Georges Rodenbach

Georges Rodenbach (1855–1898) was one of the major figures of Belgian symbolism, opening the door to a new literary direction from the stultified Romanticism that had held sway in his country until then. He was an essential bridge between the Belgian and Parisian literary scenes, and a friend and colleague of such Belgian literary figures as Emile Verhaeren, Max Elskamp, and Maurice Maeterlinck, and such Parisian figures as Stéphane Mallarmé and Joris-Karl Huysmans. He was the author of four novels, eight collections of verse, and numerous short stories, plays, and critical works. “If it were necessary to assign Rodenbach a place in Belgian literature,” wrote Emile Verhaeren, “it would be easy to define. He would stand in the premier rank of those whose sorrow, pain, subtle sentiment and talent nourished by memory, braid a crown of pale violets on the brow of Flanders.”