Late-Victorian Decadent Song Literature

This article considers the Victorian and Edwardian vogue for setting late-Victorian decadent poetry to music. It examines the particular appeal of Ernest Dowson's and Arthur Symons's verse to the composers Cyril Scott and Frederick Delius, whoseSongs of Sunset(1911) was regarded as the “quintessential expression of thefin-de-sièclespirit,” and discusses the contribution of women composers and musicians—particularly that of the Irish composer and translator Adela Maddison (1866–1929)—to the cross-continental tradition of decadent song literature and the musical legacy of decadence in the late-Victorian period and beyond.