Full text loading...
-
Stepping out in bathers: Displaying masculinities in F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway and Willa Cather
- Source: Critical Studies in Men's Fashion, Volume 2, Issue 1, Mar 2015, p. 75 - 87
-
- 01 Mar 2015
Abstract
There is a moment in post-World War I literature when the American male steps out semi-clad in bathers. At the shoreline these men in swimwear display new expressions of masculinity combined with the old to expose the flaws in society. In the revealing and concealing of men�s bodies and masculinities there is a residual anxiety despite the confidence with which these men emerge at the water�s edge, and despite the legitimizing sports aesthetic that swimwear affords their �nakedness�. This article explores the depiction of the semi-clad man at the shoreline: The bright young men in bathers in F. Scott Fitzgerald�s Tender is the Night ([1934] 1986), and The Great Gatsby ([1926] 1979), to his Movie mogul who cannot swim in The Last Tycoon ([1941] 1987) are moments of crisis and revelation. For Ernest Hemingway in Fiesta, The Sun also Rises ([1927] 2004) and The Garden of Eden ([1987] 1994) men donning their bathers experience a cleansing and rebirth. Whilst Willa Cather in The Professor�s House ([1925] 1990) unites a sense of display and assuredness of masculinity in the revelation of the male nakedness and swimming. The shoreline emerges as a liminal space that allows masculinities to be performed, displayed, explored and habituated.