The Avant-gardism of Leconte de Lisle

Parnassian poetry is usually considered retrograde, since it adopts strict and traditional forms, such as the sonnet. However, Leconte de Lisle's animal poems adopt a self-conscious modernist stance as regards romantic animal poetry, such as that of Vigny. They advertise themselves as innovative through the gradual insertion of new signs into the system inherited from Romanticism; gradually these signs come to predominate as they constitute themselves into a new hegemony that can re-evaluate the old ones, finally re-incorporating the old signs into a new sign system. (ROS)