BOURGET, LAFORGUE AND IMPRESSIONISM'S INSIDE STORY.

Considers writer Paul Bourget's and Jules Laforgue's presentation of Impressionism as a potent metaphor for cultural as well as aesthetic transformation, and as a radical envisioning of the self in modern French society. Major stimulus for Laforgue's exposition of Impressionist aesthetics; Clear correspondence between Laforgue's emphasis on Impressionist fragmentation and Bourget's links between analytic vision and Decadent forms.