The coming age of masks marks a definite period in that delightful process known as the decline and fall of a civilization – a period when a race that has lost its pioneering freshness has still some faint lingering regard for the appearance of things. It is the time of delicate pretense; it is the beginning of wisdom and the end of faith. Upon the crumbling remains of the dying civilization, the tired survivors begin to erect their rococo delicacies; the voice of decadent beauty their ears are becoming sensitively attuned; and their faces they wear the simulations of their former virtues.
Here in America – and especially in the eastern part of America – this period of gentle decadence has gradually crept upon us until we are now in somewhat the same condition as was Rome under the Emperor Commodus. The evidences of this fact are altogether indisputable; one need name only the vogue of prize-fighting, musical comedies and “The Sheik.”
Let us, then, not fail to enjoy to the utmost this “Age of Masks” – “though much is take, much remains” – and perhaps to some of us, as we don our symbols of decadence, we come to the delightful fate of Lord George Hell, Max Beerbohm’s “Happy Hypocrite”, who eventually came to resemble his pure and innocent mask.
Vanity Fair, January 1922, Sketches by Norman-bel Geddes