Decadentism


Decadentism or the Decadent movement was a late 19th century artistic, literary and philosophical movement originated in Western Europe; poets and writers of the time conceived literature and art as the only true power and followed an aesthetic ideology.  The movement was characterised by feelings of disgust and sickness towards the society of the time, artists used a crude humor to express their emotions and strongly believed in the superiority of human creativity over the logic and natural world. This revolution of resistance represented the transition between romanticism and modernism as it tried to recover the traditional elements of medieval Europe in the face of a more industrialised one. "After an initial period, aestheticism slowly degenerated into what, between 1880 and 1890, was better known as Decadentism and after 1890, in France, it was replaced by the term 'Symbolism’, Pornokratès, 1878
, 1899

European representatives

By the end of the 19th century between 1894 and 1897 the decadents had an iconic publication where everyone who joined the movement wanted to publish, its name was "The Yellow Book"; it was fundamental in defining the decadent art and literature. It was considered an innovative magazine for its time, since having decadent writers the content was very controversial in all its forms.
"The Yellow Book" became the defining object of everything that characterised the yellow nineties, from aestheticism and decadence to the emergence of the 'little magazine' to new notions of gender and sexuality".
Charles Baudelaire is considered the father of Decadentism; all the poets and writers who follow the work of the latter are considered decadent. Baudelaire discovered the correspondence between perfumes, sounds and colours and the dark and deep unity of nature, which responds to a particular feeling when the knowledge of the human soul has exhausted all its possibilities of understanding its existence and its strange deviations, such as the feminine homosexualism present in the European bourgeoisie. Baudelaire was handled between two tendencies, the Parnassians one as a tribute to perfection and a continuous desire to create a poetry that was capable of imposing itself and dominating the existing chaos, and a poetry that deepened its existential roots that served as inspiration for hundreds of decadent writers. His collection of poems, The Flowers of Evil, is his most renowned work.
Another person to whom the paternity of the decadence is attributed is Théophile Gautier, who, in 1868, in the preface of the book of poems "Flowers of Evil" by Baudelaire, spoke of a style in decline to which art comes when civilisation's age reaches a point of extreme maturity
In France, decadence was associated with the writing of Paul Verlaine, Stéphane Mallarmé, Arthur Rimbaud and also with the fiction of Joris-Karl Huysmans with his novel in 1884 "Against Nature”. A mixture of alcoholism, aimless travel, passion, falls, and a marked rejection of the modern bourgeoisie were characteristic of Verlaine's work as one of the cursed poets. The main lines of his poetry are reflected in his composition entitled "Art Poetique". Arthur Rimbaud,was another of the so known cursed poets because of his friendship with Verlaine, he devoted some years to poetry, declared himself in constant rebellion against the bourgeoisie and the mediocrity of society; aspects that are highlighted in his works. Among them are "Illuminations" or "A Season in Hell".
Huysmans' novel focused almost entirely on the inner life of its sick aristocratic protagonist, Des Esseintes, who displays his obsessive sensual experiments. Dorian Gray's passion for studying and collecting jewellery or perfume or church vestments, and surrounding himself with exotic and sensual objects, reflects Des Esseintes' search for increasingly refined sensory experiences.
In England, Oscar Wilde was considered as a Dandy, along with Arthur Symons and the poet Ernest Dowson and some writers associated with the yellow book.  Wilde was very known at the time because of his assiduous presence in theatres and clubs in London; He created a fashion in the London of the time with his sense of style. He liked to joke saying that his life was a “work of art”. However, he paid a high price for his decadent style; as he was imprisoned on charges of homosexuality. Arthur Symons, defined decadence as "a new, beautiful and interesting illness", in his work "The Declining Movement in Literature". Symons, as well as other decadent authors, considered this as a criticism of the society that was becoming ostentatious and sophisticated.
However, the decadence these poets spoke of was directed to the outlook on literature and art, that is, the field of art and literature, and was never seen by the poets as a social decadence; even though they showed their contempt for the bourgeois society of the time, this bourgeoisie was seen by them as powerful, strong and limiting in the realisation of artistic sensibility.

Term Decadentism

The term has a meaning that is very difficult to specify given its high historical content and diversity of criteria. It was first coined in France in 1880 and was very controversial. Initially it was created in a derogatory sense to minimise the artistic value of poets and writers who expressed their discontent and the existential crisis of art in the face of modernity. However, it was received with pride by all those artists who were fighting for the renewal of sensibility, taste for aesthetics, ethics, art and life in the face of a society that, according to their criteria, was in decline, because they were trying to preserve beauty, art and heroism, using the term as a flag of struggle.

Main Aspects

·      It was the antithesis of the poetic movement of the Parnassians and of their doctrine inspired by the classical ideal of art for art's sake, replacing it with the ideal of poetry that tends towards the quality of decadent music.
·      It defies the morals and bourgeois customs of the time.
·      Evades from everyday reality exalting individual heroism by exploring the most extreme regions of human sensitivity and unconsciousness
·      It was a purely artistic and philosophical movement, the decline was never in a social sense, they referred to literature and art.
·      It was a movement of resistance to modernity.
·      They sought to preserve beauty, art and heroism, using the term as a fighting flag.

Italian Decadentism

The adoption of Decadentism in Italy was less acute than in the rest of Europe, especially because of the influence of the Scapigliatura that was already taking place in Italy, this movement first generated a conflict between artist and society
Unlike European decadence, in Italy this movement is distinguished by its visibly humanistic quality and by the very strong link with the classical tradition. The ability to investigate problems closely linked to the unconscious also seems to be limited. On the other hand, the level of depth with which Decadentism is adopted in Italy is more superficial and its use is oriented not only to literature and the arts, since some exponents also extended it to the society openly characterised by vulgarity and barbarism, which unlike Europe, the decadence was never directed to the social aspect, only to literature, even though bourgeois society was depraved it overlapped under a status of superiority.

Italian Representatives

The Italian decadence was characterised by the research for new spiritual values through aestheticism and three of its most representative authors were Gabriele D'Annunzio, Giovanni Pascoli and Antonio Fogazzaro whom maintained among themselves a very subjective image of society and the world and expressed their ideas each in a unique way.

[Giovanni Pascoli] (1855-1912)

Giovanni Pascoli was characterised by a personality that mixes the extrovert with the innocent and in his works he managed to establish his own symbolism inspired by the classical tradition but keeping innovation as a standard. His works maintained the feeling, the emotions of the human being and the small details of life in a deep sense of existence with an emblematic language intentionally created to awaken emotions and intuitions in human beings, being a reference of Italian literature.
Pascoli brings together many aspects in his works, managing to establish a balance between reality and fantasy. His main works were:
1891: Myricae.
1897: Poemetti, Il fanciullino.
1903: Canti di Castelvecchio.
1904: Miei scritti di varia umanità, Poemi conviviali.
1906: Odi e Inni,   Primi poemetti.
1909: Pensieri e discorsi, Nuovi poemetti, Poemi italici.
1911: Poemi di Risorgimento.
1912: La grande proletaria si è mossa.

[Gabriele D'Annunzio] (1863-1938)

He was characterized by an overwhelming personality that even led him to venture into politics and become an inspiration for figures like Mussolini and Hitler.  D'Annunzio's work stood out for its famous prose, but he added other artistic expressions to his conception of decadence such as narrative, lyrics and theatre, giving it a very personal and superficial touch of what decadence was in the rest of Europe.
D'Annunzio took on the characteristics of decadence as a lover of good taste, aesthetics, the aristocratic and his hatred of the ordinary and banal. His art is aimed at beauty, music, elegance and exalting nature with a peculiar language in his works that encompasses the five senses, making reading them an enriching experience.
Alcycone is considered by many as D’Annunzio’s masterpiece.
Among his creations, the following stand out:
1879: Primo vere.
1882: Canto novo.
1893: Poesia celeste.
1899: La Gioconda, la città morta.
1902: Francesca da Rimini.
1904: Maia, Elettra, Alcyone, La hija de Iorio.
1911: Le martyre de Saint Sebastien.
1912: Merope.
1920: Asterope.
1926: Città del silenzio.
[Antonio Fogazzaro] (1842-1911)
He aspired to a new ideal of art contrary to impersonality and adopted prose and especially the novel as the genre with which he could best reach a large audience.
1881: Malombra.
1885: Daniele Cortis.
1888: Il mistero del poeta.
1895: Il piccolo vecchio mondo.
1901: Piccolo mondo moderno.
1905: Il Santo.
1910: Leila.