Christa Giles

or grotesque or lacking in style. . . . Our very
dress makes us grotesques. We are the zanies
of sorrow. We are clowns whose hearts are
broken. 161
It is interesting that Huysmans and Hennique had
originally planned to continue creating pantomimes, one of
which was to have been a ˝Tentation de Saint-Pierrot.˝ The
Pierrot, like the dandy, masks his ironic detachment, his
despair, but in the Pierrot’s case this mask manifests itself
as a frenetic joy. He is a parody of the dandy, and like the
dandy is a kind of mythic figure, encompassing both the
devil and the saint, joy and sorrow. On the title-page for the
Pierrot sceptique (Paris Rouveyre, 1881), we are presented
with a frenetically smiling and dancing dandy/Pierrot. His
cravat and coat-tails are flowing and prodigious and a
tailor stands by with enormous menacing scissors and a bill
of a thousand francs in his hand. The reason for the choice
of Chéret as illustrator becomes clear upon examining
Huysmans’ description of Chéret’s work in Certains:
M. Chéret a d’abord le sens de la joie, mais de
la joie telle qu’elle se peut comprendre sans
être abjecte, de la joie frénétique et narquoise,
comme glacée de la pantomime, une joie que
son excès même exhausse, en la rapprochant
presque de la douleur.
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