The brazilian criticism in the face of the huysmansian novel À Rebours

Abstract

Playing an important role in the literary scene of the late nineteenth century, the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans (1848-1907) was initially linked to Naturalism and later recognized as an important symbol of Decadentism. Although his novels have been receiving critical attention in French literary studies, this type of material seems to exist in a significantly smaller quantity in Brazil. In order to find out the repercussion of Huysmans works for Brazilian critics and readers, we have searched and analyzed newspapers. As a result, more than 600 articles about the author were revealed from 1884 to 2013. The collected texts broached the personal and professional life of Huysmans, however, it was evident that À rebours was one of his works that received most attention from critics, who saw in it an innovative, complex, and beautiful work. Besides portraying decadence in a prose text, À rebours developed several themes that prioritized art in its most varied forms, producing, in the eyes of Brazilian critics, a watershed in the manners of doing literature.