Etiquette -- 21 days ago
Words: Joseph Bullmore
Parties are a matter of life and death for some people. In Evelyn Waugh’s novel Vile Bodies, the blacklisted Simon Balcairn decides that, should he not gain entry into Margot Metroland’s landmark mixer, he may as well "end it all now". In a daring act of self-preservation, then, the young society columnist pairs a fake beard with some ceremonial medals and heads once more unto the breach. It is both his first and last outing as a party crasher. Unbearded several pages later by the wily Father Rothschild and promptly ordered to leave the party at once, Balcairn – true to his word – promptly pops his head in the Aga and joins those ancestors who’d fallen at Acre and Agincourt.
Waugh’s novel turns 95 this year, but you wouldn’t guess it from that little scene. The quiet scent of desperation, the over-egged outfit, the do-or-die attitude: these symptoms yet survive on the pavements of NoHo and Berkeley Square. And their sufferers do not go untreated.
The Wedding Crashers
A quick Google search has just furnished me with several dozen articles with titles promising ‘x tips for crashing a party’. The advice within ranges from the painfully obvious (don’t pretend to be Madonna as "her face is probably too well known") to the utterly unlikely ("Eat breakfast at the restaurant on the day of the party, and stick around till things kick off"). Everything in the middle, meanwhile, stands as good – if well-trodden – advice for a social situation of any sort: dress appropriately, be confident and don’t overdo it.
To that list we might add a fourth diktat: be charming. At least, that’s the view taken by an 11th-century Iraqi text that was uncovered for the first time just a few years ago. Entitled, rather happily, The Art of Party Crashing, the ancient book champions humour and charm over subterfuge and gall. When asked by a gatekeeper for a name, for example, crashers are advised to smile sweetly and say simply: "I’m the man who saved you the trouble of writing an invitation". After that, apparently, your entry is assured.
Breakfast at Tiffany's
The other option is to go big – or go home. That might well have been the mantra of the jolly gate-crashers over in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. "People were not invited – they went there," marvels narrator Nick Carraway of the raucous parties held in the biggest house on Long Island. "Sometimes they came and went without having met Gatsby at all; came for the party with a simplicity of heart that was its own ticket of admission".
