A Season in Hell & Illuminations
Sep 03, M. Rio rated it it was amazing Shelves: Rimbaud is a regular autumn read for me, and every time I find another captivating detail I somehow overlooked before. Quanto mais gente se sente representada por uma bandeira, menos representa ela alguma coisa: Sabemos dar a nossa vida inteira todos dias. Aug 27, ilknur a. Alindai-vos, bailai, desatai a rir. Aos vinte anos decide abandonar a escrita e dedicar-se ao trabalho: Morreu de cancro aos trinta e sete anos.
Jan 11, Fox rated it liked it Recommends it for: I was handed the text and asked to read and, being me, proceeded to open to random pages and read aloud in an impassioned tone. When read like this - in the middle of the night with all of its magic and attractions, the text is like fire. Rimbaud's words alternatively scorch and caress, they raise up the most enlivened fancies and play out dark fantasies unlike anything else one could ever be exposed to.
Rimbaud becomes the Father of all that is brutal and metal, he becomes the embodiment of debauchery and dark poetry; in this light he is pure electricity, and being that, strange, mysterious, and wonderful. In the light of day, his prose loses some of that intensity. He becomes something tamer, better understood. In light of the preface, Rimbaud runs the risk of even failing to be purely Rimbaudian - he is human, after all, and simply a man, behind a desk, writing I feel he loses his allure in this light, rather than gains it.
Yes, he is human, but the legend is so much more fun and eagerly traced? I struggle between giving this novel three stars or four - in the right conditions, he is truly incredible and quite the beloved read. For now, I shall settle with three, and perhaps increase upon a later date. Wyatt Mason Having become absurdly near apoplectic in the search for a translation of Baudelaire that I loved, I let enjoyment return by instead reading one of his close kin. There wasn't a shortage of Rimbaud translations which felt right; Louise Varese or John Sturrock , or this one I chose for reasons I can't exactly remember.
As these are prose poems without conventional, clear focus, sometimes more like notes, I thought some readers must decided they were another set of the emperor's new clothes. This stuff probably would have been wasted on my numb and spiky self back then, but still I wish with all my heart that I had read the French decadent poets when I was somewhat younger and had these lines pulsing in my veins for the last seven, or at least two, years. Rimbaud's style is elevated and incantatory and comes very close to inducing the state I call inspiration.
A Season in Hell & Illuminations by Arthur Rimbaud | theranchhands.com: Books
Others, I'm sure, have different experiences of it and they have also been able to do more useful things with it For me it even has a particular type of breathing associated with it and it was quite remarkable to notice this happening simply from reading. On one plane I could still see how odd and flimsy these fragmented prose poems could look to some, yet the works were also a form of intoxicant: Right or wrong, the works feel as if they must have been written in some laser-focus fever state, tunnel visioned, nothing but the writing, the writing and the most basic of fuel; perfunctory sleep, unwashed, eventually reeking hair and clothes but a mind in cold fire.
Perhaps this is not just some weird wittering after all, given the influence Rimbaud has had on so many. A Felt lyric says "you're reading from A Season in Hell but you don't know what it's about" but there's no shame in that when academics can't quite agree on its subject either. Much else, though is a nebulous cluster of beautiful or anguished images.
Reading both poems was like swimming in a heavy air. Illuminations was more pleasurable, sometimes psychedelic, an experience of incense strong ancient stuff, not Nag Champa from a yoga shop , patterned cloth and the soft jangle of belled bracelets on dancers' ankles and wrists. A conjuration of the east, breadcrumbs for the hippie trail.
I felt it unlocking new ways of saying things I'd thought of for aeons, and cursed not having known it before. View all 5 comments. Feb 19, Simon Robs rated it really liked it. Sheer poetical madness no outcome. Better if could read French I'll bet. In many poems the reader gets the essence of Rimbaud, but I feel it is Mathieu's voice that is most commonly communicated on the page. Of course, I am basing this largely off of other translations that I have read.
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I don't disagree with him here, but I think that he and Schmidt tend too often to err on the other side of the line, missing that very delicate balance that Mason best achieves. Another thing that bothered me was that he translated "ennui" as "boredom" throughout, as have many translators of Rimbaud, but I take the position of James McGowan in his translation of Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal that ennui is something more "forceful" than boredom and that it should just be left as is, especially as the word is well enough known in American English.
In other places I felt that Mathieu stripped the beauty out of certain phrases, such as the opening lines of Une Saison en Enfer, which has been translated by others as follows: It's not bad, but it's not the Rimbaud that I've come to know and love. So why do I give it such a high rating -- 4.
Well, first, it still does have the essence of Rimbaud and that counts for something, even if the language has become somewhat mangled.
And, finally, I really enjoyed the translator's preface and postscript. I learned some new things about Rimbaud's life from these, but the veracity of some things is questionable as certain key biographical details that Mathieu includes completely conflict with points made in the other translations that I have read. I think I will probably read Enid Starkie's biography of Rimbaud at some point and try to see what light she can offer. Of course, Rimbaud is not a poet who can easily be pinned down and the stories included by Mathieu, while different from those of other translators, are very interesting nonetheless -- missing pieces to a jigsaw puzzle that will never be complete.
And Mathieu's postscript is also valuable in the sense that it, unlike other translations, points the reader toward works that influenced the young Rimbaud, including the works of Swedenborg, Eliphas Levi and the novels of Balzac. Quite interesting and worthy of further investigation. If only for the preface and postscript, this is a work worth reading, but I would not recommend it to one discovering Rimbaud by way of some translator for the first time.
These poems need to be read particularly as the prose poem was still so novel at the time -- employed very well by Rimbaud, but first and equally well by Baudelaire , but start with Mason or even Fowlie, and move on from there. So much for the brief review that I had set out to write at the beginning. View all 4 comments. Jun 06, Andy rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: When I was a mere slip of a boy and my flesh tasted like chicken and goth had not quite creeped into non-existence I would sulk in dimly lit buses reading Rimbaud. This is good reading on rainy nights.
Aug 04, Jeff Jackson rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: Anyone looking for good Rimbaud translation. Translations matter with Rimbaud. For my taste, he's absolutely right. Many of you might find this book depressing or even pessimistic. But I think of it rather as a celebration of life. After reading the first two sentences I realised I need to know something about Rimbaud himself first. The book seems like the manifestation of his whole life. If you're about to read this book, read something about Rimbaud first too one wikipedia article is sufficent.
I came to this book because of Kudera's books, where there are several references to Rimbaud and the whole Kundera Many of you might find this book depressing or even pessimistic. I came to this book because of Kudera's books, where there are several references to Rimbaud and the whole Kundera's philosophy is based on one line from this book: Mar 01, Ty rated it did not like it.
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Oct 29, Jessica is currently reading it Shelves: However, I've decided that I can include most other artists and humans for that matter, in the repulsive category so I decided to set my hatred aside and get this book. I'm really enjoying it. View all 3 comments. Mar 02, Autumn rated it liked it. It's Rimbaud, and on one hand I really enjoy reading this book, but on the other, I don't. It may take me a few more of his books to find out whether I like him or not.
Nov 20, Joshie rated it liked it Shelves: I was partly curious and partly intrigued with the section dedicated to Wojnarovicz's Rimbaud in New York. This exhibit featured a number of people who donned Rimbaud masks with their photographs taken at different underground locations in New York. A hint of rebellion underneath the grit and grim can be felt in these photos. Rimbaud's face was pensive; prim and proper. I want to be a poet, and I'm working at turning myself into a seer.
You won't understand any of this, and I'm almost incapable of explaining it to you. The idea is to reach the unknown by the derangement of all the senses. It involves enormous suffering, but one must be strong and be a born poet. It's really not my fault. He lived a vagrant, libertine life which earned him the reputation of being an enfant terrible all the while having a tumultuous and lustful liaison with another poet, Paul Verlaine.
Afterwards, he gave up writing, travelled around Europe, and never looked back. These major works were lauded and praised by critics alike with their influence apparent on modernism, surrealism and even punk movements.
This paperback edition is a back-to-back collection of Rimbaud's two major works. His works were often in free-verse; evocative, elusive, often filled with symbolism which I personally found rather puzzling most of the time. I acknowledge that I may not have enough knowledge to completely understand them and I would not even try to write my interpretations.
Most of these related to his personal life which were often nostalgic, tragic, and drastic. Altogether, a solid collection which burned like hell and illuminated like fireflies dancing in the moonlight. My takeaways from this book: There's nothing I wouldn't contemplate doing now, burdened as I am with the contempt of the most contemptible of hearts. But what did he want with me, drab and lifeless as I was? I saw that all living things were doomed, to bliss: Morality is a weakness of mind. What will become of the world when you leave?
No matter what happens, no trace of now will remain. Aug 06, Sofia rated it it was ok Shelves: Is This It I've been relistening to Eyedea lately, read him instead. Jun 09, Ana rated it it was amazing. This is the Mark Taharne translation; in his introduction he spells out the enormous difficulties involved with translating and interpreting the poetry, and advises readers to look at as many translations as possible. The latter is a marvellous ongoing immersion in 'soundscapes', music, song and spoken word. The R3 site and its blog say of this production: An abridged radio reworking o This is the Mark Taharne translation; in his introduction he spells out the enormous difficulties involved with translating and interpreting the poetry, and advises readers to look at as many translations as possible.
An abridged radio reworking of Rimbaud's intense masterpiece of spiritual disillusionment, narrated by Carl Prekopp with a soundscape by Bristol composer Elizabeth Purnell and poems sung by Robert Wyatt. A Season in Hell was written between April and August in London and France, when Rimbaud was 18, and in the throes of an intense, transgressive and destructive relationship with Verlaine. It is regarded as one of the most remarkable pieces of prose poetry ever written - a mixture of autobiography and enigmatic dream sequence in which Rimbaud looks back in despair over his life as a poet.
Combining lucid self-appraisal with demented vision, it moves between hyper-realism and hallucinatory surrealism, blending sounds, colours, odours and intensely visual images. The 25 pages of A Season in Hell, here cut to a third of its length, are seen as both a testimony to and a tortured recantation of Rimbaud's poetic credo, the 'disordering of all the senses'. Elizabeth Purnell's soundtrack for the work includes composed music, field recordings and processed sound in a raw response to the words; she set the poems specifically for Wyatt, whose voice in its high, delicate register suggests a beyond-the-grave alter-ego to the young Rimbaud.
The programme will be broadcast in Between the Ears on Saturday 14 November at 9. Here, producer Sara Davies gives a fascinating account of the journey from the idea of turning the work into radio, through various artistic twists and turns, to the version listeners will hear on Saturday.
About thirty years ago I was in a bar in a small Mexican town where a French actor gave a thoroughly eccentric performance of some of Rimbaud's poetry to a musical accompaniment. He didn't include the prose poem A Season in Hell, probably because it defied even his eccentricity and powers of performance. Later, it seemed to me that radio was the ideal place to try to find expression for its insistent, wild, knowing autobiographical voice and emotional complexity.
I knew I'd have to make fierce cuts to fit it into half an hour, and had imagined I'd drop the songs which appear about two thirds of the way through the piece, as they seemed to me to be the most problematic elements in a pretty knotty piece of writing. But when we talked about it, Liz argued convincingly for at least some of them to be left in, and I realised when she talked about wanting to set them for Robert Wyatt that she was absolutely right.
Bad boy rebel poet, possibly gay but probably bisexual, lover of the lesser poet Paul Verlaine, survivor of literary and romantic scenes worthy of Norman Mailer. This is now joined by I Promise to Be Good: No admirer of Rimbaud will want to be without it. Mason acts as conductor, whispering into our ears through footnotes that treat their subject playfully and respectfully at the same time. Also in Modern Library Classics. Also by Arthur Rimbaud. See all books by Arthur Rimbaud.
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