Beards in Historical Romance: Where is the Love?
By Debut Romance Author Jennifer McQuiston,
What Happens in Scotland
Beards in Historical Romance: Where is the Love?
Thank you so much for having me on today! And I am especially excited to be here talking about what just might be the most undiscussed topic in historical romance: Beards.
Or rather, the lack thereof.
During my formative years—let’s generously call them the eighties and early nineties—beards weren’t cool. That doesn’t mean they aren’t cool now. Today’s hipster generation, with their “in your face” profusion of facial hair, is a notable indication the beard is becoming more mainstream, at least in educated and artistic cultures.
And yet… my forty-year-old cougar tendencies aside… I am still not sure about them.
Don’t get me wrong—I don’t dislike beards. I would characterize my reaction to beards as ambivalent, more than anything else. But, like many of us, I cut my teeth on historical romance, and this genre of fiction clearly establishes the following as an irrefutable rule: Romance heroes do not have beards.
Let me repeat that.
Romance heroes. Do NOT. Have beards.
Don’t believe me? Pull twenty random historical romances off your keeper shelf and thumb through them until you come to the description of the hero. Black-haired or blond, tall or muscular, I would wager good money that 9 times out of 10, the hero is clean-shaven, despite the fact that (at least for the Victorian era in which I write), men very often had facial hair: copious, hysterical, unhygienic amounts of it.
Nope! No Beards Here!
That isn’t to say these romance heroes couldn’t grow a beard. Many of the heroes in my “keeper” books display five-o-clock shadows that cry out for the ministrations of a valet or barber, suggesting they at least possess the capacity to have a beard. And the scientist in me argues that the lack of beards in historical romance is counter-intuitive. Biology suggests that this secondary sexual characteristic is one evolutionary trait that promotes attractiveness, as it is an outward sign of fitness as a mate.
What’s Not to Love Ladies? Victorian Hotties had beards!
Unfortunately, despite the recommendation of science, romance heroines do not seem interested in Darwinian theories of mate selection (and it should be noted that the decidedly unromantic Darwin sported a beard that would have put my grandfather to shame.)
Perhaps an Argument Against Beards…
No, romance heroines apparently want heroes who are simultaneously sympathetic and strong, nurturing and powerful.
In short: they want a man who CAN grow a beard, but who chooses not to.
In Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing (Act II), the shrewish Beatrice says: “Lord, I could not endure a husband with a beard on his face: I had rather lie in the woolen…” When Leonato suggests that perhaps she could find a husband without a beard, she then goes on to admit she is a tad conflicted about the whole thing: “What should I do with him? Dress him in my apparel and make him my waiting-gentlewoman? He that hath a beard is more than a youth, and he that hath no beard is less than a man: and he that is more than a youth is not for me, and he that is less than a man, I am not for him.”
Which really brings us ‘round full circle.
Beards: you either hate them…or you don’t yet realize you want them.
When I penned my debut historical romance, What Happens in Scotland, I really didn’t think much about the fact I gave my hero a beard. After all, I had also given James Mackenzie a legitimate reason to have his beard: he is the historical equivalent of a hipster, a self-made man who eschews the customs of his aristocratic father. The beard is but an outward example of his inward angst.
Like all good romance heroines, Lady Georgette Thorold isn’t too sure about her first glimpse of James’s beard either. Of course, given that she can’t remember a thing she did last night, her lack of appreciation for the naked, bearded man in her bed could perhaps be understood!
Evidence of her bed partner’s own state of disarray peeked out from beneath the covers, hinting at their interactions of the previous evening. A muscled calf, scattered with a dusting of dark hair, flexed alarmingly. The sheets shifted as he turned over, revealing a head of brown hair. He sported a full beard that no young man in London would have suffered without a wager first being laid down, but it did not hide the Patrician slope of his nose or the sensual slide of his lips. In sleep, his face looked peaceful. Appealing in a masculine sort of way.
And terrifyingly unfamiliar.
“Dear God, what have I done?” she whispered. Clasping the shirt tighter against her body, she picked her way closer and studied his features, trying to jog her memory for some hint of what he meant to her, or she to him. He looked to be in his early thirties. His hair showed a tendency to curl at the edges, and the brightening light of dawn caught the glint of red in his dark beard. His eyelashes lay like a smudge against his lightly weathered cheek, making Georgette’s pale, pampered skin feel insipid by comparison. No slice of recognition accompanied her perusal, though standing this close to him brought a rush of heat to her limbs.
“Please, please, at least be a gentleman,” she muttered, trying to decide if the sleeping man looked more like a footman or a peer. The shirt she held against her was of fine cotton lawn. But most gentlemen of her acquaintance weren’t quite so… muscled.
Of course, one would never know from looking at my stepback art that James Mackenzie has a beard. (Not that I object to the choice of cover model… wow!) But wouldn’t he look just as manly with a little bit of a beard? Or even a 3-day stubble?
Beard-curious?
I suspect many of us fall in that third category.
And that is just the way we like it.
Jennifer McQuiston writes lively historical romance set in the decidedly beard-friendly Victorian era. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her beardless husband and two children. A scientist by training (and, in fact, married to an evolutionary biologist) Jennifer admits she is a fan of Darwin’s theories, even if she is not a fan of the man’s atrocious beard.
Tell us, do you prefer a man with facial hair:mustache or beard or not?
Please remember to leave your email or we don't have a way of getting in touch with you.And for those of you who find themselves haggis-curious, she will throw in a bag of these Haggis-flavored potato crisps, in celebration of all things Scottish!
