Symbolism / Aestheticism / Decadentism — Quick Reference
Symbolism · Aestheticism · Decadentism — Quick Reference
Representative works list both Western and Japanese examples. Japanese titles include standard English renderings with romaji in parentheses when helpful.
Movement |
Representative works (West / Japan) |
Core themes |
Keywords |
Symbolism |
- West: Charles Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil (Les Fleurs du mal); Arthur Rimbaud, A Season in Hell / Illuminations; Stéphane Mallarmé, A Throw of the Dice Never Will Abolish Chance (Un coup de dés...)
- Japan: Kitahara Hakushū, Jashūmon (邪宗門); Miki Rofū, Haien (廃園, “The Ruined Garden”); Kambara Ariake, Dokugen Aika (独絃哀歌, “Elegy on a Single String”)
|
- Suggestion and association over direct statement
- Inner life, dream, the spiritual and numinous
- Musicality of verse; synesthetic effects
|
- symbol, metaphor, correspondences
- fragrance, fog, night, bells
- melancholy / spleen
|
Aestheticism |
- West: Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray; Walter Pater, Marius the Epicurean; A. C. Swinburne, poetry collections
- Japan: Tanizaki Jun’ichirō, The Tattooer (Shisei), Naomi (Chijin no Ai); Nagai Kafū, A Strange Tale from East of the River (Bokutō Kidan); Satō Haruo, Rural Melancholy (Den’en no Yūutsu)
|
- Autonomy of art; form, style, and surface
- Adornment, sensuality, cultivated taste
- Artificial/constructed beauty over nature
|
- art for art’s sake, beauty, pleasure
- ornament, costume, mask, performance
- eroticism, Orientalism
|
Decadentism |
- West: J.-K. Huysmans, Against Nature (À rebours); Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray; Gabriele D’Annunzio, Pleasure (Il Piacere); Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil
- Japan: Tanizaki Jun’ichirō, Quicksand (Manji); Nagai Kafū, A Strange Tale from East of the River; Sakaguchi Ango, Discourse on Decadence (Darakuron)
|
- Ennui, nihilism, cultivated weariness
- Transgression, moral inversion, self-indulgence
- Urban twilight; illness and “artificial paradises”
|
- decay / decadence, ennui
- transgression, vice, hedonism
- poison, perfume; dusk, decline
|
Rule of thumb: Symbolism = suggestion & musicality; Aestheticism = the worship of beauty; Decadentism = ennui & transgressive elegance. Overlaps are common (e.g., Baudelaire, Wilde, Tanizaki) and many works straddle categories.
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