Freak to chic: 'gay' men in and out of fashion after Oscar Wilde

Janes, Dominic (2021) Freak to chic: 'gay' men in and out of fashion after Oscar Wilde. Bloomsbury, London. ISBN 9781350172609

Creators:
Janes, Dominic
Description/Abstract:

For a period during the interwar years queer styles were in fashion. People who had been regarded as freaks became seen as chic. This book provides a new interpretation of the origins of ‘gay’ culture from a time when that word typically meant happy but was starting to mean homosexual. It explores the ways in which men who were sexually attracted to other men were able visually and creatively to express same-sex desires in the first half of the twentieth century in London seen in the context of New York and Paris. This was a time when openly homosexual sexual expression was illegal, but the worlds of glamour, fashion and art provided rich opportunities for the construction of queer spectacle such that the interwar period saw the appearance of startlingly new fashions for androgynous ‘freak chic’.

Item Type:
Book
Date:
1 July 2021
Schools:
School of Fashion & Textiles
Depositing User:
Dominic Janes
Date Deposited:
01 Feb 2023 15:00
Last Modified:
01 Feb 2023 15:00
Janes, Dominic:
ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3751-5326
URI:
https://research.uca.ac.uk/id/eprint/5922

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