Happy belated Valentine's! This is my thrift tribute to that day: The Men in Your Life, Timeless Advice and Wisdom on Managing the Opposite Sex, dug up for $1.99 at my local thrift store.Written by Genevieve Antoine Dariaux in 1968 and reissued in this 2004 pink-clad hardcover, this pocketbook contains many witty tidbits of advice, organized into alphabetized blurbs on various topics and running the gamut from "absence", "accessories" and "actors" to "sins", "skin" and "slaps".
Some of the tips are charmingly dated, while others - like Dariaux's claim that men will soon be using enough beauty products as women do, are alarmingly accurate.
I love her thoughts on "chic," something which she says depends not on intelligence, money or beauty, but rather on "ease" or "nonchalance".
A great little gem.
It looks like a lovely read. I really do enjoy coming across books or leaflets like these and seeing their older world through my modern eyes.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great find. I think it is still available through online booksellers and worth the read. Mme Dariaux penned one of the first style bibles, Elegance (but you may know that) which if you were to find in your thrifting could be worth over $100 (1960's version not repreint). A lot to learn from this woman.
ReplyDeleteHi Jenifir, so nice to have you in here; welcome to GQ! Yes, I have heard of Elegance though I have never read it - there was a book written recently that was based on it, and I've read that. Will have to keep an eye out for the originals for sure!
ReplyDeleteI am happy to have your blog. I have been looking for the original for years but with no luck, I have read the fiction book on it too. As a teenage, I read my Mum's copy that she bought as a university student in or around 1964 and she gave it to me for Christmas! It is probably worth having the reprint.
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