To his nearly 200,000 followers on Instagram, Raven Smith speaks in what could be termed “gay internet”: dry, lusty, disillusioned, pictures of celebrities make up much of his feed. His captions read like howls of ironic despair and source the universality buried in pop culture camp. “Christmas shopping on a budget,” he writes alongside an image of Winona Ryder shoplifting. “SUNDAYS” appears next to a slide of Trinny Woodall in a cloud of cigarette smoke. There’s Victoria Beckham in a lab coat. Cassie in Euphoria looking wrecked. The bored it-girl who fell out a window in Sex and the City. Princess Diana. Princess Diana. Princess Diana.
Smith is also a Vogue columnist, red carpet fixture and bestselling author – his 2020 book Trivial Pursuits anatomised the mini, ludicrous traumas of modern life. And now his latest essay collection grapples with the most omnipresent mammal that isn’t actually talked about very much: men. Who are they? Why are they? Where did we find them? Raven Smith’s Men is about the males that have come to define his life. There are tales of fathers, boyfriends, perverts and Ken dolls; porn, steroids, sports teams and lads. It’s as wise as it is bawdy; the chain-smoking baby of Eve Babitz and Kim Cattrall. In tone, it feels like an astute, elevated version of Smith’s Instagram feed, something he’d hoped for.
