Arthur Rimbaud - ANGST Writing

By: Melissa Shepard

This month, I am featuring a piece on Arthur Rimbaud, a 19th century French poet who changed the face of modern poetry, all between the ages of 15 - 19. Interesting isn't it?

Arthur Rimbaud (1854 - 1891)
The Impact Of A Child Poet On Modern Poetry

Arthur Jean Nicolas Rimbaud was born in Charleville France in 1854 and turned the French literary world into an uproar between the ages of 15 and 19. Rimbaud proclaimed himself as a seer, a "saint of poetry" which he believed he could obtain by a "long and reasoned derangement of the senses."

Rimbaud's desire to explore all of the senses, to become all people, and to challenge the borders of human experience and reality, led him into an extreme life of violence, intoxication, melodrama and the desire to shock. This made him an icon to many artists of the beat generation of the 50's - 60s including Jim Morrison (who proclaimed he was Rimbaud reincarnated), Patti Smith and Jack Kerouac. What made Rimbaud great, however, were the times he lived in while leading this life.

Angst writing is comparable to these philosophies--boiling down to one thing that I believe is paramount in good writing: The best poetry is written for yourself, not for an audience.

Rimbaud prided himself on insulting the posh and clique like nature of the literary world and denouncing the structure and heavy politics that surrounded it at that time. He even went as far as to literally urinate on a famous poet's work, calling it "shit and lies". He was a satyr to the then very refined world of French literature.

Rimbaud's poetry is raw like an open wound, rich with painted images, angst, and an honesty that breathed life into the times in which he lived. He denounced the typical subject matter, the meter and the monotony, of the lifeless work that was saturating the very fabric of the literary world.

Through this, Rimbaud unwittingly changed the face of modern poetry forever.

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Rimbaud wrote his final masterpiece (A Season in Hell) when he was 19, after a torrid and self-destructive love affair with a famous poet named Paul Verlaine. Always having a fondness for travel and adventure, he then moved to the outskirts of Africa where he began a career as a soldier, a gunrunner and a coffee trader. Rimbaud died at the age of 37, and as far as is known to anyone, never wrote again after the age of 19.

Information on Arthur Rimbaud's life and work can be found online under the keyword "Arthur Rimbaud, or Paul Verlaine". Many of the sites are in French, but don't give up too easily, the English ones are out there. I also recommend a movie titled "TOTAL ECLIPSE" starring David Thewlis and Leonardo DiCaprio illustrating the life of Arthur Rimbaud. It is an excellent film.