Decadent Subjects: The Idea of Decadence in Art, Literature, Philosophy, and Culture of the Fin de Siecle in Europe

By Charles Bernheimer

Honorable Mention for the Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studies from the Modern Language Association

Charles Bernheimer described decadence as a "stimulant that bends thought out of shape, deforming traditional conceptual molds." In this posthumously published work, Bernheimer succeeds in making a critical concept out of this perennially fashionable, rarely understood term.

Decadent Subjects is a coherent and moving picture of fin de si cle decadence. Mature, ironic, iconoclastic, and thoughtful, this remarkable collection of essays shows the contradictions of the phenomenon, which is both a condition and a state of mind. In seeking to show why people have failed to give a satisfactory account of the term decadence, Bernheimer argues that we often mistakenly take decadence to represent something concrete, that we see as some sort of agent. His salutary response is to return to those authors and artists whose work constitutes the topos of decadence, rereading key late nineteenth-century authors such as Nietzsche, Zola, Hardy, Wilde, Moreau, and Freud to rediscover the very dynamics of the decadent. Through careful analysis of the literature, art, and music of the fin de si cle including a riveting discussion of the many faces of Salome, Bernheimer leaves us with a fascinating and multidimensional look at decadence, all the more important as we emerge from our own fin de si cle.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0801867401
• ISBN13: 9780801867408
• Release Date: July 2002
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
• Length: 248 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.4" x 8.8"
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Really Nice Postmodern Criticism...

This slim volume of exquisite little critical essays is a gem of literary and aesthetic criticism. Bernheimer was dying of cancer when he composed these last pieces, and they were edited and published just after his death. But sickness and death are only marginally reflected in the essays: Bernheimer was an expert of comparative literature, and that is the locus of the book.He is looking at the phenomenon of aesthetic Decadence which appeared in European literature c.1885-1905. One can argue that Decadence had earlier adumbrations in Poe, Baudelaire, Gautier, and the Goncourts, but their earlier efforts really saw fruition in the period known as the Fin de Siècle.One can look at the table of contents to see Bernheimer's topics of Nietzsche, Flaubert, Zola, Huysmans, Freud, etc. But what I want to impart is the excellence of Bernheimer's critique: he has a firm handle on what's become known as Postmodern criticism, but he's much more lucid than others who dabble in the genre. He writes a very nice English: he constructs very pellucid texts with lovely language--vocabulary, syntax, and punctuation. And his vision is very clear: he understands what he sees, and he is able to clearly formulate his vision to relate it Au lecteur (to the Reader) in such a manner as to make it easily apprehendable--something too often lacking in Postmodern criticism. Highly recommended for students and scholars of turn-of-the-century literature, culture, and intellectual history.