This volume brings together a range of scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds to re-examine the histories of facial hair and its place in discussions of gender, the military, travel and art, amongst others.

This book explores a vital though long-neglected clash between republicans and Catholics that rocked fin-de-siecle France. The Flamidien Affair shows that masculinity was a critical site of contest in the War of Two Frances pitting republicans against Catholics.

This edition is the first to reproduce John Addington Symonds's Memoirs in its entirety. The manuscript survives because Symonds recognised its import, however 'foolish': he instructed his literary executor to preserve the text, a duty ultimately discharged by placing the manuscript under embargo in the care of the London Library.