Beau Brummell | |
|---|---|
 Brummell, engraved from a miniature portrait | |
| Born | George Bryan Brummell 7 June 1778 London, England |
| Died | 30 March 1840 (aged 61) Caen, France |
| Education | Eton College |
| Alma mater | Oriel College, Oxford |
George Bryan "Beau"Brummell (7 June 1778 – 30 March 1840)[1] was an important figure inRegency England, and for many years he was the arbiter of British men's fashion. At one time, he was a close friend of the Prince Regent, the futureKing George IV, but after the two quarrelled and Brummell got into debt, he had to take refuge in France. Eventually, he died from complications ofneurosyphilis inCaen.
Brummell was remembered afterwards as the preeminent example of thedandy, and a whole literature was founded upon his manner and witty sayings, which have persisted until today. His name is still associated with style and good looks and has been given to a variety of modern products to suggest their high quality.
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Brummell was born inDowning Street, London,[2] the younger son of William Brummell (d. 1795), Private Secretary to the Prime Minister,Lord North, and Mary (née Richardson, daughter of the Keeper of theLottery Office).[3][4] North rated William Brummell highly, procuring for him appointments including those he held at the time of his death, namely Receiver of the Duties on Uninhabited Houses in London and Middlesex, Comptroller of the Hawkers' and Pedlars' Office, and Agent and Paymaster to the out-pensioners of Chelsea Hospital; these gave William about £2,500 per annum.[5] On his retirement from politics, William had boughtDonnington Grove inBerkshire and served asHigh Sheriff of Berkshire in 1788.[6] William was the son of another William Brummell (d. 1770), who had beenvalet to aLincolnshire politician, Charles Monson, and, reckoned "an excellent servant", met with some success despite his modest origins through patronage and good fortune;[7] he went into business as a confectioner inBury Street, "in an area notorious for [...] high-class brothels", letting some rooms in the family's house for boarding. The statesmanCharles Jenkinson, 1st Earl of Liverpool, stayed there for a time and got the younger William a clerical position atthe Treasury, which led to his successful career.[8][9][10]
The family had achieved middle class status, but William Brummell was ambitious for his son George to become a gentleman, and he was raised with that understanding. It was suggested (possibly by the Brummells) that William Brummell was an illegitimate descendant ofFrederick, Prince of Wales.[11]
Brummell was educated atEton College and made his precocious mark on fashion when he not only modernised the white stock, or cravat, that was the mark of the "Eton boy", but added a gold buckle to it.[12]
He progressed to Oxford University, where, by his own example, he made cotton stockings and dingy cravats fall out of favour. While an undergraduate atOriel College in 1793, he competed for the Chancellor's Prize for Latin Verse, coming second toEdward Copleston, who later becameprovost of his college.[13] He left the university after only a year at age 16.
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In June 1794, Brummell joined the10th Light Dragoons, later the Tenth Royal Hussars as acornet, the lowest rank ofcommissioned officer,[14] and soon after had his nose broken by a kick from a horse.[15] His father died in 1795, by which time Brummell had been promoted to lieutenant.[16] His father had left him an inheritance of some £30,000.[3] Ordinarily a considerable sum, it was inadequate for the expenses of an aspiring officer in the personal regiment of thePrince of Wales. The officers, many of whom were heirs to noble titles and lands, "wore their estates upon their backs – some of them before they had inherited the paternal acres."[17] Officers in any military regiment were required to provide their own mounts and uniforms and to pay mess bills, but the 10th in particular had elaborate and nearly endless variations of uniform. Their mess expenses were unusually high because the regiment frequently enjoyed banquets and entertainment.
For such a junior officer, Brummell took the regiment by storm, fascinatingthe Prince:
"[T]he first gentleman of England", by the force of his personality. He was allowed to miss parade, shirk his duties and, in essence, do just as he pleased. Within three years, by 1796, he was made a captain, to the envy and disgust of older officers who felt that "our general's friend was now the general."[17]
In 1797,[18] when his regiment was sent from London toManchester, he immediately resigned his commission, citing the city's poor reputation, undistinguished ambience and want of culture and civility.[19][full citation needed]
Although he was now a civilian, Brummell's friendship with (and influence over) the Prince continued. He became a noted figure in fashion and adopted a habit of dress that rejected overly ornate clothes in favour of understated but perfectly fitted and tailoredbespoke garments; this was the moment of the so-calledGreat Male Renunciation seen across Europe. His daily dress was similar to that of other gentlemen in his time, based upon dark coats and full-length trousers (rather than knee breeches and stockings). Above all, Brummell favoured immaculate shirt linen and an elaborately knottedcravat.[20] This mode of cravat-wearing has been described as Brummell's chief innovation.[21]
Brummell took a house onChesterfield Street inMayfair[22] and, for a time, managed to avoid the nightly gaming and other extravagances frequent in such elevated circles. Where he refused to economise was on his dress: when asked how much it would cost to keep a single man in clothes, he was said to have replied: "Why, with tolerable economy, I think it might be done with £800",[23] at a time when the average annual wage for a craftsman was £52. Additionally, he claimed that he took five hours a day to dress and recommended that boots be polished with champagne.[24] This preoccupation with dress, coupled with a nonchalant display of wit, was referred to asdandyism.
Brummell put into practice the principles of harmony of shape and contrast of colours with such a pleasing result that men of superior rank sought his opinion on their own dress:
The Duke of Bedford once did this touching a coat. Brummell examined his Grace with the cool impertinence which was his Grace's due. He turned him about, scanned him with scrutinizing, contemptuous eye, and then taking the lapel between his dainty finger and thumb, he exclaimed in a tone of pitying wonder, "Bedford, do you call this thing a coat?"[25]
His personal habits, such as a fastidious attention to cleaning his teeth, shaving, and daily bathing exerted an influence on theton—the upper echelons of polite society—who began to do likewise. Enthralled, the Prince would spend hours in Brummell's dressing room, witnessing the progress of his friend's lengthy morning toilette.
In June 1811 he was one of the guests at theCarlton House Fête held to celebrate the beginning of theRegency era.[26]
While studying at Eton, Brummell played for the school'sfirst eleven,[27] although he is said to have once terrified a master there by asserting that he thought cricket was "foolish".[28] He did, however, play a singlefirst-class match forHampshire atLord's Old Ground in 1807 against an early all-England cricket team. Brummell made scores of 23 and 3 on that occasion, leaving him with a careerbatting average of 13.00.[29]
Brummell's wealthier friends influenced him; he began spending and gambling as though his fortune was as ample as theirs. He found it increasingly difficult to maintain his lifestyle as his spending continued over time, but his prominent position in society allowed him to float a line of credit. This situation changed in July 1813 at a masquerade ball jointly hosted atWatier's private club by Brummell,Lord Alvanley,Henry Mildmay andHenry Pierrepont. The four were considered the prime movers of Watier's, dubbed "the Dandy Club" byLord Byron. The Prince Regent greeted Alvanley and Pierrepont at the event, and then "cut" Brummell and Mildmay by staring at their faces without speaking.[30] This provoked Brummell's remark, "Alvanley, who's your fat friend?".
This incident marked the final breach in a rift between Brummell and the Regent that had opened in 1811, when the Prince became Regent and began abandoning all his oldWhig friends.[32] Brummell became an anomalous favourite, flourishing without a patron, influencing fashion and courted by a large segment of society.[33]
In 1816, Brummell, owing thousands of pounds, fled to France to escapedebtor's prison. Some sources liberally estimate he owed up to £600,000 at the time.[34] Usually, Brummell's gambling obligations, being "debts of honour", were paid immediately. The one exception to that was his final wager, dated March 1815 inWhite's betting book, which was marked "not paid, 20th January, 1816".[35] Seemingly unable to quell his urge to spend and gamble, it became apparent his lifestyle could no longer be sustained. Brummell was ostracized from his social circle and soon found refuge in France.[36]
He lived the remainder of his life in French exile, spending ten years inCalais without an officialpassport, before acquiring an appointment to theconsulate atCaen in 1830 through the influence ofLord Alvanley and theDuke of Beaufort. This provided him with a small annuity to fuel his new life in France; however, this lasted only two years because the Foreign Office acted on Brummell's recommendation to abolish the consulate. He had made it in the hope of being appointed to a more remunerative position elsewhere to regain some influence, but no new position was forthcoming, much to his detriment.
Rapidly running out of money and growing increasingly slovenly in his dress, he was forced by his long-unpaid Calais creditors into debtors' prison in 1835. Only through the charitable intervention of his friends in England was he able to secure his release later that year. In 1840, Brummell died at the age of 61, penniless and demented fromsyphilis, at Le Bon Sauveur Asylum on the outskirts ofCaen. He is buried at Cimetière Protestant, Caen, France.[37]
A very early portrait of Brummell, along with his elder brother William, occurs in theJoshua Reynolds painting of the curly-headed Brummell children, dating from 1781 and now in theKenwood House collection.[38] The caricaturistRichard Dighton painted awatercolour of Brummell at the elegant height of his dandyism and used it as the basis for a popular print in 1805. Two centuries later, it served as model for a 2002 statue of Brummell byIrena Sedlecká, erected inJermyn Street.[39] A plaque on the front of this statue is inscribed with his own words: "to be truly elegant, one should not be noticed."[40] On the other side ofPiccadilly, a blue plaque has marked Brummell's former home in Chesterfield Street since 1984, while in 2013, another plaque commemorated his name as a member of the hunting and dining club inMelton Mowbray.[41]
In literature, Brummell has been more extensively portrayed. Scarcely had he left England than he was satirised as the witty Bellair in thepicaresque novelSix Weeks at Long's, by a Late Resident (1817), now ascribed toEaton Stannard Barrett.[42] Among his humorous remarks there, he is credited with denouncing the eating of vegetables and, when challenged whether he had ever tried it, replying, "Oh, yes, I remember I once ate a pea."[43] A collection of the witticisms ascribed to him and of anecdotes about him followed under the titleBrummelliana was republished many times in the following decades.[44] This began with the story of him enquiring the identity of his companion's "fat friend", and also included his "I once ate a pea" remark.William Hazlitt borrowed the same title, "Brummelliana", for an unsympathetic essay published in 1828, referring to some of these stories and repeating others uncollected there.[45] Dandyism also came under attack inGeorge Robert Wythen Baxter's satirical essay "Kiddyism", published in humorous journals from 1832 onwards, which culminates in a set of satirical aphorisms purporting to be yet more Brummelliana.[46] Further fictitious aphorisms were published in France byHonoré de Balzac in the course of a series of articles published under the titleTraité de la vie élégante (1830). These sayings were supposed to have arisen during an interview with Brummell in Boulogne, rather than Calais, and epitomise his view of "the elegant life".[47]
Brummell appears at length inThe Memoirs of Harriette Wilson, Written by Herself, (1825) as a former suitor ofHarriette Wilson's friend Julia. "In short," she wrote, "his maxims on dress were excellent. Besides this, he was neither uneducated nor deficient. He possessed also a sort of quaint, dry humour, not amounting to anything like wit; indeed, he said nothing which would bear repetition; but his affected manners and little absurdities amused for the moment. Then it became the fashion to court Brummell's society, which was enough to make many seek it who cared not for it; and many more wished to be well with him through fear, for all knew him to be cold, heartless, and satirical."[48]
Two more books were later dedicated to confirming Brummell as a cult figure. In England, there was Captain Jesse's two volumeLife of George Brummell (1844), the first biography devoted to him.[49] In France, there was the influential essay ofJules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly, "On Dandyism and George Brummell" (1845), which seeks to define the essence of dandyism through a study of his career and opinions. In the course of his essay, Barbey d'Aurevilly deprecates English attempts to portray Brummell in fiction: "Within Brummell's lifetime two well-known authors took up their pen – sharpened to exquisite points and dipped in musk-scented Chinese ink – to cast on blue-tinted paper with silver borders a few facile lines where one catches a glimpse of Brummell."[50] He was referring to two examples of thefashionable or silver fork novel, of which more than a thousand were to be written over the next two decades.
Brummell's character also served as foundation for depiction of fictional dandies. One such is the character Trebeck inThomas Henry Lister'sGranby (1826), who abandons dandyism when he discovers a waistcoat of his devising worn by "a natty apprentice".[51] InBulwer Lytton's 1828 novelPelham, the hero of the title passes through Calais and meets the inspiration of his dandiacal way of life in the character of Mr. Russelton. The latter is modeled on Brummell, and to him are attributed such stories from the Brummell apocrypha as his once needing three tailors to make his gloves and the sartorial insult, "Do you call this a coat?"[52]
Brummell appeared under his own name as a character inArthur Conan Doyle's 1896 historical novelRodney Stone. In this, the title character's uncle, Charles Tregellis, is the center of the London fashion world, until Brummell ultimately supplants him. Tregellis's subsequent death from mortification serves as adeus ex machina, in that it resolves Rodney Stone's family poverty.[53]
Georgette Heyer, author of a number ofRegency romance novels, included Brummell as a character in her 1935 novelRegency Buck.[54] He is also referred to, or figures as a minor character, in the work of later writers of this genre. More recently, Brummell was made the detective-hero of a series of period mysteries by Californian novelist Rosemary Stevens, starting withDeath on a Silver Tray in 2000.[55] These are written as if related by their hero. Yet another American reinterpretation of his character appears in Cecilia Ryan's homoerotic novellaThe Sartorialist (2012).[56]
In the United States, Brummell's life was dramatised in an 1890 stage play in four acts byClyde Fitch withRichard Mansfield as Brummell. This in turn was adapted for the 1924 filmBeau Brummel, withJohn Barrymore andMary Astor.[57] Another play about him, authored by Bertram P Matthews, is only remembered because it had incidental music written for it byEdward Elgar. When it was staged at theTheatre Royal, Birmingham in November 1928, Elgar himself conducted the orchestra on its first night. With the exception of the minuet, Elgar's orchestral score subsequently disappeared and the manuscript has never been located.[58] Brummell's later years were the setting forRon Hutchinson's 2001 two-character playThe Beau (originallyBeau Brummell), which, following a UK national tour, played for one month at Theatre Royal Haymarket, starringPeter Bowles as Brummell.[59]
Earlier movies includeda 10-minute film by the Vitagraph Company of America (1913), based on aBooth Tarkington story, andBeau Brummell and his Bride, a short comedy made by the Edison Company in the same year. In 1937, there was a radio drama onLux Radio Theater withRobert Montgomery as Brummell.[60] A further film,Beau Brummell, was made in 1954 withStewart Granger playing the title role,Peter Ustinov as thePrince of Wales, andElizabeth Taylor as Lady Patricia Belham. There were also two television dramas: the sixty-minute GermanSo war Herr Brummell (Süddeutscher Rundfunk, 1967) and the UK'sBeau Brummell: This Charming Man (2006).[61]
In 1931, there was a French three-actoperetta,Brummell, composed byReynaldo Hahn to alibretto byRip and Robert Dieudonné. This featured Brummell as the main character in a fabricated story of a rural courtship which saw occasional performance in later years.[62] This was later broadcast by Radio-Lille (1963).
Brummell's name became associated with style and good looks, and was therefore borrowed for a variety of products or alluded to in songs and poetry. One example was the paint colour Beau Brummel Brown, used exclusively on the 1931Oldsmobile.[63] In 1934, arhododendron hybridised byLionel de Rothschild was named after the dandy.[64] In 1928, there were several Beau Brummel styles from theIllinois Watch Company[65] and in 1948,LeCoultre marketed a Beau Brummel watch with a minimalist design and no numbers.[66] In 2016, a men's skincare and shaving company launched using the nameBeau Brummell for Men.
T. S. Eliot's poem about "Bustopher Jones: The Cat About Town" refers to him as the "Brummell of Cats",[67] an allusion taken up inAndrew Lloyd Webber'sCats, the 1981 musical based on Eliot'sOld Possum's Book of Practical Cats (1939). Other allusions to Brummell appear in the lyrics of such songs as "All I Need Is The Girl" from the 1959 musicalGypsy,[68] "You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile" from the musicalAnnie (1977),[69] andBilly Joel's 1980 hit "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me".[70]
Various bands also adopted Brummell's name, beginning withZack Whyte and His Chocolate Beau Brummels, a jazz-style dance band that toured between 1924 and 1935.[71] During the 1960s, there were the rock bands such asThe Beau Brummels from San Francisco and Beau Brummell Esquire and His Noble Men, the name used by South African born Michael Bush for his English group.[72]
