I like a little debauchery and degradation as much as the next, but I almost wearied of the self-loathing pathos of the title character before Leppin let the narrative escape outside Blaugast’s head. I understand that self-obsession is a defining feature of Decadent literature, but I prefer characters that embrace revelry, intoxication, and debauchery as a choice against the misfortunes of history and the tragedy of the human condition rather than as a mark of their own self-disgust. (Blaugast became a different book when Leppin told the story of the noble whore Johanna.)

The depravity is laid on thick (for to repulse the church ladies of early 20th c. Prague?), and some of the prose is more purple than poetic. The cesspools of destiny! Everything seethes and festers and reeks. About a third of the way in I realized I was not so much reading as observing Blaugast as an artifact, with Leppin presenting a kind of performance piece: Frank Moore without the mad, spastic cackle, or Saló without the fascism. But, yes, it was entertaining.

Blaugast, by Paul Leppin (November 27, 1878 - April 10, 1945), was written
in the late 30's but not published (in German) until the 70's. English trans. 2007. Leppin was a German writer who was born and lived in Prague.
Leppin pushes the boundaries of morality and prose style in Blaugast.
Leppin alternates between descriptions of mundane life in the
"underworld" of whores, drunks, addicts with wild torrents of stream-of-
consciousness poetry. Leppin's style and extreme subject matter are
unique and effective. The matter of fact descriptions and the wild poetic
prose creates a dramatic effect; both subject and style are matched in
vivid brutality and effect.