BECKY SHARP, A DANDY

by

Dana Goodin

Vanity Fair was first published in serialized form from

1847 to 1848. It was published in volume form in the summer

of 1848.1 William Makepeace Thackeray, the author of Vanity

Fair, termed the story, a Novel without a Hero due to the lack of

true goodness or strength in any of the characters. In fact,

Vanity Fair primarily focuses on immoral, vain, shallow,

foolish and selfish characters. The two main characters, or

anti-heroines, are schoolmates Rebecca “Becky” Sharp and

Amelia Sedley; Becky will always be the character of

greatest interest and discussion. For a summary of the plot

of Vanity Fair, see Appendix A.

Vanity Fair begins in 1813, during the infamous Regency

period in England. Around the time Becky and her husband

Rawdon Crawley are making their mark on Paris society,

George Bryan “Beau” Brummell (1778-8140) was being expelled

1 Ellen Moers, The Dandy: Brummell to Beerbohm, (London: Seeker and Warburg, 1960), 206

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from English society and beginning his long slide into

poverty. 2

Brummell was born in 1778 to a family that had recently

achieved middle-class respectability. His father was a civil

servant , and his grandfather a valet and successful

entrepreneur.3 Ellen Moers, the author of The Dandy: Brummell to

Beerbohm, terms Brummell’s origins as the “upper servant

class.”4 He was educated at Eton and Oxford. It was during

his time at Eton that he befriended the future Prince Regent

and began to hone his style and interest in fashion.5 After

leaving Oxford, he was enlisted into the Tenth Hussars, the

Prince’s personal guard, whose main role was to accompany

the prince on “pleasure trips.”6 By 1798, Brummell was

already a significant part of the ton, the most exclusive of

the exclusive of fashionable London society. 7 Brummell

became the primary arbiter of taste for the exclusive set

and despite having humble beginnings, gained power through

2 Ibid, 273 Ibid, 244Moers, 24.5Ibid, 25.6Ibid, 25.7 Ibid, 25.

2

his decrees governing style and behavior.8 However,

Brummell’s power was not stable, since he was supported

socially and monetarily by the Prince Regent. Once he had

fallen out of favor with the Prince and his financial

support was withdrawn, he was forced to flee to France to

avoid his creditors, in May of 1816.9 Moers refers to his

arrival in Calais and the auction of his English property as

“the conventional curtain to this drama of Vanity Fair.”10

Rightly or wrongly, he is seen as the first dandy, on whom

all later dandies would model themselves.

Although dandyism in the nineteenth century is

considered the province of men, There are several clear

similarities between Becky Sharp and Beau Brummell. Both

make extraordinary climbs in English society. Both are well-

educated and have experience with the military (Becky via

her husband). Both show remarkable self-control and control

over their image. Both are noted to be stylish, elegant and

witty. Finally, both make fatal missteps at the peak of

8 Ibid, 26.9 Ibid, 27.10Ibid, 28.

3

their social climb that engender the wrath of their

benefactors. As a result, both are forced to flee England

and withdraw into bohemian existence. However, in a novel

filled with so many male characters that fancy themselves a

Brummell, is it possible that the anti-heroine of the Novel

without a Hero, is the true dandy? Can Becky Sharp be qualified

as a dandy? Moers quotes Mrs. Gore, a Silver Fork Society

authoress as defining a dandy as “a nobody who made himself

a somebody, and gave the law to everybody.”11

Sarah Rose Cole, in her Nineteenth-Century Literature

article, “The Aristocrat in the Mirror” identifies Brummell

and Becky as the two exceptions to the rule that it takes

three generations to become a gentleman or lady and notes

that both end in similar ways once they fall out of favor

with their benefactors. 12 It is quite likely that Brummell

was in the forefront of Thackeray’s mind when constructing

the character of Becky Sharp.

11Moers, 26.12 Sarah Rose Cole, “The Aristocrat in the Mirror: Male Vanity and Bourgeois Desire in William Makepeace Thackeray’sVanity Fair,” Nineteenth-Century Literature, vol. 61, no. 2 (September 2006): 144, accessed Oct. 11, 2013.

4

Although Thackeray was born in 1811, in the middle of

the Regency period and its notorious decadence, Vanity Fair was

clearly written with a familiarity and knowledge of the

period. Additionally, interest in Brummell and his life had

recently been revived in the decade and a half before

Thackeray began writing Vanity Fair. In 1830, Balzac published

A Treatise on Elegance, in which the author has a platonic

dialogue with the dead Dandy. In 1833, Thomas Carlyle began

the serial Sartor Restartus in Fraser’s magazine.13 In 1844,

Captain William Jesse wrote a biography of Beau Brummell and

in 1845, Barney D’Aurevilly wrote The Anatomy of Dandyism.

Thackeray reviewed Jesse’s Brummell biography for the

Morning Chronicle. In his review Thackeray introduces the idea

that Brummell’s dandyism was simply a superior performance

of middle class gentility. 14 Thackeray describes Brummell

13 Kate Irvin, “Fabricating a Dream: Two Centuries of Sketching and Defining the Dandy.” In Artist, Dandy, Rebel: Men of Fashion (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013), 27.14 Sarah Rose Cole, “The Aristocrat in the Mirror: Male Vanity and Bourgeois Desire in William Makepeace Thackeray’sVanity Fair,” Nineteenth-Century Literature, vol. 61, no. 2 (September 2006): 144, accessed Oct. 11, 2013, 137.

5

as a figure to whom the lower classes can look to for

inspiration in their pursuit of gentility.15

Thackeray inserts some of this awareness of Brummell

and the Regency period into the novel. He mentions Brummell

by name when mocking Jos Sedley’s vain pretensions and

propensity for self-exaggeration: “…he used to talk of the

pleasure of this period of his existence with great

enthusiasm, and give you to understand that he and Brummell

were the leading bucks of the day.”16

Failed dandy Jos Sedley, who is described as a “fat

gourmand” who drinks too much, and has his clothes made too

tight (“….like most fat men”17) may be a loose caricature of

another fat fellow with dandy pretensions, the Prince

Regent. Jos takes his family, friends and Becky Sharp to

Vauxhall to celebrate his visit from India. 18 Vauxhall was

a favorite of the Prince Regent. 19 By 1811, the Prince

15 Ibid, 137.16 William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, (New York: Barnes and Noble Classics, 2003), 22.17Ibid, 2218Thackeray, 51.19 Venetia Murray, An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England, (New York: Viking Penguin, 1999), 105-107.

6

Regent was already seen as a “drunken buffoon” and “a boor

and a lecher.”20

Thackeray first developed his judgmental view of the

dandy after reviewing an etiquette book by another Brummell

admirer in 1837.21 His first satirical work on the subject

of dandyism was the novel The Yellowplush Papers. The Yellowplush

Papers, also published in 1837, chronicles the misadventures

of a would-be dandy – the twist is that Yellowplush, the

narrator, is not remotely a dandy at all, he only supposes

he is. Yellowplush is described by Moers as an “upside-down

Pelham,” the eponymous dandy of the novel by Thackeray’s

rival Edward Bulwer-Lytton.22

Like many of the authors on dandyism, Thackeray also

based characters clearly on persons of the time period. The

villainous Lord Steyne, Becky’s later benefactor and

possible patron, was reportedly based on either the second

or third Lord Hertford.23 Benjamin Disraeli, former dandy

20 Murray, 5.21 Moers, 198.22 Ibid, 199.23 Ibid, 59.

7

and eventual Prime Minister, caricatured Lord Hertford as

Lord Monmouth in his novel Coningsby. 24.

In many ways, the similarities between Becky and

Brummell are striking. Like Brummell, Becky is small and

stylish. Thackeray consistently mentions her white arms and

blonde hair and slight figure. She is first described to the

reader as not being traditionally attractive, but that she

has large “attractive” eyes and looks like a child compared

to her taller, robust peers. 25 Moers describes Brummell as

“perfection in his smallness.”26

Another significant plot point is Becky’s very

fashionable command of French. She is described as speaking

“French with purity and a Parisian accent.”27 Despite the

continual wars with France, the English aristocracy was

still infatuated with Paris, so much so that they shocked

the American ambassador with the practice of primarily

conversing in French, despite living in London. 28 Her

24Moers, 59.25 Thackeray, 13.26 Moers, 17.27 Thackeray, 13.28 Murray, 12.

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command of the fashionable language, which she often used to

mock or surreptitiously insult those in stations above her,

could be equated with Brummell’s famous taste and sartorial

style. In both areas, the social climbers are more

aristocratic than the aristocrats themselves. Becky even

uses her command of French to effectively lie about her

bloodline. Her French mother was another dandy favorite, the

“opera-girl.” Becky claims to be a Montmorency, which

Thackeray identifies as French aristocracy cast into poverty

by the first French Revolution.29

While Becky’s dress is not mentioned or described with

any frequency, when it is, she is described as the being the

very fashionable and neat. As the English forces ride out of

Brussels to face Napoleon at Waterloo, Thackeray notes that

“Rebecca was dressed very neatly and smartly, as usual.” 30

Later in the novel, when Becky is avoiding spending time

with her son, Thackeray describes her as “a vivified figure

29 Thackeray, 89.30Ibid, 296.

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out the Magasin des Modes” and that “she always had a new

bonnet on; and flowers bloomed perpetually in it.” 31

If Becky’s character was male, she would likely be

identified as a dandy. Cole notes how throughout the novel

Becky is constantly contrasted with the male dandies, Jos

Sedley and George Osborne, who are shown to be vain, selfish

and impulsive. 32 However, Cole argues that Becky does not

display the same feminizing traits as the dandies around

her. She does not share the same physical vanity or careless

spending as George Osborne and Jos Sedley; however she does

use her physical appearance and accumulation of material

goods in strategic manners. Like her male counterparts,

Becky too, is interested in becoming seen as genteel and

aristocratic.

However, if a dandy must always be male, or at least

wear male dress, Becky does not qualify as a dandy. As if

Thackeray realized this, he pairs Becky with the high-born,

rough and blockheaded Rawdon Crawley. In the areas where

Becky lacks specific dandy qualities, Rawdon can provide

31 Ibid, 371.32 Cole, 159.

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them. Like most dandies he is interested in horses, horse

racing and gambling and in typical dandy fashion, it is

alluded that Rawdon supports Becky and himself by cheating

at cards. 33

Rawdon is first identified to the reader as a dandy or

“blood” by Becky in a letter to Amelia. Rawdon, the favorite

of Miss Crawley, has been previously mentioned, however it

is not until Becky’s letter to Amelia that the reader

encounters a description of the young soldier. Becky’s

description of Rawdon:

Well, he is a very large young dandy. He is six feet high, and speaks with a great voice; and swears a great deal; and orders about the servants, who all adore him nevertheless; for he is generous of his money, and the domestics will do anything for him. Last week the keepers almost killed a bailiff and his man who came down from London to arrest the captain [Rawdon], and who were found lurking about the park wall- they beat them, ducked them and were going to shoot them forpoachers, but the baronet interfered.34

Interestingly, Rawdon does not fit the ideal of the

Brummell dandy at all. He is too obvious, rough and violent.

According to Moers, “to the dandy the self is not an animal,

33 Thackeray, Vanity Fair, 35634 Thackeray, Vanity Fair, 99

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but a gentleman.”35 Rawdon’s violence and carelessness is

more animalistic than aristocratic. However, Rawdon has the

benefit of actually being of aristocratic blood, while the

dandy, like Becky, must be worthy of the station through his

behavior.

When compared to Brummell, who was described as “the

greatest of small wits”36 and “brilliant, little Becky,”37

whose wit is regularly noted by Thackeray and other

characters, Rawdon is severely lacking in wit and

refinement. Thackeray draws attention to Rawdon’s lack of

refinement and wit during a slight conversation between

them: Becky comments on the beauty of the stars over Queen’s

Crawley and Rawdon responds:

“Oh-ah-God-yes, so do I exactly, Miss Sharp…You don’t mind my cigar, do you, Miss Sharp….Jove-aw-Gad-aw- it’s the finest segaw I ever smoked in the world- aw,” – for his intellect and conversation were alike brilliant and becoming to a heavy young dragoon.”38

35 Moers, The Dandy,1836 Moers, 20.37 Thackeray, 433.38 Ibid, 99.

12

Yet, Rawdon is more similar to Brummell than Becky in

many ways and together the pair creates an almost full

dandy. Like Brummell, Rawdon lives on someone else’s good

favor, that of his bohemian aunt, Miss Crawley. When he

secretly marries Becky, he angers his aunt and she withdraws

his allowance and her protection. 39 Rawdon’s downfall, and,

by default, Becky’s as well, could be modeled on Brummell’s

expulsion from the Prince of Wales’ favor and society. Like

Becky and Rawdon, without his benefactor, Brummell was

forced to flee to France to escape his debts. Rawdon is only

saved because Becky is able to negotiate with his creditors

and allow him to return to England. Rawdon must hide in

Calais, where Brummell was marooned until 1831, as Becky

pays off his debts. 40

In the description of their lifestyle upon returning to

London, Thackeray most clearly equates Becky and Rawdon with

the lifestyle of Brummell and the ton. In the chapter

entitled “How to live well on nothing a year,”41 Thackeray

39 Ibid, 180.40 Ibid, 356-35741 Thackeray, 353.

13

details the methods the elegant and aristocratic purportedly

use to live primarily on credit. Thackeray places Becky and

Rawdon’s new home at 201 Curzon Street, Mayfair, in the

fashionable area of London’s West End. 42 According to

Moers, Brummell lived in the nearby Chesterfield Street43

and presumably, like Rawdon and Becky, did not pay his

bills. Thackeray is deliberate in his emphasis on credit and

the influence of aristocratic connections. While Becky is

charming Rawdon’s older brother, Sir Pitt, Rawdon wishes she

could convince Sir Pitt to give them money. However,

Thackeray is quick to make the point that what she received

from the visible relationship was just as good as cash:

credit. 44 Through Becky’s machinations she uses her

connection with Sir Pitt to imply a large income and

inevitable payment of all bills and loans and is able to

ward off complaints and more serious consequences from her

landlord and staff.

42 Ibid, 35343 Ibid, 2544 Ibid, 435

14

Becky is most like a dandy in her unshakeable belief

that she is better than everyone else, regardless of her

social station. Like Brummell, Becky saw herself on an

equal footing with the aristocracy. Early in the novel,

Becky thinks to herself:

“ I have nothing to look for but what my own labor can bring me; and while that little pink-faced chit Amelia, with not half my sense, has tenthousand pounds herself and an establishment secure, poor Rebecca (and my figure is far better than hers) has only herself and her own wits to trust. Well, let us see if my wits cannot provide me with an honorable maintenance, and if some day or the other I cannot show Miss Amelia my real superiority over her…. It will be a day, when I can take my place above her in the world, as why indeed, should I not?”45

Upon reaching her social goal of being presented in

court to George IV, Becky is in a state of uncontrolled

enthusiasm for the first time. 46 Becky “got up the genteel

with amazing assiduity, readiness and success…” and

“believed herself to be a fine lady,”47 and essentially

forgets her true place in society and her lack of money.

45 Thackeray, 86.46 Ibid, 465.47 Ibid, 467.

15

Thackeray describes the culmination of Becky’s view of

herself:

And as she went to court in the carriage, sheadopted a demeanor so grand, so self-satisfied, deliberate and imposing, that it made even Lady Jane laugh. She walked into the royal apartments with a toss of the head which would have befitted an empress, and I have no doubt, had she been one,she would have become the character perfectly.48

It is in this chapter, entitled ‘In Which the Reader is

Introduced to the very Best of Company”49 Becky and the

view she has of herself finally merge. Not only is she

finally somewhat justified in believing herself better than

her childhood people, better than Amelia and the majority

of polite society, she is acknowledged for her elegance,

and her superior, milliner-like taste. 50

It is in her court dress, as she is presented to George

IV, that we truly see Becky’s dandy qualities. Her court

dress “was pronounced to be charmante on the eventful day of

her presentation.” In true dandy fashion Becky’s dress

outshines those of her “betters” and the actual royalty. Her

48 Ibid, 467.49 Ibid, 465.50 Ibid, 468.

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sister-in-law concludes “sorrowfully to herself that she was

quite inferior in taste to Mrs. Becky.”51 However, as

Thackeray is quick to point out, Lady Jane does not “know

how much care, thought and genius Mrs. Rawdon had bestowed

upon that garment.” 52 Because what is a dandy if not

someone who puts considerable time and effort into their

dress, though secretly?

Becky, given her status and income, is creative in her

procurement of her “ancient brocade” and lace. She stole the

materials from Queen’s Crawley. 53 Her use of old brocade

and lace was a popular practice in the nineteenth century,

when it was common to make or remake gowns out of eighteenth

century silk or materials.

Becky’s outfit is also described in the newspapers, with the

details of all the accessories and accouterments, which may

imply that Becky is a style arbiter for the lower classes,

or anyone other than the peerage.54

51 Thackeray, 468.52 Ibid, 468.53 Ibid, 468.54 Ibid, 470

17

One of the key differences, however, between Becky and

Brummell, is that Thackeray does not focus on her clothing

and dress as significant character indicators. Instead,

discussion of Becky’s dress is relatively minor, and

seemingly mentioned only in passing and only when others

view a particular of her dress. According to Moers,

twentieth-century dandy Max Beerbohm (1872-1956) insisted

that Brummell’s attention and focus on dress is key to his

self-presentation and his “art”.55 However, the lack of

regular discussion of Becky’s dress could be just a

stylistic choice of Thackeray; the author rarely describes

the day-to-day lives of his characters and only allows

inconsistent glimpses into their inner thoughts. The

character of Becky could be modeled on Brummell, yet it

appears Thackeray was ignorant of women’s fashions of the

Regency period and has no means with which to describe them.

His illustrations that accompany the novel, feature the

women characters in anachronistic dress that is closer to

that of the 1840s than the 1810s and 1820s during which the

55 Moers, 21.

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majority of the novel takes place. Additionally, even those

characters that Thackeray has identified as dandies – such

as Cuff from George Osborne and William Dobbin’s youth,56 or

Rawdon, Thackeray neglects to discuss their dress in any

detail at all. Throughout the early chapters of the novel,

there would have been relatively little to discuss about

Becky’s dress, as she was wearing Amelia’s old gowns. 57

The question still remains whether Thackeray’s “little

adventuress” can be identified as a sort of female dandy.

Her motivations and behavior, as well as the early emphasis

of dandyism in the novel, indicate the dandy’s decided

influence on the creation of Becky Sharp’s life. However,

little time is spent on Becky’s dress or tailoring. Key

aspects of dandyism are left to her husband, such as an

education at Eton, time spent in the military and a penchant

for cheating at cards. As a female in the early years of the

nineteenth century, there are certain areas Becky is not

permitted to go. For the majority of the novel she is openly

shunned and distrusted by the society women while the men

56Thackeray, 39.57Ibid, 59-60.

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find her charming and witty. Without being a man, Becky is

limited in expressing her “dandified” nature fully. Becky,

as a female, cannot be a true dandy, but she can be the

female version of the dandy and she can be the witty,

controlled half of the dandy she and Rawdon create together.

Bibliography

20

Adburgham, Alison. Silver Fork Society: Fashionable Life and Literature 1814-1840. London: Constable. 1983.

Cole, Sarah Rose. “The Aristocrat in the Mirror: Male Vanityand Bourgeois Desire in William Makepeace Thackeray’s VanityFair.” In Nineteenth-Century Literature, Vol. 61, No.2 (September 2006): 137-170. University of California Press. accessed on Oct. 11, 2013. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/ncl.2006.61.2.137>  

de Balzac, Honoré. Treatise on Elegant Living. Translated by Napoleon Jeffries. Cambridge, MA: Wakefield Press, 2010.

Moers, Ellen. The Dandy: Brummell to Beerbohm. London: Seeker andWarburg. 1960.

Murray, Venetia. An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England. New York: Penguin Putnam, Inc, 1998.

Irvin, Kate. “Fabricating a Dream: Two Centuries of Sketching and Defining the Dandy.” In Artist, Dandy, Rebel: Men of Fashion, edited by Kate Irvin and Laurie Anne Brewer, 25-59. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013.

Perrot, Philippe. Fashioning the Bourgeoisie: A History of Clothing in the Nineteenth Century. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,1994.

Priestley, J.B. The Prince of Pleasure and His Regency 1811-1820. London: Sphere Books Ltd, 1969.

Thackeray, William Makepeace. Vanity Fair. 1848. Reprint, New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2003.

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Appendix

Plot Synopsis of Vanity Fair:

Becky is a sociopathic, opportunistic social climber

and the novel begins with her leaving a girls boarding

school, Miss Pinkerton’s, with her friend, Amelia. Becky is

poor, the daughter of an artist and was sent to the school

to teach French, the native tongue of her mother. The plot

is set in motion by Amelia’s and Becky’s cross-class

friendship, which Becky effectively manipulates. She first

attempts to wrangle a proposal from Amelia’s vain and silly

brother, Jos Sedley, but is blocked by Amelia’s fiancé,

George Osborne. Both Jos and George are presented as men who

envision themselves dandies.

Becky is then sent to Queen’s Crawley, to educate the

daughters of the vulgar baronet, Sir Pitt Crawley, where she

22

meets his aunt, the wealthy and bohemian Miss Crawley. After

worming her way into Miss Crawley’s graces, Becky secretly

marries her favored nephew and incites her wrath. While

Becky attempts to manipulate Miss Crawley’s affections to

re-instate Rawdon’s allowance, the pair travel to Brussels,

where Rawdon survives Waterloo, and then Paris, the first

place Becky is accepted into high society.

Eventually the pair return to London, son in tow, and

Becky procures the wealthy Lord Steyne as a social and

monetary supporter. While Rawdon plays cards and raises

their son, Becky works to ingratiate themselves to Rawdon’s

older, now wealthy, brother and his wife. Eventually she

succeeds socially and is presented at court. However, Becky

and Rawdon constantly live beyond their means and bankrupt

several members of the working class in their schemes.

Eventually Becky is driven from London once Rawdon suspects

her of infidelity with Lord Steyne and both men turn their

back on her. Becky eventually ends in Bohemia, living far

below her former standard of living, where she reconnects

with Amelia and finally entraps Jos. It is implied that

23

Becky slowly poisons Jos while scamming him out of his

income, until his death, when she is awarded a portion of

his assets. The novel ends on negative, cynical note where

Thackeray implies that the reader is just as vain, jealous

and unsatisfied as the characters of Vanity Fair.

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