ABSTRACT
As the epigraphs to this chapter suggest, the figure of Oscar Wilde - together with those of other fin-de-siecle dandies and decadents - continued to resonate for Natalie Barney and Romaine Brooks long after he and his work had become passe within an emerging modernist avant-garde. It is clear from the history of the critical reception of Barney and Brooks that an unconventional lifestyle, particularly if it coincides with or is grounded in a lesbian identity, is no guarantee of an avant-garde reputation. In adopting the voice of the Wildean epigrammist and decadent poet/novelist, or in assuming the costume of the dandy, Barney and Brooks deliberately invoked the cultural markers of a marginal, deviant, and illegal sexuality. In the case of Barney and Brooks, the second-hand need not be understood as second-rate but rather as a strategy of recycling images, voices, and costumes in the interest of creating a newly visible and deviant sexuality.
