Verlaine's Rimbaud

About the Book

PAUL VERLAINE (1844 - 1896) was a leading light of the French Parnassian poets, highly praised for his early collection of verse, Fêtes galantes (1869). In 1872 he deserted Paris, wife and child, and the Parnassians to travel with young poet Arthur Rimbaud on a quest to "renew poetic vision." Use of drugs, alcohol, sex and violence in this pursuit led to gunshots, a prison-term, exile and the end of the two poets' relationship. Throughout this period and over the following two decades of his life, Verlaine wrote many of his finest poems about this turbulent affair.

About the Author

Critic, poet, playwright D.J. CARLILE has also translated the complete poems and prose of Arthur Rimbaud (Rimbaud: The Works, Xlibris 2000). "These are the best renditions of Rimbaud in English since Wallace Fowlie's nearly forty years ago, and many of them surpass that high standard. These poems have been wrestled with, which is the very least they demand, and successfully brought back home. Carlile gets the difficult switches and swoops of tone mostly right, and the linguistic detail is impressive--for 'Une voix étreignait mon coeur gelé' you can't get much better than 'a voice would hobble my frostbitten heart'." [2002] Charles Nicholl, author of SOMEBODY ELSE: ARTHUR RIMBAUD IN AFRICA.