Dandyism As Spiritual Path

Dandyism As Spiritual Path By Christian Chensvold From “The Philosophy Of Style,” 2023 Can dandyism actually serve as a spiritual path, guiding us through the […]

A Man For Times Of Decadence

From “Essai de psychologie contemporaine: Charles Baudelaire” by Paul Bourget La Nouvelle Revue 13, 1881 If a special nuance in the meaning of love and […]

Majestic Though In Ruin

You probably remember the ancient riddle about the traveler who meets a fork in the road and isn’t sure which path to take. In the […]

Opposition & Revolt

The Dandy From “The Painter of Modern Life,” 1863 By Charles Baudelaire Translation by P.E. Charvet The wealthy man, who, blasé though he may be, […]

Saint-Loup

First impressions of Robert de Saint-Loup From “Within a Budding Grove” By Marcel Proust, 1919 One afternoon of scorching heat I was in the dining-room […]

Gautier On Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire By Theophile Gautier, 1867 Although his existence was short — he lived scarce forty-six years — Charles Baudelaire had time to assert himself, […]

Eye For Elegance

Eye For Elegance By Christian Chensvold Ralph Lauren Magazine, Fall 2008 Norman Rockwell’s name is synonymous with the golden age of American illustration, while that […]

Robert de Montesquiou

Robert de Montesquiou: The Magnificent Dandy From “Elegant Wits And Grand Horizontals” By Cornelia Otis Skinner, 1962 In a charming book of memoirs Elisabeth de […]

Heroism In Times Of Decadence

Baudelaire’s 1863 essay on dandyism, after characterizing the tradition as a “strange sort of spirituality,” declares it “the last stroke of heroism in times of […]

Treatise On Elegant Living

Every era has its particular expression of elegance. But while that expression is forever in flux, the principles that govern it are fixed and eternal. […]

The Joker’s Riled

“La chair est triste, helas, et j’ai lu tous les livres.” When I was younger, those lines of Mallarmé used to haunt me. This was back […]

Something Superior To The Visible World

A 19th-century woman wrote herself into the annals of history by saying that the feeling of being perfectly well dressed brings a supernatural calm that […]

New Regency: 20 Years Of Dandyism.net

When Christian Chensvold, Dandyism.net’s founder and guiding light for the past two decades, asked me to write a post commemorating the site’s twentieth anniversary, I […]

Aristocratic By Nature

From “New Notes On Edgar Poe,” 1857 By Charles Baudelaire Decadent literature! Empty words which we often hear fall, with thes onority of a deep […]

I Lock The Door Upon Myself

In 1900 Fernand Khnopff had a house built according to his plans — a house with false windows. Silence and solitude were central themes in the […]

The Prophet Of Dandyism

If it weren’t for Barbey d’Aurevilly, you probably wouldn’t be reading this. What do we mean? That if he hadn’t been born this week in […]

Dandyism & Decadence

From “The Idea of Decadence in French Literature” By AE Carter, 1958 Dandy and decadent are fused in Baudelaire’s work and life. He affected an […]

Spleen On Me

Since 1863, a certain type of young man — talented perhaps, but not creative; spiritual and philosophic, yet with expensive tastes; dismissive of commercial success, […]

Dandy Of The Apocalypse

  The Dandy Of The Apocalypse By Christian Chensvold   I am the dandy of the zombie apocalypse  Riding the underground tunnel amid blips, Lights […]

Wit & Wisdom

“Style is the dress of thought.” — Lord Chesterfield “A dandy does nothing. Can you imagine a dandy addressing the common herd except to make […]

The Canon

This list of canonical texts has not been updated since the belle epoque of Dandyism.net circa 2006, but perhaps it will be someday.  Principal Texts […]

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