French literary historians regard the Goncourt brothers as representatives of Impressionist novels. Another French poet and novelist Pierre Loti, who is regarded as a representative figure of Impressionism, has some of his poems. It is true that the Impressionist painters are "capturing the sensory impression of the moment", but not all works are like this. Some French writers in the 20th century were seriously influenced by Impressionism, and in some novels only the hazy pursuit of sensory impressions remained. Impressionist Literature Literary historians believe that Impressionism entered literature after the 1870s, but there are different opinions on how Impressionism manifests itself in literature and which writers and poets belong to Impressionism. What is certain is that some writers in Western Europe at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century did have a creative method similar to Impressionist painting and music, that is, they were dedicated to capturing vague and fleeting sensory impressions. Due to the special nature of literary creation, impressionists in literature pay more attention to how this momentary sensory experience is transformed into an emotional state. Like the Impressionists in painting and music, they also opposed logical or rational refinement of the connections between the things they described, so they themselves became intermediaries between external stimuli and instinctive reactions.
There are similarities between Impressionism literature and Symbolism literature. They are both formalist literary schools; but there are also differences between the two. The main reason is that Impressionism opposes the use of symbolic techniques to express ideas and prefers description of feeling. Some poets who are usually considered symbolists are actually more inclined to impressionism. For example, the poem "The Art of Poetry" by Paul Verlaine, one of the leaders of symbolism, is not so much about symbolism as it is a piece of impressionism. doctrine manifesto.
French literary historians regard the Goncourt brothers as representatives of Impressionist novels. Another French poet and novelist Pierre Loti, who is regarded as a representative figure of Impressionism, has some of his poems. It is true that the Impressionist painters are "capturing the sensory impression of the moment", but not all works are like this. Some French writers in the 20th century were seriously influenced by Impressionism, and in some novels only the hazy pursuit of sensory impressions remained.
In some works by Oscar Wilde and others at the end of the 19th century in Britain, the tendency of Impressionism is relatively obvious. The Image Poetry School, formed by a group of British and American poets in London from 1912 to 1918, shared the same emphasis on the depiction of sensory impressions as Impressionism, but they claimed to pursue "clear and tough" images. They believed that the vagueness and ambiguity of images were the remnants of romanticism, and therefore attacked them with all their strength. However, the theoretical differences are sometimes difficult to detect in creative practice. For example, many of the works of American poets such as Imagist E. Lowell, H. Doolittle, and John Gold Fletcher are inconsistent with Impressionist poetry is indistinguishable from one another.
The situation was similar in German literature, where literary historians were unable to identify a clear-cut Impressionist school. Led by Detlef von Liliencron and including Richard Demmer, Gustav Falke and others, they are considered to be the most obvious poetic school of German Impressionism, but they emphasize truthful recording. The sensory experience that things give the poet is therefore close to naturalism. In addition, many poems by Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Arno Holz also have impressionistic tendencies to varying degrees.