Belgium

Abstract At the end of the nineteenth century, Belgium was at the peak of its power, and therefore suggesting little about decadence. The predominance of French in the cultural life of the country made Belgian writers and artists highly dependent on Parisian tendencies, but their new international visibility enabled many of them to position themselves as distinctive. Although a movement did not exist as such in Belgium, European decadence and fin-de-siècle aesthetics were deeply defined by a set of representations—attitudes, places, and use of language—that were associated with the new Belgian movement. Because of their self-proclaimed “Belgian soul” and northern identity, the Belgians could be perceived either as barbarians or as an energizing influence on France. They themselves represented their own cities as places of decadence, whether through the melancholy of Bruges or the corruption of Antwerp. Finally, their peculiar style of literature can be remembered as one their most original contributions to the decadent tradition.