A Decadent Woman by Georges de Peyrebrune

The fencing-schools of the city, running low on their traditional customers, had recently opened their doors wide to female clients, who flocked there in much the same spirit, compounding the scandal in the eyes of the popular press, which swiftly created a mythology of female duelists that was enthusiastically transplanted into fiction by writers proud to belong to the largely fictitious “decadent school,” including Catulle Mendès. The political fashion statement had been made before, but the possibility of making it “official” when it was challenged was an attractive floupetterie of which several determined self-publicists took advantage. The early 1880s was the hey day of the Parisian “Amazons,” women who took satirical advantage of an old city statute that permitted them to apply to the Prefecture of Police for a permit to wear male attire in public. The novella tells the story of Hélione d’Orval, possibly suffering from tuberculosis, and primarily her interactions with her immediate family, sister Marguerite and brother in law Marcus, who is a doctor. Her novella ‘Une Décadente’ (translated here as ‘A Decadent Woman’) first appeared, in two parts, in the ‘Revue Bleue’ 20 March and 27 March 1886. Mathilde-Marie-Georgina-Élisabeth de Peyrebrune, a decadent name if I’ve ever seen one, wrote under the pseudonym of Georges de Peyrebrune and according to ‘A Library of the World’s Best Literature – Ancient and Modern, Volume XLIII’ was “one of the most popular women novelists in France”.

A Decadent Woman by Georges de Peyrebrune