Kandinsky Colored Shorts

Opening of Herzog, protagonist goes shopping for a trip to the beach:

The windows glittered and Herzog looked into them, shamefaced and excited. The new styles seemed to him reckless and gaudy — madras coats, shorts with melting bursts of Kandinsky colors, in which middle-aged or paunchy old men would be ludicrous. Better puritan restraint than the exhibition of pitiful puckered knees and varicose veins, pelican bellies and the indecency of haggard faces under sporty caps. Undoubtedly Valentine Gersbach, who had beat him out with Madeleine, surmounting the handicap of a wooden leg, could wear those handsome brilliant candy stripes. Valentine was a dandy….

Madras, a kind of plaid pattern (e.g.)

Tags: caps, madras coat, shorts, windows