“LINCOLN’S SOUL MATE and the love of his life was a man named Joshua Speed,” John Stauffer writes in his dual biography of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. Stauffer refers to carnal love, not to one of those asexual “romantic friendships” in vogue with certain scholars. He chairs the History of American Civilization Department at Harvard; Stauffer’s perspective can’t be easily dismissed as fringe. But that did not deter Sean Wilentz.

HAUTE COUTURE took a distinct “downtown” turn in the 1980’s with

the emergence of Stephen Sprouse, who set the fashion world on fire as

the first designer to successfully merge street culture, punk, and high

fashion in edgy clothing designs incorporating graffiti, vibrant and at

times even garish colors, plus a fine arts sensibility.

The theme of Maurice can be described as essentially the search for a compatible social construct by which the protagonist can understand himself and go on to self-actualization.