The tremendous Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds has a section on "Influence of Politics and Religion on the Hair and Beard", detailing the various times it's been banned/compulsory/taxed.
This is an interesting article and all, but I have to say that the picture of a waiter with a tray and a bottle of wine in mid-fall was even more interesting. Probably staged, but still an arresting shot.
Before I clicked the link to the article, I thought this comment was referring to the season (i.e. "mid-autumn"), and I was really confused about why this would be so interesting
Hemingway talks about similar mustache-relates social strife occurring in the 1920s, in _A Movable Feast_, his memoirs of his life as a young man in Paris.
The conversation is set at the Cafe Lilas (which is still open today, though mostly as a tourist trap), with Evan Shipman, a fellow American writer and journalist.
“He’s in trouble already,” Evan said.
“How?”
“They’re changing the management,” Evan said. “The new
owners want to have a different clientele that will spend
some money and they are going to put in an American bar.
The waiters are going to be in white jackets, Hem, and
they have been ordered to be ready to shave off their
mustaches.”
“They can’t do that to André and Jean.”
“They shouldn’t be able to, but they will.”
“Jean has had a mustache all his life. That’s a dragoon’s
mustache. He served in a cavalry regiment.”
“He’s going to have to cut it off.”
I drank the last of the whisky.
“Another whisky, Monsieur?” Jean asked. “A whisky,
Monsieur Shipman?” His heavy drooping mustache was a part
of his thin, kind face, and the bald top of his head
glistened under the strands of hair that were slicked
across it.
“Don’t do it, Jean,” I said. “Don’t take a chance.”
“There is no chance,” he said, softly to us. “There is
much confusion. Many are leaving. Entendu, Messieurs,” he
said aloud. He went into the café and came out carrying
the bottle of whisky, two large glasses, two ten-franc
gold-rimmed saucers and a seltzer bottle.
“No, Jean,” I said.
He put the glasses down on the saucers and filled them
almost to the brim with whisky and took the remains of the
bottle back into the café. Evan and I squirted a little
seltzer into the glasses.
“It was a good thing Dostoyevsky didn’t know Jean,” Evan
said. “He might have died of drink.”
“What are we going to do with these?”
“Drink them,” Evan said. “It’s a protest. It’s direct action.”
On the following Monday when I went to the Lilas to work
in the morning, André served me a bovril, which is a cup
of beef extract and water. He was short and blond and
where his stubby mustache had been, his lip was as bare as
a priest’s. He was wearing a white American barman’s coat.
I think you haven't heard about all the latest protests in France? Between the new work code (loi travail), the Notre Dame des Landes airport and the recent transport strike, there are still organized protests here.
[+] [-] pjc50|7 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_Popular_Delusion...
[+] [-] msla|7 years ago|reply
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24518
[+] [-] scott_s|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] KeitIG|7 years ago|reply
Worth to mention the Pioneers of the French Foreign Legion are one of the only soldiers (that I know) who can wear beards. [1]
[+] [-] gaius|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rossdavidh|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] saghm|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AceJohnny2|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] atourgates|7 years ago|reply
The conversation is set at the Cafe Lilas (which is still open today, though mostly as a tourist trap), with Evan Shipman, a fellow American writer and journalist.
[+] [-] yosefzeev|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Legogris|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baud147258|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mrec|7 years ago|reply