First published fifty years ago, Baldick's biography presents a narrative of Huysmans' life and work in all its various phases - from the Naturalism of the 1870s to the Decadence of the 1880s, and from the occult vogue of the 1890s to the Catholic Revival of the turn of the century - and it is written with such impeccable scholarship that it is still relied on today as regards matters of fact and detail. For this new edition - the first time the biography has been reprinted in English - Baldick's notes have been extensively revised and updated by Brendan King to take account of the new developments and publications in the field of Huysmansian studies.