Modern Poetry’s Genesis: Baudelaire to Symbolism

Late 19th Century Aesthetic Currents

In the late nineteenth century, different artistic movements emerged (Parnassianism, Symbolism, and Decadence) that shared some common characteristics:

  • Opposition to Realism, positivism, and bourgeois society.
  • Defense of creative freedom and a desire for rebellion.
  • A non-utilitarian conception of art that seeks beauty in itself (“art for art’s sake”).

Parnassianism: Impersonal Perfection

This movement consisted of a group of French poets gathered around the writer Leconte de Lisle (the principal representative) who collaborated on the journal The Contemporary Parnassus. Some of its features include:

  • It is impersonal poetry, rejecting Romantic sentimentalism.
  • Emphasis on art for art’s sake, setting aside political and social engagement. Therefore, formal perfection in the poem is sought.
  • Sources of inspiration are found in classical culture and the East.

Symbolism: Intuition and Music

Symbolism was born in France with the “Symbolist Manifesto” by Jean Moréas. Its precursor was Baudelaire, and its main representatives are Verlaine, Rimbaud, and Mallarmé.

Some of its features are:

  • The poet seeks knowledge through intuition and divination.
  • Importance of music and the search for sound effects in words (musicality of language).
  • Use of free verse as a means to express thought without the constraints of meter.
  • Use of the symbol to refer to complex situations (death, loneliness, time) through concrete objects or elements.

Decadence: Refinement and Melancholy

This is an aesthetic trend characterized by refinement and melancholy. Its most outstanding representatives are the English Oscar Wilde and the Italian Gabriele D’Annunzio.

  • Adherents saw themselves as chosen beings, yet lost in a world they did not understand; therefore, they sank into melancholy and morbid pessimism.
  • They admired late historical periods: the Byzantine (final period of the Roman Empire in the East) and the Alexandrian (Hellenistic period, end of Greek cultural dominance).

Key Poets of the Late Nineteenth Century

Charles Baudelaire: Spleen and Correspondences

His major contribution was The Flowers of Evil. The collection, divided into six parts according to its themes, marks the beginning of modern poetry:

  • The book can be seen as a controversial exploration, sometimes interpreted as a celebration of evil or an approach to Satanism.
  • It explores the theme of spleen (a profound sense of boredom and dissatisfaction), expressing the situation of the poet in a world that marginalizes him.
  • Knowledge based on the senses and the spirit is valued over reason.
  • It emphasizes the concept of correspondences, a worldview seeing duality and connections between material and spiritual forces.
  • Love is presented extremely, exalting the beloved object to the point of worship.

Paul Verlaine: Suggestion and Musicality

Verlaine was a poet seeking to suggest rather than define. He showed metrical innovations and experimented with rhyme.

His work Romances without Words is notable, where the author reflects on his relationship with Rimbaud and transmits his moods through the landscape.

Arthur Rimbaud: Hermetic Visions

Rimbaud created a hermetic and often obscure poetry. His bold, sometimes incomprehensible metaphors foreshadow Surrealism. His poem The Drunken Boat is significant, where the image of an abandoned ship wandering the seas symbolizes the poet himself.

Stéphane Mallarmé: The Central Symbol

Mallarmé constructed his poetry around a central symbol. For example, blue represents the sky, the infinite, the abyss—what lies beyond the earthly. Among his most important works is Hérodiade.

Walt Whitman: American Free Verse

Walt Whitman is considered the first great American poet. His collection was published under the title Leaves of Grass.

  • He sings of America, its geography, and its people. He was influenced by the Transcendentalism of Emerson, who believed in reaching spiritual growth through contemplation and love of nature.
  • Expressive freedom is characteristic of his work. Ahead of his time, he created long-lined, unrhymed verse (free verse).
  • Thus, rhyme becomes less important than the rhythm created by processes of lexical and syntactic repetition (parallelism).
  • He possessed a wealth of vocabulary, used geographical terms, and incorporated words from other languages. He used different linguistic registers, from the elevated to the colloquial.