The farther you get from that iPhone glow, the clearer it becomes: Our civilization has entered into decadence.<\/p>\n
The word \u201cdecadence\u201d is used promiscuously but rarely precisely. In political debates, it\u2019s associated with a lack of resolution in the face of threats \u2014 with Neville Chamberlain and W.B. Yeats\u2019s line about the best lacking all conviction. In the popular imagination, it\u2019s associated with sex and gluttony, with pornographic romances and chocolate strawberries. Aesthetically and intellectually it hints at exhaustion, finality \u2014 \u201cthe feeling, at once oppressive and exalting, of being the last in a series,\u201d in the words of the Russian poet Vyacheslav Ivanov.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s possible to distill a useful definition from all these associations. Following in the footsteps of the great cultural critic Jacques Barzun, we can say that decadence refers to economic stagnation, institutional decay and cultural and intellectual exhaustion at a high level of material prosperity and technological development. Under decadence, Barzun wrote, \u201cThe forms of art as of life seem exhausted, the stages of development have been run through. Institutions function painfully. Repetition and frustration are the intolerable result.\u201d He added, \u201cWhen people accept futility and the absurd as normal, the culture is decadent.\u201d And crucially, the stagnation is often a consequence of previous development: The decadent society is, by definition, a victim of its own success.<\/p>\n
Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n My Sunday essay excerpts my new book: The Age of Decadence: https:\/\/t.co\/3cvLqNVQpv<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Ross Douthat (@DouthatNYT) February 7, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n