Works of Joris-Karl Huysmans

He next wrote a series of naturalistic novels that focused on the sordidness and futility of everyday life: These works were early indexes of the distinctive style and the talent for precise, detailed description which were to characterize all of Huysmans' writing. Huysmans remained a disciple of Zola for only a short time and soon asserted his independence from codified naturalism.

His subsequent novels formed a loosely linked series in which the author, under various guises, traced his quest for happiness. The first of this group was A vau-l'eau ; Down Stream , a pessimistic account of the empty existence of an obscure functionary. Huysmans' last novels are primarily an intellectual and spiritual self-portrait: Huysmans also ranks as one of the foremost art critics of his generation and was one of the first to appreciate the impressionists in L'Art moderne and in Certains Huysmans died of cancer on May 12, , in Paris.

Robert Baldick, The Life of J.

Huysmans , is the most comprehensive work on Huysmans in English and the first fully documented biography of the novelist. His mother Malvina Badin Huysmans had been a schoolmistress. Huysmans' father died when he was eight years old. After his mother quickly remarried, Huysmans resented his stepfather, Jules Og, a Protestant who was part-owner of a Parisian book-bindery.

During childhood, Huysmans turned away from the Roman Catholic Church. For 32 years, Huysmans worked as a civil servant for the French Ministry of the Interior, a job he found tedious. The young Huysmans was called up to fight in the Franco-Prussian War , but was invalided out with dysentery. He intended to set up a community of Catholic artists, including Charles-Marie Dulac In addition to his novels, Huysmans was known for his art criticism in L'Art moderne and Certains In Huysmans was diagnosed with cancer of the mouth.

Huysmans never married or had children.

He had a long-term, on-and-off relationship with Anna Meunier, a seamstress. He used the name Joris-Karl Huysmans when he published his writing, as a way of honoring his father's ancestry. They attracted little attention but revealed flashes of the author's distinctive style. Huysmans followed it with the novel, Marthe, Histoire d'une fille His next works were similar: Les Soeurs Vatard , dedicated to Zola, deals with the lives of women in a bookbindery.

It featured the character of an aesthete , des Esseintes, and decisively broke from Naturalism. It was seen as an example of " decadent " literature. The description of des Esseintes' " alluring liaison " with a "cherry-lipped youth" was believed to have influenced other writers of the decadent movement, including Oscar Wilde. It is now considered an important step in the formation of " gay literature ".

The prosecutor referred to it as a " sodomitical " book.

The book appalled Zola, who felt it had dealt a "terrible blow" to Naturalism. Huysmans' next novel, En rade , an unromantic account of a summer spent in the country, did not sell as well as its predecessor. The commercial success of this book enabled Huysmans to retire from the civil service and live on his royalties. In L'Oblat , Durtal becomes a Benedictine oblate. He finally learns to accept the world's suffering. Huysmans' work was known for his idiosyncratic use of the French language , extensive vocabulary, detailed and sensuous descriptions, and biting, satirical wit.

Huysmans expresses a disgust with modern life and a deep pessimism.

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This had led him first to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer. Later he returned to the Catholic Church, as noted in his Durtal novels. Works of Vernon Lee.

Art of the Devil. Voyage Around My Room. Louis Gaston de Segur. The Witch of the Middle Ages. Farewell, My Only One.

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