laid before us.

Rodgers starts off by loosely defining the dandy as sardonic [certainly not an essential dandy feature, but rather characteristic to some of the dandy variations, e.g. the Byronic dandy, or the devil dandy], aloof and independent. Fashion forms a central part in Rodgers view on dandyism, as well (and justly so), but it is sometimes given as the only defining trademark of the dandies he records – a rather unconvincing argument, as the dandyism of these reputed dandies is not sufficiently documented. After all, dandyism first and foremost is an intellectual stance and fashion is only one of its diverse manifestations. For example, Rodgers sees Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Arthur Schnitzler as representatives of Viennese dandyism, albeit none of the two writers seriously qualifies as a dandy. Both writers are dealt with in two or three sentences which would hardly suffice if they would really belong to the complex genus dandy. Rodgers’ wide selection of dandies seems at times rather arbitrary. Yet he does give some interesting, hitherto commonly unknown agents of dandyism, e.g. the Russian writer Mikhail Bulgakov, inducing the zest for further reading.?

Another critical point is Rodgers’ statement that women cannot be dandies. This is ignorant of the historic phenomenon of the dandizettes which appeared on the London scene in 1819/1820. Further, he grants women the capability of being dandified in their art, yet being unable to be dandies in real life. This division of life and art is, of course, impossible in dandyism as the dandy (re)creates himself as a work of art. Thus, dandyesque literature can only be written by écrivain-dandys (see Barbey d’Aurevilly, Baudelaire, Gautier, etc.).

With respect to the genealogy of the dandy, Rodgers starts off with the well-known ancestors leading back to antiquity (Alcibiades, Petronius, the ducs de Lauzun and Richelieu, the Macaronis, the Incroyables etc.) up to Brummell and his paradox situation of being called the first dandy without ever actually being a dandy in his time, as the positive notion of the term only developed much later in 1830s romanticism in France and finally with Barbey d’Aurevilly’s study Du Dandysme et de George Brummell. Following Brummell, Rodgers traces the development of dandyism in England during the reign of the “Dandy King” George IV., the cross-over to France where it mingled with French romanticism and developed from a purely social and fashionable phenomenon into an intellectual stance. Oddly enough some form of democratisation took place in French dandyism: It became less a habitus of the aristocracy as it has been in England predominantly, but was adopted by artists and journalists. Here we meet Balzac, Eugène Sue, Eugène Delacroix and others. Again, Rodgers imprecise definition of a dandy becomes apparent. While Balzac can hardly be called a dandy, Rodgers grants him (as well as others) some dandyesque allure: “In his extravagance at least Balzac was a true Dandy.” Dandyism is hard to grasp. Though a complex and paradox phenomenon, the dandy carries a set of trademark features which form a coherent dandy style. Being a dandy requires following this style from head to toe, inside and outside. Meanwhile dandyism is in a constant change of flux as the dandy always reacts to the conventions of his times. As times change, the dandy changes, see the flamboyant dandyism of Alfred d’Orsay versus Brummell’s icy demeanour and Baudelaire’s decadence. Rodgers does indeed address this circumstance implicitly by defining several (though at times questionable) archetypes of dandyism (the dandy-artist, the dandy king, the dandy-painter, women writer-dandies, the dancing dandy, the dandy-photographer), yet he fails to explicitly analyse this process. Granted, Rodgers does not aim for a scientific treatment of the subject, but many of the examples he gives remain unconvincing due to this lack of theoretic backbone. In his portrayal, dandyism oftentimes comes across as a pose that can be put on while dressing up, but dandyism can not be followed as a part-time job, it’s a lifestyle.

Thankfully, Rodgers addresses – albeit briefly, but in a book of this scope, there is hardly any other way – some of the oftentimes neglected representatives of Russian dandyism (Pushkin, Lermontiv, Bulgakov). He then returns to Victorian England where Carlyle’s Sartor Resartus gave a temporary death blow to dandyism. We meet Bulwer, a promising dandy in his youth, who fails to impress as such when he orders the bowdlerisation of his Pelham after sharp attacks; Dickens who, though a flashy dresser, was too affective to be a dandy; and Thackeray who joined Carlyle in dismissing the idea of dandyism.

Meanwhile in France, Barbey d’Aurevilly and Baudelaire built the basics for the scholarly dispute with dandyism in their respective works Du Dandysme et de George Brummell and The Painter of Modern Life. Soon after, the Belle Epoque became the era of aristocratic dandies such as Boson de Talleyrand-Périgord, his nephew Boniface de Castellane and Robert de Montesquiou.

Rodgers then takes us to the more interesting part of his book, looking at the dandies of the roaring twenties (Harold Acton, Anthony Powell, John Betjeman, Robert Byron, Cyril Connolly, Osbert Lancaster, Peter Quennell, Noel Coward), the Hollywood Gentleman (Cary Grant, Fred Astaire) and writers such as Julian Maclaren-Ross, Quentin Crisp and Vladimir Nabokov, the last of which he dismisses as dandies, yet Nabokov is considered as “one of the very greatest Dandies in his writing” due to his “glacial playful detachment”. Throughout the 1960s Rodgers identifies several “dandy-photographers” (Patrick Lichfield, David Bailey, Terence Donovan and Anthony Armstrong-Jones) and “rock star dandies” (Mick Jagger, Marc Bolan and David Bowie) only to (correctly) denounce their dandyism as they depend on and concede to an industry whose products they are.

In his final pages Rodgers focuses on contemporary dandyism, yet again he only presents various examples in no depth and fails to analyse in how far dandyism has developed and changed over the past two hundred years. So, for example we meet Nick Foulkes, “indisputably a Dandy”, but we are not informed what marks his dandyism. Rodgers keenly observes that modern dandies are not to be sought in the limelight – as many people tend to think. Currently, two dandy movements can be detected that mirror London’s dandy-mania between 1818 and 1824: the Chaps of London and the Sapeurs of Kinshasa. The latter follow the peacock dandy tradition in wearing bright colours to accentuate, as Rodgers states, their independence from the slavery of work – which they don’t have as the sapeurs dress up only on sundays, some of them following regular jobs throughout the week.

To sum up, Rodgers’ book gives a wide-spanning overview on the history of dandyism up to today which is a great recommendation for undiscerning readers. The book’s weak point is the superficial treatment of the topic with some heavy name-dropping that at times lacks substantial background information. The dandyism of many alleged dandies is not satisfyingly expounded. This makes for a rather frustrating read, especially when it comes to his gallery of modern and postmodern dandies.

Nigel Rodgers: The Dandy – Peacock or Enigma? Benefactum Publishing, 2012. ISBN: 978-903071-30-4