• James B. Twitchell: Living It Up: Our Love Affair With Luxury; Columbia University Press; 2002; 309 pp; $29.95
For centuries, luxury has connoted items available only to the elite few. Through scarcity and by statute (sumptuary laws), luxury was kept out of the hands of the masses. Since the Industrial Revolution, however, luxury has become attainable by the average consumer, and the desire for it is as prevalent as ever in today’s culture. Typically, the pursuit of luxury is looked down upon by cultural commentators, and even those who indulge in such pursuits often tacitly accept guilt. However, in his work Living It Up, James B. Twitchell, University of Florida professor of English and advertising, says of such criticism: not so fast.
The “democratization” of luxury since the 19th century has occurred at such a pace that luxury itself is constantly being redefined. A century ago, indoor plumbing was considered a luxury; today, lack of it is considered a mark of abject poverty. How do luxuries become necessities? Twitchell outlines the key role played by the much-maligned “early adopters.”
“They are willing and able,” he says, “to pay the high first costs” and eventually make goods once considered luxurious affordable for the masses. Despite the grumblings of academic scolds, there is no doubt that such consumption has increased the quality of life for most everyone. “One would almost surely prefer to be poor today than upper middle class a century ago,” notes Twitchell, quoting Paul Krugman in the New York Times. Beyond food and shelter, says Twitchell, all needs are cultural, not natural. While one may dispute his classification of psychological needs, his argument is illuminating. If people had lived by the reasoning of the critics of consumption, humans would never have advanced beyond subsistence level.
Such a defense certainly works for what Twitchell calls “technoluxe” items, whose benefits are tangible. But what of so-called “opuluxe”: names such as Armani, Louis Vitton, Tiffany’s, or Fendi, attached to objects whose functionality is comparable to their nonluxury counterparts but whose price may be several times higher? Twitchell readily asserts that those brands are purely marketing constructs. Continuing a theme from his earlier works, he establishes that the purpose of advertising is to attach meaning to objects. Consumers, for their part, knowingly buy the resulting image, not the product. While critics may point to such behavior as proof of the shallowness of our age, Twitchell scoffs at such ideas. “The balderdash of cloistered academics aside,” he contends, “we did not suddenly become materialistic.” Rather, as material comforts have increased, consumers have shifted their desires towards entire “experiences” rather than simply goods. For “opuluxe” items, buying itself has become the sought-after experience.
All this leads Twitchell to what he terms a “mild” defense of luxury. In finding meaning in luxury, people are granting to consumption the status enjoyed by religion in centuries past. “Materialism is not the opposite of spiritualism,” he contends. “Materialism is what you spiritualize when you have lots of stuff.” Money cannot buy happiness, Twitchell concedes — but poverty almost guarantees unhappiness.
As to the concrete benefits of this trend, those Twitchell cites fall more in the category of evils avoided. Societies focused on consumption, he says, will be too busy shopping to wage offensive war. As consumption choices create distinctive “tribes” of consumers, lines of ancestry and religion will slowly disappear. Better, remarks Twitchell wryly, to be mugged for your shoes than to be ethnically cleansed.
Unfortunately, the author’s defense of the system that makes luxury consumption by the masses possible is lukewarm. While avoiding the outright hostility to capitalism prevalent in academia, he nonetheless laments that the “private vices of the rich” give more help to the needy than the “public virtues of the poor.” Capitalism will continue to thrive, he acknowledges, but only until another system can “codify and satisfy” human needs and yearning. Twitchell notes that in our culture what you consume is more important than what you produce — but in doing so glosses over the fact that production is the prerequisite of consumption. On the role that freedom has to play in all this, Twitchell is, alas, silent.
Twitchell’s treatment of the subject of luxury is entertaining and, notwithstanding a few obscure literary references, generally unencumbered by an overly academic style. He meanders through a variety of destinations on the way to his conclusions: the tony shops and hotels of modern-day America; plague-stricken Holland during 17th century tulip-bulb craze; the boardrooms of French conglomerates who have cornered the “opuluxe” market by applying American marketing techniques to European luxury. While providing some useful insights, usually of a sociological nature, his narrative lacks an appreciation of the economic and political aspects of his subject.
Tom Welch is a free-lance writer in Atlanta.