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1. The theories and practice of a school of French poets in the 19th century, especially an emphasis upon art for art's sake, careful metrics, and the repression of emotive elements.
   "In the early 1880s he embarked on a literary career in Paris, rejecting with equal vehemence the Naturalism of Émile Zola and the Parnassianism of Leconte de Lisle."

Type of: literary movement

Encyclopedia: Parnassianism