[1] The term is French for "half-world", and derives from an 1855 play called Le Demi-Monde, by Alexandre Dumas fils,[2] dealing with the way that prostitution at that time threatened the institution of marriage.
Demimondaine became a synonym for a courtesan or a prostitute who moved in these circles—or for a woman of social standing with the power to thumb her nose at convention and throw herself into the hedonistic nightlife.
She acted as her husband's model for some time, but aspired to a more intense and moneyed existence, and opened a salon in their villa at 6 bis, Impasse Ronsin, close to Montparnasse, which was soon frequented by all of Paris.
[citation needed] Possibly the most famous portrayal of the demimonde, albeit from before the word was coined, is in Giuseppe Verdi's opera La traviata (1853).
In writing his 1924 play Easy Virtue, Noël Coward stated his object was to present a comedy in the structure of a tragedy "to compare the déclassée woman of to-day with the more flamboyant demi-mondaine of the 1890s.