The Use and Misuse of Fin-De-Siècle Decadence and Its Imagination

Dear Colleagues,

Fin-de-siècle decadence is an intricate hallmark that subsumed various aesthetic climates in the late nineteenth-century Europe, which were shaped into aestheticism, symbolism, escapism, dandyism, and fashionable subversion against bourgeoise conformism, etc. Marked by the sense of skepticism for industrial modern society, fin-de-siècle decadents gestured, in sum, an individually stylized form of aesthetic defiance. The clique of representative figures includes Charles Baudelaire, Arthur Rimbaud,  Stéphane Mallarmé, and Joris-Karl Huysmans in France, and in England, Arthur Symons, Oscar Wilde, and Earnest Dowson, to name a few. Their literary works—novels, novellas, dramas, essays, and prose poetry—wielded the power of decadent imaginations, expanding their loci of sensorial expression to painting, theatrical performance, perfume, and cuisine.

The uniqueness of fin-de-siècle decadence lies in its proliferation and longevity. In the early twentieth century, the aesthetic and socio-political gesticulation reached outside the European continent and influenced other local cultures and led to the germination of their own aesthetic forms. The evolution of “decadence” has continued ever since, resulting in the further articulation or magnification of what the aesthetic concept initially intended. On the other hand, it is impossible to deny the profusion of cultural artifacts and commodities that distort, misunderstand, and abusively employ the initially embraced concept, in the process of circulation and adaptation. With this assumption in mind, we invite articles that address issues of utilization and misuse of fin-de-siècle decadence as the source of creative imagination across the world.

Please send an abstract of 500 words with a short bibliography to Dr. Ikuho Amano at [email protected] by *30 October 2024*.

Finished essays of 6000-12,000 words (not including bibliographic information) will be due by *30 June 2025*.

Dr. Ikuho Amano
Guest Editor

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• fin-de-siècle decadence
• late nineteenth-century Europe
• aesthetic defiance
• literary works
• decadent imaginations
• sensorial expression
• proliferation and longevity