When Oscar Wilde arrived in the United States aboard the SS Arizona back in 1882, he reputedly told a customs officer that he had “nothing to declare but my genius.” When Sebastian Horsley arrived in 2008, he humbly acknowledged that he had “nothing to declare but Oscar Wilde’s genius,” before being promptly sent back home to England. Whilst on tour promoting his memoirs, Dandy in the Underworld, Horsley - who is perhaps best known for having himself crucified in the name of “beauty” - was denied entry into the U.S. on grounds of moral turpitude: a wide net that encompasses everything from fornication to simply being a public nuisance. And whilst crimes of fashion are not normally deemed qualifying acts, the customs incident is believed to be incited by Horsley’s appearance of top hat, three-piece suit, and nail polish. His reputation had indeed preceded him; the bon mot voyage may have been cut prematurely but the triumph was all Horsley’s… “I am the only thing of value in this country and I am removing it immediately.”
After Eugène Sue’s Les Mystères de Paris (1842-1843), the dandy author became somewhat synonymous – or rather notorious – as being a champion of socialism and ‘friend of the People’. By the publication of Horsley’s ‘unauthorised autobiography’, however, he was no longer such an enthusiastic preacher. Horsley was far more concerned with the melodrama of life; too titillated by the lurid back alleys, the prisons and the brothels he haunted. He loved the masquerade of his daily fare just as he did the exposure to society’s nocturnal underworld. The Regency once held scorn over the bourgeoisie for its relationship between the fashionable ‘high’ and the criminal ‘low’; one class that esteems itself above the law, and the other that finds itself too frequently below it. Yet Horsley recognised a likeness in their libertinism and made himself a welcome guest at both parties. He had entered The Harlot’s House and found a home away from home.
‘My tastes are to the tacky and tasteless. I like the literature of the illiterate, the culture of the low-brow, the wealth of the poor, the privilege of the under-privileged, the exclusive clubs of the excluded masses. I waltz through life with one foot in the grave, the other in Woolworth’s.’
Every anarchist dandy has crumbled into his own ruins and so Horsley’s fate was perhaps inescapable. Like the sunflower with which the dandy identifies himself, Horsley’s impulsive radiance heralded an equally sudden collapse at the age of 47. It is believed that how a man dies shows his true character as much as how he lives. If that be so then Horsley’s end was rather apt; he died of a heroin and cocaine overdose, alone in his Meard Street flat (a brothel in all but name). There is no such thing as innocent or mischievous pleasures. There are only pleasures. That is all.
Horsley did not want to be a man; he wanted to be a mannequin. His life was a performance in search of an audience and now, the first anniversary of his passing, he has achieved that aim. Now he has become a work of art.
After Eugène Sue’s Les Mystères de Paris (1842-1843), the dandy author became somewhat synonymous – or rather notorious – as being a champion of socialism and ‘friend of the People’. By the publication of Horsley’s ‘unauthorised autobiography’, however, he was no longer such an enthusiastic preacher. Horsley was far more concerned with the melodrama of life; too titillated by the lurid back alleys, the prisons and the brothels he haunted. He loved the masquerade of his daily fare just as he did the exposure to society’s nocturnal underworld. The Regency once held scorn over the bourgeoisie for its relationship between the fashionable ‘high’ and the criminal ‘low’; one class that esteems itself above the law, and the other that finds itself too frequently below it. Yet Horsley recognised a likeness in their libertinism and made himself a welcome guest at both parties. He had entered The Harlot’s House and found a home away from home.
‘My tastes are to the tacky and tasteless. I like the literature of the illiterate, the culture of the low-brow, the wealth of the poor, the privilege of the under-privileged, the exclusive clubs of the excluded masses. I waltz through life with one foot in the grave, the other in Woolworth’s.’
Every anarchist dandy has crumbled into his own ruins and so Horsley’s fate was perhaps inescapable. Like the sunflower with which the dandy identifies himself, Horsley’s impulsive radiance heralded an equally sudden collapse at the age of 47. It is believed that how a man dies shows his true character as much as how he lives. If that be so then Horsley’s end was rather apt; he died of a heroin and cocaine overdose, alone in his Meard Street flat (a brothel in all but name). There is no such thing as innocent or mischievous pleasures. There are only pleasures. That is all.
Horsley did not want to be a man; he wanted to be a mannequin. His life was a performance in search of an audience and now, the first anniversary of his passing, he has achieved that aim. Now he has become a work of art.
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