Wormwood: A Drama of Paris (1890) is a proto-modernist novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 written by Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli

Marie Corelli was a British novelist. She enjoyed a period of great literary success from the publication of her first novel in 1886 until World War I. Corelli's novels sold more copies than the combined sales of popular contemporaries, including Arthur Conan Doyle, H. G...

. Although the novel was published in Europe in the traditional Victorian

Victorian era

The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...

 three-volume format, it addressed the very modern effects and woes of absinthe

Absinthe

Absinthe is historically described as a distilled, highly alcoholic beverage. It is an anise-flavoured spirit derived from herbs, including the flowers and leaves of the herb Artemisia absinthium, commonly referred to as "grande wormwood", together with green anise and sweet fennel...

 in fin-de-siecle Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

.

The European edition was published in 1890 by Richard Bentley & Son, London. The American edition was published by Wm. L. Allison, New York.

External links

• Marie Corelli's Wormwood — At The Virtual Absinthe Museum: Photographs of the rare 1890 London first edition, and extensive extracts from the book downloadable in PDF format.