The Figure of the Dandy in Barbey D'Aurevilly’s Le Bonheur Dans Le Crime

This study examines the figure of the dandy in Barbey d'Aurevilly’s short-story, Le bonheur dans le crime, one of 6 Diaboliques (1874), in an attempt to bridge a gap in aurevillian criticism. This short story is a piece of dandy-writing, in that it takes up several significant issues Barbey had raised in his essay on dandyism of 1845, Du Dandysme et de George Brummell: dress, sexuality and the notion of the mask. The author demonstrates how these features are not only apparent in the representation of the protagonists, but are present in the story’s themes and narrative processes as well.