It occurred to me there were some fairly obvious reasons to wear a trenchcoat—because you were a detective, a spy, or a flasher…There are three reasons to wear a trenchcoat: because you have something to find, something to hide, or something you want desperately to show. The garment that seems to beg you ‘Don’t notice me!’ is also begging you to take notice, whether the wearer wants you to see what’s underneath, or whether he wants you simply to fear it. But part of the contract is for the wearer and the witness—who is also being watched—to maintain the fiction of non-theatricality, of non-spectacularity, of the extreme understatement of performance.

Author: Barbara Browning