Les jeunes mélancoliques is French and translates to ‘the young melancholics’. Partially inspired by dark romanticism, it is the vision of a new literary movement that reflects the human condition, and especially of the young generation, at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
Founded by Thierry Heles by writing the manifesto at the beginning of 2007, the idea quickly took fruition and several writers proclaimed their interest. This website tries offer a platform to all the authors of the movement and give people an idea on who we are and what we are trying to achieve.
Ever since, les jeunes mélancoliques has been a group of avid young writers, currently aged between 19 and 23, originally all from Luxembourg but now spread across Europe. Although referring to ourselves as melancholics, we draw, as can be read in the manifesto, a very strict line to the emo subculture, which to us is caught in the unoriginal and insignificant style of teenage angst. Melancholy in the sense of les jeunes mélancoliques does not mean that we are depressed or write depressive texts, albeit such themes may surface in our writings. We understand melancholy to be much more complex than this, for example (over)happiness is an inherent part of melancholy. We simply are aware of and concerned with the social problems in a world that is, sadly, technologically far more advanced than morally. In other words, we feel a strong “début de siècle” if you will.
In more precise terms, we see the constant devaluation of creative writing – in all its forms – and the lack of a consistent movement at the beginning of this twenty-first century with great distress and endeavour to change this. We are a loose collective and as such our common ground lies not so much in a similar style (although they may sometimes mirror each other) as in a similar theme. We are driven by the question of who these human beings, struggling with life at the dawn of this new millennium, are. We do not claim to have, or ever be able to find, an answer to this question, but our works show fragments and describe the frameworks of a society that seems lost and unhappy. We strive to give our readers a new perception of life, by offering them our perspective on it.
At the moment we are not openly accepting new members, instead putting all our resources into providing exposure for our current members. This may or may not change in the future – the safest bet is to subscribe to our feed to get updated should this happen.
Founded by Thierry Heles by writing the manifesto at the beginning of 2007, the idea quickly took fruition and several writers proclaimed their interest. This website tries offer a platform to all the authors of the movement and give people an idea on who we are and what we are trying to achieve.Ever since, les jeunes mélancoliques has been a group of avid young writers, currently aged between 19 and 23, originally all from Luxembourg but now spread across Europe. Although referring to ourselves as melancholics, we draw, as can be read in the manifesto, a very strict line to the emo subculture, which to us is caught in the unoriginal and insignificant style of teenage angst. Melancholy in the sense of les jeunes mélancoliques does not mean that we are depressed or write depressive texts, albeit such themes may surface in our writings. We understand melancholy to be much more complex than this, for example (over)happiness is an inherent part of melancholy. We simply are aware of and concerned with the social problems in a world that is, sadly, technologically far more advanced than morally. In other words, we feel a strong “début de siècle” if you will.In more precise terms, we see the constant devaluation of creative writing – in all its forms – and the lack of a consistent movement at the beginning of this twenty-first century with great distress and endeavour to change this. We are a loose collective and as such our common ground lies not so much in a similar style (although they may sometimes mirror each other) as in a similar theme. We are driven by the question of who these human beings, struggling with life at the dawn of this new millennium, are. We do not claim to have, or ever be able to find, an answer to this question, but our works show fragments and describe the frameworks of a society that seems lost and unhappy. We strive to give our readers a new perception of life, by offering them our perspective on it.At the moment we are not openly accepting new members, instead putting all our resources into providing exposure for our current members. This may or may not change in the future – the safest bet is to subscribe to our feed to get updated should this happen.