Green carnation
The green carnation has become a gay symbol since it was popularised by Oscar Wilde in the 1890s. Green carnations do not exist in nature; they are prduced by plunging a white carnation into malachite dye.[1]
The shape of the carnation has been said to symbolise the anus, while the colour green was thought to be favoured by homosexuals.[2][3]
At the opening night of his play Lady Windermere's Fan in 1892, Wilde persuaded members of his circle to wear green carnations in their buttonholes.[3] When asked what all this meant, Wilde replied, "Nothing whatever, but that is just what nobody will guess."[3]
In 1895 an article in Punch mocked at the "Decadents" who
- "nightly gathered at any of the theatres where the plays of Mr WILDE were being given. Nightly, the Stalls were fulfilled by Row upon Row of neatly-curled Fringes surmounting Button-holes of monstrous size."[4]
By 1910, C D Wilton, writing in the journal Modern Man, noted that wearers of the green carnation had
- "brought the inoffensive buttonhole into grave disrepute – so much so that our tailors to-day make no proper provision in dress suits for a floral decoration."
References
<references>
- ↑ "From Month to Month, a Summary (The green carnation to which we have referred)", The Artist and Home Journal, 13, 1 April 1892: 114–115.
- ↑ Graham Robb, Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century (London: Picador, 2003): page 151.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 David Haldane Lawrence, Diverse Performances, pages 46–49.
- ↑ Max Meerboom, "From the Queer and Yellow Book – Book I 1894", Punch, 2 February 1895: page 58.