Talk to impress09 May 2020
The dandy’s pivotal intention to cause a sensation that elevates him from the masses inevitably leads to a use of language that supports this aim. Accordingly, the dandy talks in order to impress. He stands out through either unique words and phrases, unintelligible jargon and prosody, witticism, or gaucheness. The epitome of dandyism, George Brummell, is said to have
To reach utmost exclusivity and effect, understanding was aggravated through inverted meanings and the evasion to foreign languages.
The strategies involved in this manipulation of language were perfected with the advent of literary dandyism. Writing became a performance of the dandy-as-narrator who established himself as a sovereign instance, oftentimes mocking the anticipated bourgeois reader. Literary dandyism is marked by obscurity, opacity, ambiguity, mockery, irony, and exclusiveness. In unison with the dandy, who intends to recreate himself as a work of art, the literary text of the dandy writer is highly stylized. Form trumps content. Ultimately, this influenced the advent of Symbolism and Dada.