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Arthur Rimbaud

Illuminations Hardcover – May 16, 2011

by Arthur Rimbaud (Author), John Ashbery (Translator)

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"If we are absolutely modern―and we are―it's because Rimbaud commanded us to be."―John Ashbery, from the preface

First published in 1886, Arthur Rimbaud’s Illuminations?the work of a poet who had abandoned poetry before the age of twenty-one?changed the language of poetry. Hallucinatory and feverishly hermetic, it is an acknowledged masterpiece of world literature, still unrivaled for its haunting blend of sensuous detail and otherworldly astonishment. In Ashbery's translation of this notoriously elusive text, the acclaimed poet and translator lends his inimitable voice to a venerated classic.

W. H. Auden recognized the strong affinities between Ashbery's poetry and Rimbaud's Illuminations in his 1956 introduction to Ashbery's first book, Some Trees, noting that "the imaginative life of the human individual stubbornly continues to live by the old magical notions." And it is here, in the "crystalline jumble" and "disordered collection of magic lantern slides" of Illuminations, as Ashbery writes in the Preface, that we can rediscover this essential lineage. "Absolute modernity" was for Rimbaud "acknowledging the simultaneity of all of life, the condition that nourishes poetry at every second. [...] If we are absolutely modern?and we are?it's because Rimbaud commanded us to be."

Ashbery's idiomatic and lyrical translations of these forty-four texts convey the originality of Rimbaud's vision to English-speaking readers of a new century.

Print length

176 pages
Language

English
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

May 16, 2011
Dimensions

5.9 x 0.8 x 8.6 inches
ISBN-10

0393076350
ISBN-13

978-0393076356
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Editorial Reviews

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"John Ashbery has gifted us with an exquisite, untainted translation of Rimbaud; a transmission as pure as a winged dove driven by snow."
― Patti Smith

"More than a century after Arthur Rimbaud composed his Illuminations, they are reborn in John Ashbery's magnificent translation. It is fitting that the major American poet since Hart Crane and Wallace Stevens should give us this noble version of the precursor of all three."
― Harold Bloom

"This is the book that made poetry modern, and John Ashbery's sizzling new translation lets Rimbaud's eerie grandeur burst into English. Finally we have the key to open the door onto these magic Illuminations, and all their 'elegance, knowledge, violence!' This is an essential volume, a true classic."
― J. D. McClatchy

"To translate from one language into another is to risk losing the force, the soul, of the original. But not in this instance of John Ashberry's splendid version of Rimbaud's Illuminations. "Wise music is missing from our desire," he writes in his English version of the last line of "Conte" ("Tale"), losing neither the substance nor the truth of Rimbaud's great poetry."
― Paula Fox, author of Desperate Characters

"A marriage divine."
― Joy Williams, author of State of Grace

About the Author

Unknown beyond the avant-garde at the time of his death in 1891, Arthur Rimbaud has become one of the most liberating influences on twentieth-century culture. Born Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud in Charleville, France, in 1854, Rimbaud’s family moved to Cours d’Orléans, when he was eight, where he began studying both Latin and Greek at the Pension Rossat. While he disliked school, Rimbaud excelled in his studies and, encouraged by a private tutor, tried his hand at poetry. Shortly thereafter, Rimbaud sent his work to the renowned symbolist poet Paul Verlaine and received in response a one-way ticket to Paris. By late September 1871, at the age of sixteen, Rimbaud had ignited with Verlaine one of the most notoriously turbulent affairs in the history of literature. Their relationship reached a boiling point in the summer of 1873, when Verlaine, frustrated by an increasingly distant Rimbaud, attacked his lover with a revolver in a drunken rage. The act sent Verlaine to prison and Rimbaud back to Charleville to finish his work on A Season in Hell. The following year, Rimbaud traveled to London with the poet Germain Nouveau, to compile and publish his transcendent Illuminations. It was to be Rimbaud’s final publication. By 1880, he would give up writing altogether for a more stable life as merchant in Yemen, where he stayed until a painful condition in his knee forced him back to France for treatment. In 1891, Rimbaud was misdiagnosed with a case of tuberculosis synovitis and advised to have his leg removed. Only after the amputation did doctors determine Rimbaud was, in fact, suffering from cancer. Rimbaud died in Marseille in November of 1891, at the age of 37. He is now considered a saint to symbolists and surrealists, and his body of works, which include Le bateau ivre (1871), Une Saison en Enfer (1873), and Les Illuminations (1873), have been widely recognized as a major influence on artists stretching from Pablo Picasso to Bob Dylan.

Pulitzer Prize–winning poet John Ashbery (1927―2017) translated many French writers, including Alfred Jarry, Pierre Reverdy, and Raymond Roussel. In 2011 he was awarded the National Book Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Bilingual edition (May 16, 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 176 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393076350
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393076356
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.8 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.9 x 0.8 x 8.6 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,324,802 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #185 in French Poetry (Books)

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Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1891) was a French poet who is known for his contributions to the Symbolist movement. Born in the small town of Charleville-Mézières, Rimbaud wrote the majority of his literary works during a five-year period between late-adolescence and early adulthood, including his major collections Une Saison en Enfer (1873) and Les Illuminations (1886). Both titles were translated into English by Bertrand Mathieu and published by BOA Editions in 1973.

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JG

Grandfather Of Modernism, Surrealism, Post Modernism, ETC

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 28, 2011

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It's hard to pick the exact point in time when I first encountered surrealism, but one of the earliest memories I have is when, as a child, my grandfather showed me pictures of Dali and his paintings in a book he'd brought back from a trip to Paris. He was a huge fan and loved to imitate the classic Dali look (the one with the crazy eyes, usually staring down at the camera). Who knows whether those early experiences helped draw me toward other surrealists, the Beat poets, and eventually music like Talking Heads, Tom Verlaine (who took his nom de plume from Rimbaud's lover Paul Verlaine), Patti Smith, Grateful Dead, and on and on and on and on, as I got older.

During the last five decades or so of getting immersed into all this, I'd become aware of Arthur Rimbaud, but had never actually read any of his writings. Am not sure how I stumbled across this new edition of Illuminations either. As I read it the first time, it reminded me of the first time I heard one of Beck's non sequitur songs (wait, aren't -all- of Beck's songs non sequitur?....I digress) or the seemingly non sensical words and phrases being projected on panels behind Talking Heads during their "Stop Making Sense" tour. The imagery of each line, whether Rimbaud's, Talking Heads, Dylan, William S. Burroughs, many songs by The Beatles, or Beck, fires up the synapses for a few seconds, and then you're onto the next line.

I chose to read Illuminations in its entirety in just a few settings rather than stop to focus or concentrate or try to understand or gather any meaning from what I'd just read from one "chapter" to the next. I will also most likely read it again many times, just to experience that fleeting sense of disorientation and bewilderment.

I've mentioned just a short list of artists, writers, and musicians who were clearly influenced by Rimbaud and the Romantics/Symbolists and who came to my mind as I read this hallucinatory book. As you read it, you too will undoubtedly marvel at the unbelievable influence Rimbaud continues to have upon countless favorite writers, painters, and musicians of your own.

12 people found this helpful

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Allen Prebus

Great translation of a French classic of modern poetry

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 21, 2012

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I ordered the 'hardback' edition -- it was not hardback, but rather a thicker cover and better print and type -- I wanted a good edition because Rimbaud's 'Illuminations' is a classic that I read as a French major.

Ashbury does a fine job of translation and renders much of the strange allusiveness of Rimbaud. No problems with the translation.

The graphic design was a little out of control -- repeated images of the same staring, probing, hostile face of Rimbaud in faint black and white against a yellow background -- I could have done without that. But then I put my head into the book and enter Ribaud's fantastic world, leaving the book design behind.

Definitely I recommend the book if you are looking for a good 'Illuminations'

3 people found this helpful

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Paul Dresman

An elegantly printed book by Norton that contains a great translation of the famously original French poet by an ...

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 12, 2013

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An elegantly printed book by Norton that contains a great translation of the famously original French poet by an American poet. Ashbery is clear and accurate and sometimes amazes by finding the poetically apt English for the French: "biscuit d'route" becomes "hardtack of the highway." Keats swooned when he first looked at Chapman's 17th century translation of Homer, so you might sit down before you open this volume by an original bad boy and his adept translator. The fireworks will start to explode shortly thereafter.

3 people found this helpful

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Erricka Grace

Nice edition

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 1, 2020

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This translation was recommended to me by a well-known American poet who was my professor in college. I adore Ashbury and feel his style complements Rimbaud’s original.

The book jacket is very attractive and paper is good quality. The typesetting is a good font but almost seems too large in a strange way.

4 people found this helpful

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Hank Napkin

HIS NAME IS ARTHUR RAINBOW AND TONIGHT HE'S YOUR HOST

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 21, 2011

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On a purely subjective note, of all I've read during my lifetime, Illuminations remains the most compelling work of literature I've encountered. My first contact with the work lead to what was probably intended: a slapp happy sense of disorientation imbued with a sustained and profound attraction to the fluidity of meaning and perception, to the images, to the now broken and drowned world overrun: impervious to inference, awash with unexpected associations and "new misfortunes". Rimbaud's work lead my reading on to Baudelaire, Lautréamont, Tzara, Breton, Eluard. Yet none of these authors has left as deep an impression, with such pervasive force or tangible presence. In its form, in its brevity, in its perpetual instability Illuminations accomplished mutually exclusive ends, including the end of Rimbaud's pursuit of writing. Concise and expansive, effortless and intricate, of language and of experience, it remains the best possible compass for getting lost, now made more acutely affecting by Ashbery's new and resonant translation.

34 people found this helpful

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Fiona Webster

brilliant translation, the best ever

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 17, 2020

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This book has facing French and English pages, so this reader (who knows some French) can clearly see how superb is John Ashbery's translation—no doubt a labor of love.

2 people found this helpful

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ida Perkins

Quite fascinating

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 1, 2019

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I didn't know what to expect when I ordered this book, but found it quite fascinating and also interesting.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 14, 2011

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Of course this is a more literal translation than some, which I find most helpful. Of course, you will never find the true meaning of Rimbaud's work through a translation, but this text will help guide you through the tough readings of "Ville", "Barbare", and "Génie". Rimbaud's writing can be very difficult, so this text is a great aid for the French speaker who may not feel quite comfortable reading and interpreting profound poetry like that of Rimbaud.

2 people found this helpful

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Júlia Manacorda

livro incrível mas entrega a desejar

Reviewed in Brazil 🇧🇷 on April 18, 2022

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Infelizmente, o livro chegou muito amassado, basicamente, dobrado.

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Diego Montelongo

One of my favorites

Reviewed in Mexico 🇲🇽 on July 27, 2018

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My favorite poet, always good to read this book, the book didn't were in perfect condition but who cares when you read this you forget everything else

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