George Gissing: A Fan's Commonplace Blog

Commonplace 16 George & His Moustache - in Celebration of Movember.

Why does a man grow a moustache? What is he trying to hide?

An early version of what became the 
Gissing Walrus.
George experimented with beards before settling
on his signature look. 

The Walrus, rampant. Not as easy to maintain as you would think - must have needed manual attention when it came to supping tea. Runs the risk of getting manky at mealtimes. Note the up and out projection offsetting the girly jawline.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with his handlebar. A vigorous sportsman, the building where he met with his confederates to start Portsmouth FC still stands - in the same street where George Meredith was born.

Algernon's basic utility model lacks brio and verve - needs a stouter wax, perhaps? Must try harder, young Alg.



Fred Engels - Manchester dweller - in his latter days - there is absolutely no excuse for this. What was his wife thinking when she let him get away with it?



Alphonse Daudet was a great hit with the ladies - you can see why.

JM Barrie - a small man with a massive moustache. Giving the walrus a run for its money here. George was not impressed by his writing but liked him, and was a tad jealous of his wife - tall and beautiful, refined and well-bred. If only George had given the world a Peter Pan to make money for a hospital...

In some ways, George was Peter Pan - the 'boy who never grew up' (according to Gabrielle) The Walrus under control. Nelly said George was very short-sighted - he acquired a pair of specs in July 1890 - was he too vain for spectacles except to aid reading and writing and moustache maintenance? 

Paul Gavarni - fab beard.

This is one of my all time favourite Paul Gavarni prints. Beloved of the de Goncourts, Daudet, Baudelaire - this is called 'The Martyrs'.  The things we do for vanity! George, we know, spent a lot of time on his hair, which was naturally curly.

A man with a moustache by Ford Maddox Brown (of Pre-Raphaelite 'Work' fame).

Eduard Bertz with a nicotine-stained 'tache.

Thomas Hardy looking every inch the blackguard. George thought him common, and under 'coarse' Mrs Hardy's oppressive thumb. A fine example of facial hair balancing a high forehead, but he could do with cheering the feck up. My old English teacher met Hardy when she was a wee girl, and adored him. Every year the whole class had to make a day trip pilgrimage to various bits of 'Wessex' - long after he was passed, obviously. Happy days. 

The boy band contenders of Moustache Wars - our man is on the far left (instead of the far right boom boom). Next to him is the creator of Raffles, EW Hornung (buried near George in St Jean de Luz). Raffles was a mean fast bowler, a cracker of crime, and general muse to his public school ex-fag factotum, Bunny. Hornung was also once Conan Doyle's brother-in-law. Next is Conan Doyle himself. He lived very close to where was sited the draper's store where HG Wells was apprenticed. Then, there is HG, small but beautifully moustached. Looks like a gay night out in Southport. George wins by a whisker.  

George Meredith with his ultra upper class moustache and impeccably topiaried beard.  Wrote an unreadable book entitled The Shaving of Shagput, but went on to do much better. His father was 'in trade' as a naval outfitter - the shop was in the High Street, Portsea. He put this experience to good use in his novel Evan Harrington, where 'trade' is presented as nothing to be ashamed of (note to Gissing).

HG Wells and his mock Walrus - definitely a lower class pretender, not a patch on George's authoritative little number. What, exactly, was the nature of their friendship? George made the ignorant observation women are never really friends with each other (it's the assigning gender roles to the commonly displayed normal  human characteristics that proves George knew nothing about people) - but were HGW and GRG ever really soul mates? According to HGW, George looked down on him - GRG did have a tendency to socialise with men he found 'inferior', no doubt to make himself feel 'adequate'. But George claimed HG was his best friend - !? 

Vide Domine mirabile mustache, magnificus

Morley Roberts - posing.

William, very much refusing to follow in George's footsteps.

David Levine captures George's later haunted look but fails to do justice to the shapely and controlled Walrus. George had bad teeth (narrow jaw, and a pipe smoker) and a droopy 'tache is a good way to hide this defect.

There is only one Dali and only one Dali moustache!!

Another David Levine portrait. The Walrus is king.



Frida Kahlo in every way, an icon. Women with facial hair are rightly claiming their natural beauty with Frida at the forefront of the movement. Why should boys have all the joy of a muzzy?

Fred Nietzsche famously said: 'My moustache brings all the girls to the yard'. He then proceeded to scare them off with his crazy misogynist chat up patter. On balance, a genius who would have been horrified at Nazism.

Speaking of Nazis....Eric Blair tried this look...

Before settling for this... Wise move. Reminiscent of Graham the Slug, Baldrick's fake moustache in Blackadder Goes Forth

 



HAPPY MOVEMBER.