After a childhood with the Jesuits, Des Esseintes, low body of a noble family in the terminal stage of decomposition, discovers the Parisian social life, and it stands out for its eccentricity in a displayed accoutrements or festivals that take shape in the castle family.
Tired of this environment that do not fit, this company and its codes mismatch with his mind and his sensitivity, he decided to disappear, sell his castle to live on his income in an apartment with his books and a willingness to satisfy his aesthetic eccentricities, feed exclusively on its own sun lit his needs, to revel in his artifices.
Esseintes is in the glorification of the artificial posture that meets rigorous pessimism facing the human condition linked to the vision of Schopenhauer but also filigree naturalism of his time, cold and flat.
Nietzsche would parallel the Greek they described as "weathered depth".
At that time Huysmans is a member of naturalist and this novel contains a reflection on ancient art, religious, mystical, negative of his time.
Besides his apologies, Baudelaire, Aurevilly .. are not in realism, but in the depth of the human soul, even in its transcendence.
This novel is that of an inability to move in his day. Through his reading, his intuitions forged, his knowledge and his conscience, which make him feel the grandeur of earlier times, its principles, its codes and its representations, Esseintes dream life backwards.
But if his inner adventure within this singular apartment is a relief to his melancholy soul, and physical and mental deterioration is the price to pay for his life upside down, the pitfall of madness.
Its failure to Louie that disrupts, Des Esseintes pay the backlash of his visibly unsustainable lifestyle.
His visit is also conducive to remember his memories, that of women or its immoralities, for narratives that bring the thickness to the psychology of Des Esseintes.
Like a Dostoyevsky and cathedral "The Brothers Karamazov", Huysmans up the pillar of his novel in his reflections on the church.
One senses from Des Esseintes an attraction / repulsion between his reason and his inclinations, scientific evidence and scientistic mediocrity, medieval emphasis and Liberal Catholicism.
The novel ends elsewhere on a praise of Leglise, compared to systemic modern society, which augurs the gradual transformation of Huysmans.
Lambiguïté decadence illustrated by Huysmans in the character of Des Esseintes is in its origins and its existence. If Des Esseintes, by its conduct, its activities, its deadly tastes can be seen as a decadent, it is not fooled and strongly condemns the Decadence, that of modern society. Thus its decay is of another nature than is usually admitted.
And I think the key to its ambiguity is in the passage on sadism. Des Esseintes and mirror Huysmans, clear analysis sadism as intrinsically linked to Christianity, rebellion, a sacrilege which has meaning only as defiance, as a challenge. So Des Esseintes in its report attraction / repulsion with church and religion is between a respect for it and nihilism or pessimism that attracts desperation to this rebellion, which is found in Chapter VI and that it drives him to abandon his will.
Moreover, its elitism, his conscience and his erudition makes him inclined to move in the decadent posture, exceeded both of romanticism and naturalism, dictated by the time more and more disunited, more and more oppressive.
I see and fratricidal opposition between the pessimism of his century and the panacea of the church that is played in Des Esseintes between his paintings and deadly poisonous plants on one side and his theological library well stocked, he knows by heart, as the main existential divide that affects Des Esseintes.
The other aspect that characterizes the novel is its symbolism, after and before other works that are part of those called, logically, the symbolic novel.
Thus, despite the refutation of a Huysmans use of symbols particularly in the choice of lémeraude, one may wonder whether it tells us not salads, if we do not want to swallow green and not ripe, it pervert.
If this novel provides a fascinating reflection on subjects as broad as art, transcendence or dilemma between positivism and romanticism, it is also considered for the great style Huysmans.
He who shows his immense talent critical in this novel, through the analysis of the style of his contemporaries or those who have gone before, writing a noble language, wielding the precise adjective with great talent, but also makes the complex as understanding the language is rich. Some may speak of affectations, but we can deny the beauty of style and language, which cast the story with grace produces sweat, so not to be confused with a style "flowing".
I do not get into the characterization of style to Huysmans, dadjectifs insider, feeling that very few capable of this feat.
I highly recommend this novel, which opened new perspectives to the disembodied naturalism of his time, but also makes a brilliant reflection on modern society, art or pessimism, all in a grandiose language.
This novel really has to be a door oeuvre by Huysmans where subjects dear to it are more developed in the following novels. In addition, this novel also makes you want to discover the popular works and so explained by Des Esseintes.
It is easily understood that Des Esseintes door beliefs and the opinions of Huysmans, a deadly modern society, materialistic, mercantile and Americanized, in 1884, what would it in 2014.
