"... I communicate in silence, too / With nap of cloth, and shine of shoe"
Or: Let us Now Praise Christian Chensvold
I am the dandy of the zombie apocalypse
Riding the underground tunnel amid blips,
The lights from $hining $creens, the undead’s sustenance,
While, inconspicuous to avoid their wrath,
I read a volume of Byron bought for sixpence
On a semester abroad in the town of Bath.
…
Click through to read the rest of “The Dandy Of The Apocalypse” by Christian Chensvold
Christian’s Dandyism site is a treasure trove. Click over and scroll through.
Take the helpful quiz to find the answer to the question How dandy are you? Full disclosure: My own score was pitiful. I am disclosed as a nullity. I nonetheless hold my head up, and do my poor best, here and there, now and then, as I can.
Christian was at one time the proprietor of the wonderful Ivy Style site. That also deserves a click-over visit. He kindly published two pieces by me under my IRL name on that site, so I have a particular fondness for it. Full disclosure: I am a man of fiery, volcanic egotism, smoldering beneath a thin crust of feigned self-effacement.
He also recently published The Philosophy of Style, which I know is brilliant. The Philosophy of Style “collects 25 years of his writings on menswear history and gentlemanly topics.” Full disclosure: I have not yet bought it, or read it. But I will. Order your own copy here.
An excerpt from The Philosophy of Style may be found here.
An excerpt of the excerpt:
A sort of rebellious chameleon, the dandy at once defines his era and defies it, exemplifying his cultural milieu while simultaneously subverting it. Though dandies have always been and forever will be like comets, their appearance is rare but inevitable. A rebel with no cause but himself, the dandy is ideally a man of leisure; “free,” as one historian writes, “of all entanglements that interfere with taste.”
Living the life of the Dandy in the vulgar, vapid, and vacuous mid-2020s could, with some justice, be dismissed as a scheme of utter foolhardiness and futility. Yet, was any prior age really any better? Beau Brummel and Charles Baudelaire, thou shouldst be with us at this hour! And as we imagine these men gazing down from their Valhalla of wit and style, a smile flickers across their haughty countenances at the sight of at least one paladin who yet serves the same Muse, defying his times, and setting his own standard …
The text from the back of the book:
Beginning in 2004, Chensvold founded two of the most original and stimulating menswear websites — Dandyism.net and Ivy-Style.com — which drew dozens of contributors, tens of thousands of followers, and international accolades and opprobrium. His articles on style theory, gentlemanly pursuits and menswear history have appeared in The Rake, L’Uomo Vogue, Robb Report and the Wall Street Journal. This book groups together his finest work, including previously undigitized articles on dandyism, as he shines his “diabolical monocle” on a diverse range of subjects all of which share a bittersweet nostalgia for gallant eras of the past.
Also included are three stylish works of fiction: “The Disengage,” a flamboyant pastiche of fin-de-siecle Decadence; “These Are Our Failures,” a rollicking James Bond-like tale on the fate of menswear; and “The Philosophy Of Style,” a culmination of three decades of contemplation on matters of style, and where the search must ultimately arrive.
“I highly recommend taking Master Chensvold’s tome out for a stroll,” writes legendary historian and haberdasher Alan Flusser in his foreword. “The book is a virtual Baedeker of classic male hunting grounds, unearthing style points in such diverse pleasures as pipe smoking and the tango to the evolution of the bachelor pad and go-to-hell pants. It’s with much appreciation for his scholarship that I was able to augment my recent Ralph Lauren biography with the addition of Chensvold’s writings.”
While internally screaming, "worthless! worthless! worthless!" I found myself enjoying this a great deal. Which, no doubt, should alert me to the possibility that I still have a lot to learn.
I like the title quite a bit, "I communicate in silence, too." As I've grown up I have seen a trend where people in my life don't wanna understand the silence anymore. All that I've learned from my vicarious observations is, they wanna play it safe. They don't wanna risk misunderstanding.
It's truly something to think about, and maybe write about, isn't it?