:Beau Brummell

File:Joshua Reynolds - The Brummel Children (1780s).jpg, The Brummel Children, 1780s. George is the younger.]]

Brummell was born in Downing Street, London,{{Cite web |title=Beau Brummell {{!}} Leader of Fashion {{!}} Blue Plaques |url=https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/blue-plaques/beau-brummell/ |access-date=2023-04-27 |website=English Heritage}} the younger son of William Brummell ({{abbr|d.|died}} 1795), Private Secretary to the Prime Minister, Lord North, and Mary (née Richardson, daughter of the Keeper of the Lottery Office).John Timbs, English Eccentrics and Eccentricities (London: Chatto and Windus, 1875), 22.{{Cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-3771|isbn = 978-0-19-861412-8|doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/3771|chapter = Brummell, George Bryan [known as Beau Brummell] (1778–1840), dandy and socialite|title = Oxford Dictionary of National Biography|year = 2004|last1 = Carter|first1 = Philip}} North rated William Brummell highly, procuring for him appointments including those he held at the time of his death, namely Receiver of the Duties on Uninhabited Houses in London and Middlesex, Comptroller of the Hawkers' and Pedlars' Office, and Agent and Paymaster to the out-pensioners of Chelsea Hospital; these gave William about £2,500 per annum.The Life of George Brummell, commonly called Beau Brummell, vol. 1, William Jesse, Grolier Society, 1981, p. 22 On his retirement from politics, William had bought Donnington Grove in Berkshire and served as High Sheriff of Berkshire in 1788.A Visitation of the Seats and Arms of the Noblemen and Gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland, second series, Sir Bernard Burke, Hurst & Blackett, 1855, p. 25 William was the son of another William Brummell ({{abbr|d.|died}} 1770), who had been valet to a Lincolnshire politician, Charles Monson, and, reckoned "an excellent servant", met with some success despite his modest origins through patronage and good fortune;{{Cite web|url=https://www.wivenhoehistory.org.uk/content/topics/people-2/william-brummell-1777-1853|title=William Brummell (1777-1853)}} he went into business as a confectioner in Bury Street, "in an area notorious for{{nbsp}}[...] high-class brothels", letting some rooms in the family's house for boarding. The statesman Charles Jenkinson, 1st Earl of Liverpool, stayed there for a time and got the younger William a clerical position at the Treasury, which led to his successful career.Beau Brummell: The Ultimate Man of Style, Chapter 1: Blessed are the Placemakers- 1778–1786, Ian Kelly, Simon & Schuster, 2006, p. 1The Life of George Brummell, commonly called Beau Brummell, vol. 1, William Jesse, Grolier Society, 1981, pp. 17–18The Incredible Beau Brummell, Samuel Tenenbaum, A. S. Barnes, 1967, p. 16

The family had achieved middle class status, but William Brummell was ambitious for his son George to become a gentleman, and he was raised with that understanding. It was suggested (possibly by the Brummells) that William Brummell was an illegitimate descendant of Frederick, Prince of Wales.The Gentleman's Magazine, Nov. 1866, collected vol. 221, p. 693

Brummell was educated at Eton College and made his precocious mark on fashion when he not only modernised the white stock, or cravat, that was the mark of the "Eton boy", but added a gold buckle to it.{{Citation

| last =John

| first =Doran

| year =1857

| title =Miscellaneous Works, Volume I: Habits and Men, Beau Brummell

| place =Great Britain

| publisher = Richard Bentley

| page =379

}}

He progressed to Oxford University, where, by his own example, he made cotton stockings and dingy cravats fall out of favour. While an undergraduate at Oriel College in 1793, he competed for the Chancellor's Prize for Latin Verse, coming second to Edward Copleston, who later became provost of his college.The list of winners appears in successive editions of the [https://books.google.com/books?id=VbkUAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA134 Oxford University Calendar] He left the university after only a year at age 16.

File:George Stubbs (1724-1806) - Soldiers of the 10th Light Dragoons - RCIN 400512 - Royal Collection.jpg.]]

In June 1794, Brummell joined the 10th Light Dragoons, later the Tenth Royal Hussars as a cornet, the lowest rank of commissioned officer,{{London Gazette|issue=13677|page=619|date=28 June 1794}} and soon after had his nose broken by a kick from a horse.{{Citation

| last =Jesse

| first =William

| year =1844

| title =The Life of George Brummell, Esq., Commonly Called Beau Brummell

| place =Great Britain

| publisher =Saunders and Otley

| page =383

}} His father died in 1795, by which time Brummell had been promoted to lieutenant.{{London Gazette|issue=13773|page=379|date=28 April 1795}} His father had left him an inheritance of some £30,000. Ordinarily a considerable sum, it was inadequate for the expenses of an aspiring officer in the personal regiment of the Prince of Wales. The officers, many of whom were heirs to noble titles and lands, "wore their estates upon their backs – some of them before they had inherited the paternal acres."Doran, p. 380 Officers in any military regiment were required to provide their own mounts and uniforms and to pay mess bills, but the 10th in particular had elaborate and nearly endless variations of uniform. Their mess expenses were unusually high because the regiment frequently enjoyed banquets and entertainment.

For such a junior officer, Brummell took the regiment by storm, fascinating the Prince:

{{blockquote|"[T]he first gentleman of England", by the force of his personality. He was allowed to miss parade, shirk his duties and, in essence, do just as he pleased. Within three years, by 1796, he was made a captain, to the envy and disgust of older officers who felt that "our general's friend was now the general."}}

In 1797,{{London Gazette|nolink=y|issue=14072|page=1175|date=12 December 1797}} "10th Regiment of Light Dragoons, Lieutenant John Chambers to be Captain, by Purchase, vice Brummell, who retires." when his regiment was sent from London to Manchester, he immediately resigned his commission, citing the city's poor reputation, undistinguished ambience and want of culture and civility.Jesse{{full citation needed|date=November 2023}}

File:BrummellDighton1805.jpg]]

Although he was now a civilian, Brummell's friendship with (and influence over) the Prince continued. He became a noted figure in fashion and adopted a habit of dress that rejected overly ornate clothes in favour of understated but perfectly fitted and tailored bespoke garments; this was the moment of the so-called Great Male Renunciation seen across Europe. His daily dress was similar to that of other gentlemen in his time, based upon dark coats and full-length trousers (rather than knee breeches and stockings). It is believed that around this time Brummell and his tailor (whom he shared with the Prince Regent) Jonathan Meyer (later Meyer & Mortimer) of Conduit Street, collaborated to produce what was to become the contemporary trouser – a garment, it is alleged, that Brummell subsequently introduced to London society and that has remained standard gentleman’s attire ever since. https://us.masonandsons.com/blogs/the-periodical/recreating-a-masterpiece-part-006-the-make Above all, Brummell favoured immaculate shirt linen and an elaborately knotted cravat.[http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/21/dillon.php "A Poet of Cloth"], a Spring 2006 article on Brummell's cravats from Cabinet magazine This mode of cravat-wearing has been described as Brummell's chief innovation.William Jesse, Beau Brummell (London: Saunders and Otley, 1844), Vol. I, 61.

Brummell took a house on Chesterfield Street in Mayfair{{cite news|title=Chesterfield Street|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/periodproperty/9821880/Homes-for-sale-with-blue-plaques.html?frame=2460164|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130130065446/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/periodproperty/9821880/Homes-for-sale-with-blue-plaques.html?frame=2460164|url-status=dead|archive-date=2013-01-30|newspaper=Daily Telegraph}} and, for a time, managed to avoid the nightly gaming and other extravagances frequent in such elevated circles. Where he refused to economise was on his dress: when asked how much it would cost to keep a single man in clothes, he was said to have replied: "Why, with tolerable economy, I think it might be done with £800",The laws of etiquette: or, Short rules and reflections for conduct in society by A Gentleman, Carey, Lea, & Blanchard, 1836 p. 136 at a time when the average annual wage for a craftsman was £52. Additionally, he claimed that he took five hours a day to dress and recommended that boots be polished with champagne.{{cite web|url=https://www.janeausten.co.uk/beau-brummell-and-the-birth-of-regency-fashion/|title=Beau Brummell and the Birth of Regency Fashion|first=Written byLaura|last=Boyle|date=17 June 2011|website=Jane Austen}} This preoccupation with dress, coupled with a nonchalant display of wit, was referred to as dandyism.

Brummell put into practice the principles of harmony of shape and contrast of colours with such a pleasing result that men of superior rank sought his opinion on their own dress:

{{blockquote|The Duke of Bedford once did this touching a coat. Brummell examined his Grace with the cool impertinence which was his Grace's due. He turned him about, scanned him with scrutinizing, contemptuous eye, and then taking the lapel between his dainty finger and thumb, he exclaimed in a tone of pitying wonder, "Bedford, do you call this thing a coat?"Doran, p. 386}}

His personal habits, such as a fastidious attention to cleaning his teeth, shaving, and daily bathing exerted an influence on the ton—the upper echelons of polite society—who began to do likewise. Enthralled, the Prince would spend hours in Brummell's dressing room, witnessing the progress of his friend's lengthy morning toilette.

In June 1811 he was one of the guests at the Carlton House Fête held to celebrate the beginning of the Regency era.David, Saul. Prince of Pleasure: The Prince of Wales and the Making of the Regency. Sharpe Books, 2018. p.297

While studying at Eton, Brummell played for the school's first eleven,Kelly 2005 although he is said to have once terrified a master there by asserting that he thought cricket was "foolish".Max Beerbohm, [http://www.dandyism.net/beerbohms-dandies-and-dandies Dandies and Dandies (1896)] He did, however, play a single first-class match for Hampshire at Lord's Old Ground in 1807 against an early all-England cricket team. Brummell made scores of 23 and 3 on that occasion, leaving him with a career batting average of 13.00.George Brummell at [http://www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/player/10534.html CricInfo]

File:Almacks with Brummell.jpg, supposedly in 1815; the couple on the left are annotated as "Beau Brummell in deep conversation with the Duchess of Rutland".]]

Brummell's wealthier friends influenced him; he began spending and gambling as though his fortune was as ample as theirs. He found it increasingly difficult to maintain his lifestyle as his spending continued over time, but his prominent position in society allowed him to float a line of credit. This situation changed in July 1813 at a masquerade ball jointly hosted at Watier's private club by Brummell, Lord Alvanley, Henry Mildmay and Henry Pierrepont. The four were considered the prime movers of Watier's, dubbed "the Dandy Club" by Lord Byron. The Prince Regent greeted Alvanley and Pierrepont at the event, and then "cut" Brummell and Mildmay by staring at their faces without speaking.Grace and Philip Wharton, The Wits and Beaux of Society, London 1861, [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10797/10797-h/10797-h.htm Volume 2] This provoked Brummell's remark, "Alvanley, who's your fat friend?".

File:Who's your fat friend.png by pretending not to know him.{{citation |title=The Wits and Beaux of Society |pages=394–397 |author=Grace and Philip Wharton, illustration by James Godwin.|year=1861}}]]

This incident marked the final breach in a rift between Brummell and the Regent that had opened in 1811, when the Prince became Regent and began abandoning all his old Whig friends.{{cite book|last1=Campbell|first1=Kathleen|title=Beau Brummell|date=1948|publisher=Hammond|location=London}} Brummell became an anomalous favourite, flourishing without a patron, influencing fashion and courted by a large segment of society.Kelly, Campbell, Jerrold

In 1816, Brummell, owing thousands of pounds, fled to France to escape debtor's prison. Some sources liberally estimate he owed up to £600,000 at the time.{{Cite web |date=2018-08-15 |title=Beau Brummell: The Original Gentleman Of Style |url=https://www.gentlemansgazette.com/beau-brummell-the-original/ |access-date=2022-06-05 |language=en-US}} Usually, Brummell's gambling obligations, being "debts of honour", were paid immediately. The one exception to that was his final wager, dated March 1815 in White's betting book, which was marked "not paid, 20th January, 1816".[http://janeaustensworld.wordpress.com/2007/05/28/beau-brummells-gambling/The Regency Underworld, Donald A Low] Seemingly unable to quell his urge to spend and gamble, it became apparent his lifestyle could no longer be sustained. Brummell was ostracized from his social circle and soon found refuge in France.{{Cite web |last=Knowles |first=Rachel |title=The rise and fall of Beau Brummell (1778-1840) |url=https://www.regencyhistory.net/2012/11/the-rise-and-fall-of-beau-brummell-1778.html |access-date=2022-06-05}}

He lived the remainder of his life in French exile, spending ten years in Calais without an official passport, before acquiring an appointment to the consulate at Caen in 1830 through the influence of Lord Alvanley and the Duke of Beaufort. This provided him with a small annuity to fuel his new life in France; however, this lasted only two years because the Foreign Office acted on Brummell's recommendation to abolish the consulate. He had made it in the hope of being appointed to a more remunerative position elsewhere to regain some influence, but no new position was forthcoming, much to his detriment.

Rapidly running out of money and growing increasingly slovenly in his dress, he was forced by his long-unpaid Calais creditors into debtors' prison in 1835. Only through the charitable intervention of his friends in England was he able to secure his release later that year. In 1840, Brummell died aged 61, penniless and demented from syphilis, at Le Bon Sauveur Asylum on the outskirts of Caen. He was buried at Cimetière Protestant, Caen, France.Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 6018–6019). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.

File:Beau Brummell Statue Jermyn Street.JPG in London's Jermyn Street]]

A very early portrait of Brummell, along with his elder brother William, occurs in the Joshua Reynolds painting of the curly-headed Brummell children, dating from 1781 and now in the Kenwood House collection.{{Cite web|url=http://uploads3.wikiart.org/images/joshua-reynolds/the-brummell-children-1782.jpg|title=WikiArt}} The caricaturist Richard Dighton painted a watercolour of Brummell at the elegant height of his dandyism and used it as the basis for a popular print in 1805. Two centuries later, it served as model for a 2002 statue of Brummell by Irena Sedlecká, erected in Jermyn Street.{{cite web|url=https://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/beau-brummell-statue/|title=Beau Brummell statue|website=London Remembers}} A plaque on the front of this statue is inscribed with his own words: "to be truly elegant, one should not be noticed."{{Cite web|title=Beau Brummell Statue|url=https://citydays.com/places/beau-brummell-statue/|access-date=2021-12-02|website=citydays.com|date=15 October 2021 |language=en}} On the other side of Piccadilly, a blue plaque has marked Brummell's former home in Chesterfield Street since 1984, while in 2013, another plaque commemorated his name as a member of the hunting and dining club in Melton Mowbray.{{cite web|url=http://openplaques.org/plaques/22|title=Beau Brummell blue plaque|first=Open|last=Plaques|website=openplaques.org}}

In literature, Brummell has been more extensively portrayed. Scarcely had he left England than he was satirised as the witty Bellair in the picaresque novel Six Weeks at Long's, by a Late Resident (1817), now ascribed to Eaton Stannard Barrett.Romantic Circles, [https://www.rc.umd.edu/reference/byron-fictions/1816.html "Fictions of Byron"] Among his humorous remarks there, he is credited with denouncing the eating of vegetables and, when challenged whether he had ever tried it, replying, "Oh, yes, I remember I once ate a pea."Hathi Trust, [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=dul1.ark:/13960/t8ff4nt0n;view=1up;seq=41 vol.3, p. 33] A collection of the witticisms ascribed to him and of anecdotes about him under the title Brummelliana was republished many times in the following decades.The Flowers of Literature vol.2, London 1821, [https://books.google.com/books?id=jPMIAAAAQAAJ&dq=%22brummelliana%22&pg=PA131 pp. 131–4] This began with the story of him enquiring the identity of his companion's "fat friend", and also included his "I once ate a pea" remark. William Hazlitt borrowed the same title, "Brummelliana", for an unsympathetic essay published in 1828, referring to some of these stories and repeating others uncollected there.{{Cite web|url=http://www.dandyism.net/2024/01/06/hazlitts-brummelliana/|title=Hazlitt's Brummelliana – Dandyism.net|date=6 January 2024}} Dandyism also came under attack in George Robert Wythen Baxter's satirical essay "Kiddyism", published in humorous journals from 1832 onwards, which culminates in a set of satirical aphorisms purporting to be yet more Brummelliana.Humour and Pathos, London 1838, [https://books.google.com/books?id=hgwtAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22+Let+notoriety+be+your+leading+principle%22&pg=PA102 pp. 98–102] Further fictitious aphorisms were published in France by Honoré de Balzac in the course of a series of articles published under the title {{lang|fr|Traité de la vie élégante}} (1830). These sayings were supposed to have arisen during an interview with Brummell in Boulogne, rather than Calais, and epitomise his view of "the elegant life".Rising Star: Dandyism, Gender, and Performance in the Fin de Siecle, Princeton University 1999, [https://books.google.com/books?id=sbMZzSzHHLoC&dq=balzac+trait%C3%A9+de+la+vie+%C3%A9l%C3%A9gante++%22Brummell%22&pg=PA14 p. 16]

Brummell appears at length in The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson, Written by Herself, (1825) as a former suitor of Harriette Wilson's friend Julia. "In short," she wrote, "his maxims on dress were excellent. Besides this, he was neither uneducated nor deficient. He possessed also a sort of quaint, dry humour, not amounting to anything like wit; indeed, he said nothing which would bear repetition; but his affected manners and little absurdities amused for the moment. Then it became the fashion to court Brummell's society, which was enough to make many seek it who cared not for it; and many more wished to be well with him through fear, for all knew him to be cold, heartless, and satirical."{{Cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XNFhEAAAQBAJ&dq=his+maxims+on+dress+were+excellent.+Besides+this,+he+was+neither+uneducated+nor+deficient.%22&pg=PT42|title=The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson|first=Harriette|last=Wilson|date=9 July 2020|publisher=e-artnow|via=Google Books}}

Two more books were later dedicated to confirming Brummell as a cult figure. In England, there was Captain Jesse's two volume Life of George Brummell (1844), the first biography devoted to him.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kew5AAAAcAAJ|title=The life of George Brummell commonly called Beau Brummell |author=William Jesse |volume=I|date=6 May 2019|publisher=Saunders & Otley|via=Google Books}} In France, there was the influential essay of Jules Amédée Barbey d'Aurevilly, "On Dandyism and George Brummell" (1845), which seeks to define the essence of dandyism through a study of his career and opinions. In the course of his essay, Barbey d'Aurevilly deprecates English attempts to portray Brummell in fiction: "Within Brummell's lifetime two well-known authors took up their pen{{spnd}}sharpened to exquisite points and dipped in musk-scented Chinese ink{{spnd}}to cast on blue-tinted paper with silver borders a few facile lines where one catches a glimpse of Brummell."Du dandysme et de George Brummell, [https://archive.org/stream/dudandysmeetdeg00aurgoog#page/n45/mode/2up/search/Pelham chapter 7] He was referring to two examples of the fashionable or silver fork novel, of which more than a thousand were to be written over the next two decades.

Brummell's character also served as foundation for depiction of fictional dandies. One such is the character Trebeck in Thomas Henry Lister's Granby (1826), who abandons dandyism when he discovers a waistcoat of his devising worn by "a natty apprentice".Available on the [https://archive.org/stream/granbynovel01list#page/n5/mode/2up Internet Archive] In Bulwer Lytton's 1828 novel Pelham, the hero of the title passes through Calais and meets the inspiration of his dandiacal way of life in the character of Mr. Russelton. The latter is modeled on Brummell, and to him are attributed such stories from the Brummell apocrypha as his once needing three tailors to make his gloves and the sartorial insult, "Do you call this a coat?"Richard Cronin, "Bulwer, Carlyle and the fashionable novel" in The Subverting Vision of Bulwer Lytton, University of Delaware 2004, [https://books.google.com/books?id=ct_TWOHpp6YC&dq=Bulwer%2C+Carlyle+and+the+fashionable+novel&pg=PA38 pp. 38–41]; the chapters in the novel are [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7623/7623-h/7623-h.htm#link2HCH0032 32–33]

Brummell appeared under his own name as a character in Arthur Conan Doyle's 1896 historical novel Rodney Stone. In this, the title character's uncle, Charles Tregellis, is the center of the London fashion world, until Brummell ultimately supplants him. Tregellis's subsequent death from mortification serves as a deus ex machina, in that it resolves Rodney Stone's family poverty.Available at [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/5148/5148-h/5148-h.htm rodney stone Gutenberg]

Georgette Heyer, author of a number of Regency romance novels, included Brummell as a character in her 1935 novel Regency Buck.Jennifer Kloester, [https://jenniferkloester.com/the-first-regency-novel-regency-buck "The first Regency novel – Regency Buck"] He is also referred to, or figures as a minor character, in the work of later writers of this genre. More recently, Brummell was made the detective-hero of a series of period mysteries by Californian novelist Rosemary Stevens, starting with Death on a Silver Tray in 2000.A synopsis at [http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-425-17468-5 Publishers Weekly] These are written as if related by their hero. Yet another American reinterpretation of his character appears in Cecilia Ryan's homoerotic novella The Sartorialist (2012).{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mPoFG_x4IDQC|title=The Sartorialist|first=Cecilia|last=Ryan|date=28 March 2012|publisher=Dreamspinner Press|isbn=9781613724088|via=Google Books}}

In the United States, Brummell's life was dramatised in an 1890 stage play in four acts by Clyde Fitch with Richard Mansfield as Brummell. This in turn was adapted for the 1924 film Beau Brummel, with John Barrymore and Mary Astor.Synopsis at [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0014702 IMDB]; watch the film on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaP4DXPwQN4 YouTube] Another play about him, authored by Bertram P Matthews, is only remembered because it had incidental music written for it by Edward Elgar. When it was staged at the Theatre Royal, Birmingham in November 1928, Elgar himself conducted the orchestra on its first night. With the exception of the minuet, Elgar's orchestral score subsequently disappeared and the manuscript has never been located.{{cite web|url=http://www.acutamusic.co.uk/beau-brummel-mdash-elgarrsquos-lost-masterpiece.html|title=Beau Brummel — Elgar's Lost Masterpiece|website=Acuta Music}} Brummell's later years were the setting for Ron Hutchinson's 2001 two-character play The Beau (originally Beau Brummell), which, following a UK national tour, played for one month at Theatre Royal Haymarket, starring Peter Bowles as Brummell.{{cite web|title=Bowles Closes Early in Hutchinson's Beau, 23 Jun |url=http://www.whatsonstage.com/west-end-theatre/news/06-2001/bowles-closes-early-in-hutchinsons-beau-23-jun_18206.html |date=8 June 2001 |work=WhatsOnStage.com |access-date=5 December 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131210190609/http://www.whatsonstage.com/west-end-theatre/news/06-2001/bowles-closes-early-in-hutchinsons-beau-23-jun_18206.html |archive-date=10 December 2013}}

Earlier movies included a 10-minute film by the Vitagraph Company of America (1913), based on a Booth Tarkington story, and Beau Brummell and his Bride, a short comedy made by the Edison Company in the same year. In 1937, there was a radio drama on Lux Radio Theater with Robert Montgomery as Brummell.There is a recording on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3PemdGS5dxs YouTube] A further film, Beau Brummell, was made in 1954 with Stewart Granger playing the title role, Peter Ustinov as the Prince of Wales, and Elizabeth Taylor as Lady Patricia Belham. There were also two television dramas: the sixty-minute German So war Herr Brummell (Süddeutscher Rundfunk, 1967) and the UK's Beau Brummell: This Charming Man (2006).{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/somerset/content/articles/2006/03/10/james_purefoy_beau_brummell_feature.shtml|title=James Purefoy plays Beau Brummell|last=BBC|website=www.bbc.co.uk}}

In 1931, there was a French three-act operetta, Brummell, composed by Reynaldo Hahn to a libretto by Rip and Robert Dieudonné. This featured Brummell as the main character in a fabricated story of a rural courtship which saw occasional performance in later years.[http://194.254.96.55/cm/?for=fic&cleoeuvre=62 "Brummell"], Encyclopédie multimedia de la comédie musicale en France website {{in lang|fr}}, accessed 25 June 2018 This was later broadcast by Radio-Lille (1963).

File:Beau_Brummel_Gillette_ad.jpg

Brummell's name became associated with style and good looks, and was therefore borrowed for a variety of products or alluded to in songs and poetry. One example was the paint colour Beau Brummel Brown, used exclusively on the 1931 Oldsmobile.{{cite web|url=http://paintref.com/cgi-bin/paintdetail.cgi?paintx=1931%7CGM%7CBeau+Brummel+Brown%7C48259|title=1931 GM Beau Brummel Brown paint|website=paintref.com}} In 1934, a rhododendron hybridised by Lionel de Rothschild was named after the dandy.It is illustrated [http://www.rhododendrons.co.uk/Product/16278/rhododendron-beau-brummel.aspx here] In 1928, there were several Beau Brummel styles from the Illinois Watch Company{{cite web|url=https://www.watchtalkforums.info/forums/thread47860.html|title=Vintage Illinois Spotlight—Beau Brummel|website=www.watchtalkforums.info|date=24 April 2011 }} and in 1948, LeCoultre marketed a Beau Brummel watch with a minimalist design and no numbers.{{Cite web|url=http://shop.connoisseuroftime.com/1948-Vintage-Jaeger-Lecoultre-Mens-Watch/dp/B00BDF27VG|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304054615/http://shop.connoisseuroftime.com/1948-Vintage-Jaeger-Lecoultre-Mens-Watch/dp/B00BDF27VG|title=Connoisseur of Time|archivedate=4 March 2016}} In 2016, a men's skincare and shaving company launched using the name [https://beaubrummellformen.com/ Beau Brummell for Men].

T. S. Eliot's poem about "Bustopher Jones: The Cat About Town" refers to him as the "Brummell of Cats",In Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, London 1939; text available [http://www.moggies.co.uk/html/oldpssm.html#jones online] an allusion taken up in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cats, the 1981 musical based on Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats (1939). Other allusions to Brummell appear in the lyrics of such songs as "All I Need Is The Girl" from the 1959 musical Gypsy,{{Cite web|url=https://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/gypsy/allineedisthegirl.htm|title=All I Need Is The Girl Lyrics - Gypsy Cast - STLyrics.com|website=www.stlyrics.com}} "You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile" from the musical Annie (1977),{{Cite web|url=https://www.streetdirectory.com/lyricadvisor/song/elflfo/never_fully_dressed_without_a_smile|title=Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile Lyrics by Annie Soundtrack|website=www.streetdirectory.com}} and Billy Joel's 1980 hit "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me".{{Cite web|url=https://www.billyjoel.com/song/its-still-rock-and-roll-me-10/|title=It's Still Rock And Roll To Me|website=Billy Joel Official Site}}

Various bands also adopted Brummell's name, beginning with Zack Whyte and His Chocolate Beau Brummels, a jazz-style dance band that toured between 1924 and 1935.{{Cite web|url=http://www.redhotjazz.com/bands.html|title=A History of Jazz before 1930}} During the 1960s, there were the rock bands such as The Beau Brummels from San Francisco and Beau Brummell Esquire and His Noble Men, the name used by South African born Michael Bush for his English group.{{Cite web|url=http://www.chronoglide.com/wwws_2p09_Beau.html|title=Beau Brummell Esquire And The Noblemen, Kenny Everett, Worlds Worst Wireless Show, The World's Worst Wireless Show|website=www.chronoglide.com}}

{{reflist|2}}

• Barbey d'Aurevilly, Jules. On Dandyism and George Brummell, 1845
• Campbell, Kathleen. Beau Brummell. London: Hammond, 1948
• Jesse, Captain William. The Life of Beau Brummell. Published in two volumes. Available at Google Books, [https://books.google.com/books?id=kew5AAAAcAAJ vol. 1] and [https://books.google.com/books?id=-ocJAAAAIAAJ vol. 2]
• Kelly, Ian. Beau Brummell: The Ultimate Dandy. Hodder & Stoughton, 2005
• Lewis, Melville. Beau Brummell: His Life and Letters. New York: Doran, 1925
• Moers, Ellen. The Dandy: Brummell to Beerbohm. London: Secker and Warburg, 1960
• Nicolay, Claire. Origins and Reception of Regency Dandyism: Brummell to Baudelaire. Ph.D. diss., Loyola U of Chicago, 1998
• Wharton, Grace and Philip. Wits and Beaux of Society. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1861

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{{EB1911 poster|Brummell, George Bryan}}

• {{Cite AmCyc|wstitle=Brummel, George Bryan |short=x}}

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