Volkskuns en fin de siêcle: Perspektiewe op parallelle tendense in die Vlaamse en Afrikaanse prosa
In nineteenth century Europe, the fin de siécle was in a literary sense characterized by the aesthetic cult, Symbolism , and a decadent mood . However, the traditional historians of Flemish and Afrikaans literature accentuate the mild romanticism and realism as typical of what have since become, for...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | Afrikaans |
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AOSIS
1992-05-01
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| Series: | Literator |
| Online Access: | https://literator.org.za/index.php/literator/article/view/739 |
| Summary: | In nineteenth century Europe, the fin de siécle was in a literary sense characterized by the aesthetic cult, Symbolism , and a decadent mood . However, the traditional historians of Flemish and Afrikaans literature accentuate the mild romanticism and realism as typical of what have since become, for a corresponding period (± 1895-1925), in both those literatures their canonized texts. Literary history also identifies in Flemish and Afrikaans prose a definite striving towards a ‘national’ literature, thus reflecting the nationalistic political and cultural movements of those early times. This article focusses on a few, but interesting deviations from that established pattern. It reveals that, especially in works of prose written by surprisingly many of those authors (who were often identified with a ‘national’ cause), some marked tendencies of the decadent fin de siêcle are clearly present. A contextual rereading of these texts - which even now are either completely under-estimated or ignored by conventional literary history - may bring about a re-evaluation of the existing canon of early Flemish and Afrikaans prose. |
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| ISSN: | 0258-2279 2219-8237 |