or (or ) is a French phrase that became a rallying cry for the French Decadent poets of the late 19th century including

Charles Baudelaire Charles Pierre Baudelaire (, ; ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist and art critic. His poems exhibit mastery in the handling of rhyme and rhythm, contain an exoticism inherited ...

and

Arthur Rimbaud Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (, ; 20 October 1854 – 10 November 1891) was a French poet known for his transgressive and surreal themes and for his influence on modern literature and arts, prefiguring surrealism. Born in Charleville, he start ...

.Decadence
It will not translate precisely into English, but is usually rendered as "to shock or scandalise the (respectable) middle classes."Merriam-Webster OnLine
/ref> The Decadents, fascinated as they were with hashish, opium, and absinthe, found, in

Joris-Karl Huysmans Charles-Marie-Georges Huysmans (, ; 5 February 1848 – 12 May 1907) was a French novelist and art critic who published his works as Joris-Karl Huysmans (, variably abbreviated as J. K. or J.-K.). He is most famous for the novel '' À rebour ...

' novel (1884), a sexually perverse hero who secludes himself in his house, basking in life-weariness or , far from the bourgeois society that he despises. The

Aesthetes Aestheticism (also the Aesthetic movement) was an art movement in the late 19th century which privileged the aesthetic value of literature, music and the arts over their socio-political functions. According to Aestheticism, art should be pr ...

in England, such as Oscar Wilde, shared these same fascinations. This celebration of "unhealthy" and "unnatural" devotion to art and excess has been a continuing cultural theme. Later,

Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, with early centres in Zürich, Switzerland, at the Cabaret Voltaire (in 1916). New York Dada began c. 1915, and after 1920 Dada flourished in Pari ...

and Surrealism pursued the same intent.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Epater la bourgeoisie French words and phrases Slogans 19th-century neologisms Decadent literature

See also

References