Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Cigarette etiquette according to Oscar Wilde

Tuesday, cigarette #1

From The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde:
When Pierre Louÿs wrote to André Gide about the elegant customs and manners of Oscar and his disciples, he was charmed by the way 'X,' a young man to whom he had just been introduced, offered him a cigarette. 'Instead of simply offering it as we do,' Louÿs wrote, 'he began by lighting it himself and not handing it over until he had taken the first drag. Isn't that exquisite? They know how to envelop everything in poetry.'
UPDATE: Reader AGS suggests "cigaretiquette." Appalling, simply appalling.

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