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THACKERAY AND ALEXANDER DUMAS FILS

Alexander Dumas fils published The Lady of the Camellias in 1848 [fils: French for "the son of"; translated as "the Younger"]. Like Thackeray, he is a moralist, exposing the hypocrisies and vanities of his society. Both write about the heartlessness and materialism of fashionable society, though the openness with which they present their materials differs significantly. In Vanity Fair, Thackeray frankly admits that he depicts vice only in the vaguest terms, the terms which his prudish society allows:

The times are such that one scarcely dares to allude to that kind of company which thousands of our young men in Vanity Fair are frequenting every day, which nightly fills casinos and dancing rooms, which is known to exist as well as the Ring in Hyde Park or the Congregation at St. James's–but which the most squeamish if not the most moral of societies is determined to ignore. (page 579, chapter XLIX)

Society's hypocrisy is inhibiting, "There are things we do and know perfectly well in Vanity Fair, though we never speak of them" because a "polite society" will not "read an authentic description of vice" (page 759, chapter XLIV). Therefore, Thackeray can only hint at the demimonde [demimonde: a class of women who are not respectable because of sexual promiscuity or indiscreet behavior].

Writing at the same time as Thackeray, whose serialized Vanity Fair appeared in 1847-1848, Dumas forthrightly depicts the world of the courtesan and the aristocratic pursuit of pleasure. Men, of course, could move between the respectable world and the demimonde. The Lady of the Camellias is the story of the grand passion of Armand Duval and Marguerite Gautier, a successful courtesan who is dying of tuberculosis.

In effect, Dumas fills in the blanks in Thackeray's depiction of the life led and attitudes held by "thousands of our young men in Vanity Fair" and by aristocrats like Lord Steyne. There can be no clearer summary of the life they are leading than the passage in which Marguerite's next door neighbor, Prudence Duvernoy, urges Armand to accept Marguerite's having other (paying) lovers. Prudence is attempting to initiate him into the mercenary, soulless way of the world or Fashionable Society.

Armand, who became Marguerite's lover just the day before, is jealous of her relationships with other men. He waits with the greedy, self-serving Prudence for the Comte de G. to leave Marguerite's house, so that Armand can spend the rest of the night with Marguerite. The middle-aged Prudence lives off of Marguerite and abandons her as she slowly dies in agony and in debt.

March 2, 2011