Alexandre Dumas was a writer from France. He wrote many books that are still widely read today all over the world. The best known are The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo.
Together with the seamstress Marie-Laure-Catherine Labay he had a son. But the parents were not married. Since the son bore the same name as the father and also became a writer, one also speaks of Alexandre Dumas the Elder and Alexandre Dumas the Younger to distinguish them.
Alexandre Dumas was born in 1802 in Villers-Cotterêts near Paris. His father Thomas was the son of a black slave woman from Haiti. He later became a general in Napoleon’s army. The young Dumas was interested in writing from an early age. As a teenager he wrote plays for the theater together with a friend. By the time he was in his mid-twenties, he was doing it enough to make a living.
Later he also wrote many novels, especially those about adventure. He also made many trips across Europe and wrote reports for newspapers. He even wrote books about French cuisine. Dumas died in 1870 at the age of 68.
Alexandre Dumas the Elder (1802-1870) grew up in the provinces of northern France, the son of a Napoleonic general. Orphaned and poor at an early age, but convinced of his talents, he went to Paris at the age of nineteen, where he wanted to work in the theatre. His capital: a beautiful handwriting, a couple of wild partridges and an almost inexhaustible imagination. The plays that he first wrote are now forgotten. But twenty years later, in 1844, he was the king of the literary feuilleton with “The Count of Monte Cristo”. Almost at the same time he wrote – based on a historical source from 1700, the “Memoirs of Herr d’Artagnan” by Gatien de Courtils de Sandras – what is still his most famous novel, “The Three Musketeers”, which was continued from 1844 to 1847 appeared and founded Dumas’ worldwide success.
What does A Dumas have to do with slavery?
Marquis Alexandre Davy de la Pailleterie fathered four children with the black slave Marie-Césette Dumas. Around 1775 mother and children were mortgaged as slaves.
Which two novels are by Alexandre Dumas?
Alexandre Dumas the Elder was a French writer. Today he is best known for his historical novels, which have become classics, such as The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo.
Was Alexandre Dumas black?
Dumas was descended from black Haitian slaves. He described himself as a “negro” (“nègre”). Accordingly, he suffered because of the color of his skin.
What did Alexandre Dumas write?
Dumas is an important representative of French Romanticism. He became known and popular through his historical adventure novel “The Three Musketeers” (1844) and the social novel “The Count of Monte Cristo” (1845/46) – by the way, the only social novel he ever wrote.
When was Alexandre Dumas born?
July 24, 1802
When did Alexandre Dumas die?
December 5, 1870
What language did Alexander Dumas write in?
Alexandre Dumas, pere, born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie (July 24, 1802- December 5, 1870), is best known for his numerous historical novels of high adventure which have made him the most widely read French author in the world.
Why is Thomas-Alexandre Dumas famous?
Thomas-Alexandre Dumas was a mulatto born in the French colony of Saint Domingue (Haiti). He joined the French Army as a private and rose to the rank of a General during the French Revolution. Dumas is probably best known for fathering the famous French writer Alexandre Dumas (père).
Why did Alexandre Dumas change his name?
However, his father refused to allow him to use his name in the lowest rank of the army. Thus, he dropped Thomas from his given name and took his mother’s surname, entering Louis XVI’s service as Alexandre Dumas.
Who wrote The Three Musketeers was the black?
It turns out that this happens to be true: Alexandre Dumas was both a Frenchman and a black man, and retelling his story reinforces the more important point that imagination should not be shackled by skin color.
Did Alexandre Dumas face racism?
Despite his noble background and success as a writer, Dumas had faced discrimination and racism due to ancestry and race. He wrote the novel, Georges, in 1843, which was about the son of a biracial plantation owner who faces discrimination due to his ancestry, despite appearing to be white.
Is Count of Monte Cristo a true story?
The Count of Monte Cristo wasn’t just a book for Dumas. It was a revenge fantasy he wrote on behalf of his father, a Black general who fought in the French Revolution and was ultimately betrayed by Napoleon.
What is the message of The Count of Monte Cristo?
“The Count of Monte Cristo” Themes. The Count of Monte Cristo explores six core themes: revenge, justice and God’s will, happiness, love and redemption, identity, and the domestic and the foreign.
Does The Count of Monte Cristo have a happy ending?
Dantès, his revenge complete, arranges for Valentine de Villefort and Maximilian Morrel to be together (they have been in love, but Valentine’s parents forbade their union), and Haydée declares her love for Dantès, to his great joy.
The German writer is one of the most important novelists and most outstanding essayists of the 20th century. He is considered a master of irony and literary mannerism. Thomas Mann wrote short stories and novels that reflect the end of the bourgeois era. As a traditionalist, he consciously placed himself in the footsteps of the educated middle classes and poets such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Theodor Fontane. His large-scale family saga “Buddenbrooks”, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize, achieved literary world fame. In his works, the author often appears as a defender of European humanistic culture – often realized in a commenting, reasoning-ironic attitude…
Thomas Mann was born as the son of the merchant and senator Johann Heinrich Mann and his wife Julia, née da Silva-Bruhns, on June 6, 1875 in Lübeck.
Mann grew up with four siblings: Heinrich (1871-1950), Julia (1877-1927), Carla (1881-1910) and Karl Victor (1890-1949). He first attended a private school in his native town, later he switched to the Realgymnasium there. After the death of his father in 1891, the company was sold and two years later the family moved to Munich. There Mann began a traineeship with an insurance company, which he gave up again. A small pension gave him the financial security he needed to become a freelance writer. His brother, Heinrich Mann, also pursued this career. From 1896 to 1898 Thomas Mann lived in Italy. After his return he was briefly an editor of the magazine “Simplicissimus”. From 1900 he did his military service. In 1905 he married the wealthy Munich professor’s daughter and student Katja Pringsheim. The marriage was to bring his homoerotic inclinations into a contemporary bourgeois constitution. The marriage produced a total of six children.
The success of the family saga “Buddenbrooks” (1897-1900) and his marriage to Katja Pringsheim enabled the writer to lead the life of a bourgeois. Thomas Mann countered his brother Heinrich Mann’s attitude towards the First World War as political activism with polemical and national-conservative statements such as “civilization writers”; they became the cause of a fratricidal quarrel that lasted for years. In 1919 Thomas Mann was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Bonn. With the end of the war, Thomas Mann campaigned for democracy and was a supporter of the Weimar Republic. In 1922 the brotherly relationship was restored. Mann was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1929 for his opulent novel “Buddenbrooks”. Even before the National Socialists seized power in 1933, the writer acted as a warning against the brown menace. In the year in question he had long since moved to Switzerland. It was not until 1936 that he publicly acknowledged his existence as an emigrant.
Mann became a Czechoslovakian citizen. In addition to the deprivation of German citizenship, he was also deprived of his honorary doctorate. After Austria was “connected” to the German Reich in 1938, Thomas Mann withdrew to the USA. There he first lived in Princeton and worked as a visiting professor. In 1941 he moved to Pacific Palisades near Los Angeles. During the war from 1940 to 1945 his monthly speeches “Deutsche Hörer!” sent to Germany by the BBC. Shortly before the end of the war in 1944, he became an American citizen. His public letter “Why I don’t return to Germany” from 1945, in which the author expressed his view of the collective guilt of the Germans, provoked widespread critical resistance. With his Goethe speeches on his first visit to Germany after the end of the war in 1949, Thomas Mann once again triggered fierce criticism. In 1952 Mann moved to Erlenbach near Zurich and in 1954 he settled in Kilchberg.
With the exception of the drama “Fiorenza” (1906) and the idyll “Gesang vom Kindchen”, Thomas Mann wrote only prose. He supplemented his literary genre focus on novels and stories with essays and journalistic works with recurring themes of bourgeoisie, being an artist, myth, life, spirit or decadence. Before his first big success with the “Buddenbrooks” he created the collection of short stories “Der kleine Herr Friedmann” in 1898. The Nobel Prize novel then tells of the decadence of the Buddenbrooks in epic breadth, which the writer associates with Schopenhauer’s philosophy. The ambivalence between art and bourgeoisie is the subject of the stories “Tonio Krüger” and “Tristan” (1903) and in the novella “Death in Venice” (1912). In the period novel “Der Zauberberg” (1925), Mann describes, among other things, the years before the First World War and the decadence of contemporary society.
In his most extensive piece, the Joseph Tetralogy 1933-1943, the writer exemplifies the mythical tradition of the spirit. His novel “Lotte in Weimar” (1939) represents a high point in Mann’s preoccupation with Goethe, in which he contrasts his enlightened attitude with contemporary conditions. In his novel “Doktor Faustus” (1947) lifelong social conditions are discussed, such as the development of German fascism and its downfall. In his last novel, “The Confessions of Felix Krull the Conman” (1954), Mann parodies the Bildungsroman and the question of being an artist and of narcissism.
Thomas Mann died in Zurich on August 12, 1955.
What is special about Thomas Mann?
Loved, hated and read a lot – Thomas Mann is one of the most important German writers of the 20th century. But during his lifetime he polarized: he was too intellectual for the conservatives, too German for the left and too bourgeois for his fellow writers.
Why is Thomas Mann so important?
With his work, THOMAS MANN took the tradition of the great realists of the 19th century to a final climax. In addition to LEW TOLSTOJ, JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE was one of his role models; he himself was one of the most important storytellers of the 20th century.
What religion did Thomas Mann belong to?
Thomas Mann, who played an important role as a politically engaged author in exile during the National Socialist period, repeatedly described himself as a philo-Semite, fought for the recognition of the discriminated Jewish minority and was associated with a number of Jewish intellectuals whom he very much …
Where did Thomas Mann stand politically?
He was initially skeptical about Western democracy, but by the early 1920s he had become a staunch defender of the Weimar Republic. During the National Socialist regime he emigrated to Switzerland in 1933 and to the USA in 1938, where he became a citizen in 1944.
As a writer of fairy tales, the Danish writer, novelist and poet became the spiritual father of some of the most popular and beautiful children’s stories. Stories like “The Ugly Duckling”, “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, “The Snow Queen” or “The Princess and the Pea” made Hans Christian Andersen one of the most respected authors in world literature. “The Little Mermaid” was the reason for the sculpture reminiscent of the poet in the port of Copenhagen. Hans Christian Andersen’s stories have been translated into more than 80 languages and served as the basis for theatre, ballet and film…
Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense on April 2, 1805, the son of a shoemaker and a washerwoman.
Andersen lived through an unhappy childhood marked by deep poverty. When he was 14, he left home and fled to Copenhagen alone. Here the head of the Royal Theater, Jonas Collin, took care of the child and gave him shelter and work. With his help, the young Hans Christian Andersen was also able to attend school. Inspired by the theater work, he began to write his first plays, which he later wanted to develop into stage plays. This is how the first narratives, stories and poems came about at this time. In 1822 Andersen’s first actions were published with great success. He rose to become a recognized writer in 1829 with his fantastic story, which was entirely indebted to the German writer Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann.
In 1835, Andersen’s debut novel “The Improviser” was written, which received extremely positive reviews from critics. The Danish philosopher and writer Sören Kierkegaard was critical of him in his 1837 essay “Only a Violinist”. From 1839 Andersen was awarded a state poet salary. As a result, financially secure, he traveled through Europe, Asia and Africa. However, he spent most of his time in Germany. He recorded his adventures and experiences in dramas, novels and travel books. Anderson became a man of letters with worldwide attention through his precise rendering of individual characters, which the writer wrote in the then atypical everyday language. Secret fears and longings of the characters were presented, which also represented an educational claim through their exemplary behavior.
During his writing career, Andersen wrote some of the most popular children’s stories of modern times. Andersen’s collected fairy tales and poems were published between 1835 and 1848 under the Danish title “Eventyr, fortalte for børn”. His most successful stories include “The Ugly Duckling”, “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, “The Snow Queen” and “The Princess and the Pea”. Andersen’s extensive legacy includes over 150 fairy tales, including “The Little Mermaid”, which gave rise to the sculpture of the same name in memory of him in Copenhagen harbour. Andersen’s stories have been translated into over 80 languages and have served as the basis for theatre, ballet, picture books and later also as successful films.
Hans Christian Andersen died in Copenhagen on August 4, 1875.
Which fairy tales are by Hans Christian Andersen?
The lighter.
Little Claus and Big Claus.
The princess and the Pea.
Little Ida’s flowers.
Thumbelina.
The traveling buddy.
The little mermaid.
The Emperor’s New Clothes.
Why did Hans Christian Andersen die?
The term liver cancer summarizes the malignant tumors of the liver. The now uncommon term hepatoma summarizes the primary neoplasms of the liver, which includes not only malignant but also benign adenomas of the liver.
How many fairy tales did Hans Christian Andersen write?
An important body of work. When Andersen died of liver cancer in Copenhagen on August 4, 1875, he had written a good 160 fairy tales.
Why did Hans Christian Andersen call it the fairy tale of my life?
As an artist he called himself H.C. Andersen. Andersen became famous for his many fairy tales, which are now known all over the world. He called his autobiography “The fairy tale of my life”: “My life is a pretty fairy tale, so rich and happy”.
What is Hans Christian Andersen most famous for?
His most famous fairy tales include “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, “The Little Mermaid”, “The Nightingale”, “The Steadfast Tin Soldier”, “The Red Shoes”, “The Princess and the Pea”, “The Snow Queen”, “The Ugly Duckling”, “The Little Match Girl”, and “Thumbelina”.
Who was Hans Christian Andersen for kids?
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) was a renowned Danish writer. Although he wrote numerous plays, stories, autobiographies and travelogues, he is most famous for writing over 156 fairy tales in his lifetime. His original tales include The Ugly Duckling, The Little Mermaid, and many others.
How many fairy tales did Hans Christian Andersen write?
Andersen wrote two hundred and ten fairy tales in all, published over the course of his life. The tales were translated across Europe, then made their way around the world, making him the best-known Scandinavian writer of his age.
What are 6 interesting facts about Hans Christian Andersen?
Some of Andersen’s fairy tales are autobiographical.
Andersen was declared a Danish national treasure.
Andersen was dyslexic.
Andersen suffered Taphophobia.
Andersen made for a disconcerting house guest.
Andersen’s image may have been lost in translation abroad.
GEORGE GORDON NOEL LORD BYRON belonged to the second generation of English Romantics, along with JOHN KEATS and PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. This second generation took a critical look at the early English romantics, WILLIAM WORDSWORTH and SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. Last but not least, his extravagant lifestyle made BYRON the leading figure of this circle of young poets. Due to his numerous amorous affairs and an incestuous relationship with his half-sister, he was ostracized by English society. He then moved to Switzerland, where he became close friends with SHELLEY.
BYRON’S poetry reflects his predilection for the satanic as well as exotic subjects. The first two cantos of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, published in 1812, made him instantly famous. BYRON died of fever at the age of 36 while joining the Greek struggle for freedom against the Turks.
Biography
LORD BYRON was considered to be a personality that was as charming as it was ambivalent. He combined devotional love and excessive sensuality, the pose of world pain and genuine suffering, enthusiasm and harsh rejection. BYRON lost his father at an early age and was raised by his hysteria-prone mother. In 1798 he inherited his great-uncle’s title and fortune, which enabled him to study at Harrow and Cambridge.
Debts, his divorce and the incestuous relationship with his half-sister led to BYRON being ostracized by English society and withdrawing abroad. In 1816 he traveled first to Switzerland, where he befriended fellow poet PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY, and then to Italy. Driven by restlessness, after a lengthy stay in Ravenna (1819–1821), he moved to work with SHELLEY in Pisa. In 1824 he decided to travel to Greece to support the Greeks in their fight for freedom against the Turks. However, he died of fever shortly after landing in Mesolongion.
Literary creation
BYRON’S poetry reflects his eventful life. After less successful early works, he wrote the first two cantos of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage in 1812, which made him famous overnight. In it he processed the impressions of his 1809-1811 journey to the Mediterranean and the Orient. He published in quick succession several romantic verse narratives from the Orient, including The Giauor (1813), The Corsair (1814) and Lara (1814). Despite their often lax form, the poems were a great success thanks to their linguistic virtuosity and exotic subject matter.
Byron created his great works during his stay in Italy. These include:
the Cantos III and IV of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1816–1818),
the dramatic poem Manfred (1817), a tragedy about an enigmatic guilt,
the drama Cain (1821), the glorification of man rebelling against God,
finally the fragmentary epic Don Juan (1819–1824, 16 cantos), which, with its art of language and irony, was conceived as a large-scale contemporary satire.
LORD BYRON himself embodies the prototype of the fun-loving, adventurous, amoral Byronian hero he conceived in the dramatic poem Manfred and the epic verse Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage. His verse novel Don Juan (1819–1824) depicts the bourgeois idea of a love marriage, which had been prevalent since the mid-18th century, as a source of incessant disappointments. BYRON, who knew how to effectively stage his outsider status, became a cult figure. His erotic escapades and his political radicalism captivated the sensationalist audience with the allure of the forbidden.
Although BYRON’s work was still influenced by classicism, as can be seen in the tragedies The Two Foscari (1821), Marino Faliero (1821) and Sardanapalus (1821), it is one of the most important contributions to English Romanticism. His poetry also left a lasting impact on European literature. French, German and Russian poets, composers and philosophers felt inspired by him, including GOETHE and ROBERT SCHUMANN. BYRON was in Germany for a long time the most famous English poet after SHAKESPEARE. GOETHE erected a monument to him in the second part of Faust (1832) in the form of Euphorion.
BYRON’S life and work was a model for Byronism, a style and lifestyle named after him that emerged at the beginning of the 19th century. The life and poetry of the Byronides was characterized by the demonstrative emphasis on culture weariness and weariness with life. Unbridled individualism was glorified; and proudly surrendered to homelessness and loneliness.
Other works (selection)
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809)
The Bride of Abydos (1813)
Hebrew Melodies (1815)
The Prisoner of Chillon (1816)
Lament of Tasso (1817)
Beppo (1817)
Mazeppa (1818)
The Prophecy of Dante (1819)
Werner (1822)
Heaven and Earth (1823)
The Age of Bronze (1823)
The Island (1823)
What is Lord Byron known for?
Lord Byron was a British Romantic poet and satirist whose poetry and personality captured the imagination of Europe. Although made famous by the autobiographical poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1812–18)—and his many love affairs—he is perhaps better known today for the satiric realism of Don Juan (1819–24).
What is Byron’s most famous poem?
Don Juan is considered as the masterpiece of Lord Byron and ranks as one of the most important English long poems since John Milton’s renowned work Paradise Lost. It is a variation of the epic form and Byron himself called it an “Epic Satire”.
Why is Byron called Lord?
As a result he lacked discipline and a sense of moderation, traits he held on to his entire life. In 1798, at age 10, George inherited the title of his great-uncle, William Byron, and was officially recognized as Lord Byron.
What did Lord Byron believe in?
From his Presbyterian nurse Byron developed a lifelong love for the Bible and an abiding fascination with the Calvinist doctrines of innate evil and predestined salvation. Early schooling instilled a devotion to reading and especially a “grand passion” for history that informed much of his later writing.
Why did Byron have such a scandalous reputation?
In 1812, Byron embarked on a affair with the passionate, eccentric – and married – Lady Caroline Lamb. The scandal shocked the British public. He also had affairs with Lady Oxford, Lady Frances Webster and also, very probably, with his married half-sister, Augusta Leigh.
Why did Lord Byron write She walks in beauty?
Byron is believed to have been inspired to write the poem after seeing a woman with very good looks at a fashionable London party. His poem is, therefore, a very personal one which responded to a personal situation.
How did Lord Byron end?
In July 1823, Byron left Italy to join the Greek insurgents who were fighting a war of independence against the Ottoman Empire. On 19 April 1824 he died from fever at Missolonghi, in modern day Greece. His death was mourned throughout Britain.
What is the overall tone of this excerpt from “when we two parted” by lord byron?
The overall tone of this excerpt from “When We Two Parted” by Lord Byron is distressful.
How did lord byron die?
Later in life Byron joined the Greek War of Independence fighting the Ottoman Empire and died leading a campaign during that war, for which Greeks revere him as a folk hero. He died in 1824 at the age of 36 from a fever contracted after the First and Second Sieges of Missolonghi.
What is lord byron known for?
Lord Byron was a British Romantic poet and satirist whose poetry and personality captured the imagination of Europe. Although made famous by the autobiographical poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1812–18)—and his many love affairs—he is perhaps better known today for the satiric realism of Don Juan (1819–24).
Jean de La Fontaine was born in Château-Thierry in north-eastern France on July 8, 1621 and died in Paris on April 13, 1695. He was a French writer.
De la Fontaine was born the son of a bourgeois official nobleman, whose office he later inherited but did not exercise. He finished his schooling in Paris, where he had moved in 1637. After two years he dropped out of a theology degree he started, as did a two-year law degree.
In 1647 he married a girl who was only fourteen and also came from a middle-class, aristocratic family. Despite a son together, it should not have been an intimate relationship. Although de la Fontaine was admitted to the Supreme Court, not much is known of his practice.
From 1658 he appeared in public with his first literary works, including commissioned works. Ten years later the first edition of his fables, which later made him world famous, was published. Some of his other works, such as plays, were failures. In 1692 he fell seriously ill, but published a complete edition of his fables.
Jean de la Fontaine died in 1695 at the age of 73 in the home of a patron in Paris.
What is Jean de La Fontaine known for?
Jean de La Fontaine, (born July 8?, 1621, Château-Thierry, France—died April 13, 1695, Paris), poet whose Fables rank among the greatest masterpieces of French literature.
What is Jean de La Fontaine’s most famous fable?
Le Corbeau et le Renard. Le Corbeau et le Renard (= The Crow and the Fox) is one of the most famous fables. Really, every French person knows this fable, often by heart!
How did Jean de La Fontaine become famous?
In 1668 La Fontaine published six books of Fables, in verse. Dedicated to the Dauphin, these poems were extraordinarily successful, and La Fontaine’s fame was secure at last. The fables cover a vast range of human experience; formally they are remarkably varied and free.
Why did Jean de La Fontaine write about animals?
Jean de La Fontaine (born July 8, 1621 in Château-Thierry in the Aisne, and died April 13, 1695 in Paris) was a French fabulist, moralist and novelist who worked as a master of water and forests. During his tours, he observed the behavior of animals. This inspired him to write fables.
What does the name Fontaine mean?
Fontaine is a French word meaning fountain or natural spring or an area of natural springs.
How do you pronounce La Fontaine?
How many fables did Jean de la Fontaine wrote?
Jean de la Fontaine (1621-95) was the author of 12 books containing a total of 243 fables in verse, published between 1668 and 1694.
Did La Fontaine copy Aesop?
Jean de La Fontaine was a great teller of fables in France in the 17th century. He based many of his fables on those of Aesop. Gustave Doré (1832-1883) was one of the most celebrated 19th-century French illustrators.
Who did Jean de La Fontaine dedicate his books to?
In 1669, La Fontaine published Les Amours de Psyché et de Cupidon, dedicated to one of his patrons, Marie-Anne Mancini, Duchess of Bouillon.
What did Jean de La Fontaine want to become?
Then he decided to become a writer and first published l’Eunuque, in 1654, translated from Terentius’s old version, then a heroic poem, Adonis, in 1658, inspired by Ovid. The latter work allowed him to have the admiration and protection of Nicolas Fouquet.
How old was Jean de La Fontaine when he died?
73 years
1621–1695
When did Jean de La Fontaine start writing Fables?
In 1668, his first book of fables was written. His works mostly consist of fables, tales and other miscellaneous work. His fables are universally famous and his tales are known by all lovers of French literature.
Is Aesop and Jean de La Fontaine?
Some legends suggest Aesop was an ugly hunchbacked slave, although his real appearance is a mystery. One thing is known for sure – Aesop was a very smart, resourceful and inventive man. Jean de La Fontaine was a French poet and fabulist, who lived and worked during the XVII century.
Who was La Fontaine’s protector when he published his second book of Fables in 1679?
Fouquet, known for his support of the arts and of artists, soon became La Fontaine’s admirer and protector.
The ancient writer Publius Vergilius Marco, called Virgil, was born on October 15, 70 BC. Born in Andes near Mantua. He received his first lessons in Cremona and Milan. He later began studying rhetoric, medicine and astronomy in Rome. But he is mainly interested in philosophy, and he expresses this passion by joining a circle of Epicureans around Siron. Maecenas, who was commissioned by Octavian to gather Roman writers around the imperial court, accepts Virgil into his circle. The “Bucolica” and the “Georgica” (37 to 29 BC), dedicated to his patron Maecenas, date from this fertile period. When Octavian was awarded the title “Augustus” by the Senate, he commissioned Virgil to write an epic to celebrate his reign. Work on the famous “Aeneid” begins. Before completing his work, Virgil dies on September 21, 19 BC. on his return journey from a stay in Brindisi. The unfinished work is published by Augustus’ order, contrary to the author’s wish. Virgil is still one of the most important and enduring writers of Roman antiquity.
Whom did Virgil sing?
I sang about pastures, fields, rulers. This is a good summary of what we know for certain about Virgil’s life. Publius Vergilius Maro was born in 70 BC.
Where was Virgil born?
Gallia cisalpina or Gallia citerior was from 203 to 41 BC. a province of the Roman Empire and thereafter became an integral part of the Roman heartland.
When was Virgil born?
October 15, 70 BC
When did Virgil die?
September 21, 19 BC
What did Virgil copy from Homer?
The most important models for the Aeneid are the Homeric classics Iliad and Odyssey. Many main and secondary motifs, even entire text passages, are closely based on Homer (e.g. Aeneas in a storm at sea and Achilles almost drowning in a river).
Why did Virgil write the Aeneid?
Virgil is unmistakably based on his great role model Homer: Just as Homer sings of the Trojan War and the journeys of Odysseus, Virgil describes the adventures of the Trojan prince’s son Aeneas.
Is Aeneas Trojan?
He comes from a sideline of the Trojan dynasty, son of Anchises with the goddess Aphrodite (Roman Venus) and cousin of Priam. In Homer’s Iliad, Aeneas is a Trojan prince from a branch line of the ruling house and leader of the Dardanians (allies of the Trojans).
What is the hero show?
The “hero show” in the 6th book of the Aeneid is not only a highlight in Virgil’s epic, but can also be described as one of the greatest scenes in Western literature.
How did Anchises die?
He broke the prohibition while intoxicated and as a result was paralyzed (and/or blinded) by a bolt of lightning from Zeus. At the end of the Trojan War, Aeneas carried him on his shoulders out of burning Troy. He died trying to escape to Drepanon in Sicily.
Is Anchises a god?
Anchises (ancient Greek Ἀγχίσης Anchísēs) is a figure from Greek mythology, known as the handsome king of Dardanos near Troy, a scion of an ancient Trojan royal family, son of Kapys and Themiste (daughter of Ilos) and brother of Laocoon.
Who is the ruler of the underworld?
In Greek mythology, the underworld is described as follows: Its ruler is the god Hades (Roman: Pluto), it is also called Hades. Hades’ wife is Persephone. With the help of the ferryman Charon, the river Styx, which separates the upper and lower worlds, can be crossed.
Which son of Aphrodite was in Troy?
The warriors of Troy were Hector, the son of the Trojan king Priam, and Aeneas, the son of Aphrodite and the Trojan Anchises.
What is Virgil’s most famous poem?
The Aeneid is widely considered Virgil’s finest work, and is regarded as one of the most important poems in the history of Western literature (T. S. Eliot referred to it as ‘the classic of all Europe’).
What was Virgil famous for?
Best known for his epic poem, “The Aeneid”, Virgil (70 – 19 BC) was regarded by Romans as a national treasure. His work reflects the relief he felt as civil war ended and the rule of Augustus began.
What famous works did Virgil make?
Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works—the Bucolics (or Eclogues), the Georgics, and the Aeneid—although several minor poems are also attributed to him.
Who is known as the English Virgil?
On October 15, 70 B.C.E., Publius Vergilius Maro, known in English as Virgil or Vergil, was born in the farming village of Andes, near Mantua, in northern Italy.
What is the meaning of Virgil?
A writer of poems (the term is usually reserved for writers of good poetry).
What is Virgil’s story?
Virgil was regarded by the Romans as their greatest poet, an estimation that subsequent generations have upheld. His fame rests chiefly upon the Aeneid, which tells the story of Rome’s legendary founder and proclaims the Roman mission to civilize the world under divine guidance.
Although Edgar Allan Poe was barely 40 years old, he is one of the most important writers in world literature. The American is still considered the father of short stories and crime and horror literature. To this day, his dark gothic tales have been repeatedly adapted and filmed.
From the life of Edgar Allan Poe
Although famous, his life was marked by suffering and pain. Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston in 1809. His father left the family shortly after Edgar’s birth. When the boy was only 2 years old, his mother died of tuberculosis, and Edgar came to the orphanage with his older brother and younger sister. His hard fate caught society’s attention and a wealthy merchant named John Allan took Edgar Allan Poe into his family in Richmond, Virginia. Edgar chose his family name as his middle name out of gratitude. Thanks to the good position of his foster father, Edgar was able to spend a few years in England and received a good education and upbringing. His talent for languages was evident early on.
How did his life go on?
Today it would be said that Edgar Allan Poe was an adventurer with nowhere to really settle. At the age of 17 he began university studies, but soon dropped out because he was in debt and started to drink alcohol. After just a year at university, he enlisted in the US Army in 1827 and wanted to pursue a career in the military. But nothing came of it, although Edgar Allan Poe even attended the famous West Point Military Academy. In 1831 he left military service and began his life as a writer. Although his works were well recognized, it was hard and characterized by deprivation. He was seldom paid enough for his work. No wonder that Edgar Allan Poe was occasionally prone to binge drinking. He married his cousin Virginia and had a daughter. Edgar Allan Poe died in Baltimore in 1849. Large parts of his life are still unknown today.
His literary works
Edgar Allan Poe is best known for his numerous short stories and poems, which he published in various American magazines. He also wrote numerous essays and was an important literary critic. His only novel was The Adventures of Arthur Gordon Pym, which was serialized in a newspaper. Many of his works are about beautiful women who suddenly die a tragic death. Others take up the theme of “buried alive” or deal with characters who, blinded by madness, knowingly stagger to their demise.
Edgar Allan Poe left a rich legacy of literary works. Among the best known are the stories “The Treacherous Heart” and “Pit and Pendulum”.
Poe’s stories have been made into films again and again. To date, more than 300 films have been made based on his works. Many songs also take up themes from Edgar Allan Poe. Although he did not have a good reputation during his lifetime, his influence continues to this day.
What is Edgar Allan Poe most famous for?
Edgar Allan Poe is credited with initiating the modern detective story, developing the Gothic horror story, and being a significant early forerunner of the science fiction form.
Where was Edgar Allan Poe from?
Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston in 1809. Both of his parents were actors. His mother, the much admired Elizabeth Arnold Poe was a talented actress. His father, David Poe was considered less talented.
Who was Edgar Allan Poe and why is he famous today?
Poe was one of the country’s earliest practitioners of the short story, and considered to be the inventor of the detective fiction genre, as well as a significant contributor to the emerging genre of science fiction.
What is Edgar Allan Poe most famous poem?
Poe achieved arguably his greatest triumph in 1845 when his poem, “The Raven,” was published to great acclaim. It is often billed as the most famous poem in American literature, and for a time the poem made him a celebrity. Despite his success, Poe remained impoverished and all but destitute.
What makes Edgar Allan Poe unique?
Poe is best remembered for his tales of terror and haunting poems, but he is also credited as one of the earliest writers of short stories, the inventor of the modern detective story, and an innovator in the genre of science fiction.
What inspired Edgar Allan Poe’s writing?
Poe’s work was likely inspired by his own tragic childhood; both of his parents died while he was very young, and his foster mother passed away when he was 20.
What are three facts about Edgar Allan Poe?
He was the first person to use the term ‘short story’.
Poe carried on writing even after he’d died.
The American football team the Baltimore Ravens are named in honour of Edgar Allan Poe’s classic poem ‘The Raven’.
Poe often wrote with his Siamese cat on his shoulder.
Poe coined the word ‘tintinnabulation’ to describe the sound made by the ringing of bells.
How many poems Edgar Allan Poe wrote?
This fabulous collection comprises 79 poems. To the best of our knowledge, this is the most complete collection of Poe’s poems available for the Kindle.
How many stories did Edgar Allan Poe write?
The Raven
1845
The Tell‑Tale Heart
1843
The Black Cat
1843
Annabel Lee
1849
The Fall of the House of Usher
1839
The Cask of Amontillado
1846
How did edgar allan poe die?
A hopeless alcoholic, Poe died at age 40, drunk in a gutter in Baltimore, a victim of his debauched lifestyle. Those legends abound, and they are apocryphal. Poe likely died of rabies. Poe had been seen in a bar on Lombard Street, disheveled and delirious, but it is well established that he died in the hospital.
Who was edgar allan poe?
Edgar Allan Poe is credited with initiating the modern detective story, developing the Gothic horror story, and being a significant early forerunner of the science fiction form.
Where was edgar allan poe buried?
Date of burial: October 9, 1849
Place of burial: Westminster Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, Maryland, United States
When was edgar allan poe born?
January 19, 1809
Did edgar allan poe have children?
Although Edgar Allan Poe had no children, numerous people are under the misunderstanding that they are descendants. Many are actually descendants of Poe’s cousins, especially Neilson Poe, but others are no relation at all.
When was edgar allan poe considered a success as a writer?
Edgar Allan Poe had a professional writing career that spanned more than 20 years. Fame came late in his career. In the year 1845, he received instant and world-wide recognition for this poem The Raven.
Where did edgar allan poe live?
Boston. Edgar Allan Poe was actually born in Boston back in 1809, but didn’t stay very long in this colonial town.
Richmond. The Allan home, where Poe lived as a boy, was on the west side of Fourteenth Street between Franklin and Main in Richmond, VA.
Baltimore.
New York.
When and where was edgar allan poe born?
January 19, 1809, Boston, Massachusetts, United States
How many poems did edgar allan poe write?
This fabulous collection comprises 79 poems. To the best of our knowledge, this is the most complete collection of Poe’s poems available for the Kindle.
What part of this excerpt from edgar allan poe’s “the cask of amontillado” uses irony?
To wrap it up, Edgar Allan Poe’s short story ”The Cask of Amontillado” is the story of a man named Montresor who decides to seek revenge against a man named Fortunato, who has insulted him. He meets Fortunato at a carnival, lures him into the catacombs of his home, and buries him alive.
When was edgar allan poe considered a successful writer?
In 1841, Poe launched the new genre of detective fiction with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” His literary innovations earned him the nickname “Father of the Detective Story.” A writer on the rise, he won a literary prize in 1843 for “The Gold Bug,” a suspenseful tale of secret codes and hunting treasure.
Which theme is conveyed in this excerpt from “the tell-tale heart” by edgar allan poe?
The theme which is conveyed in this excerpt from “The tell-tale heart” by Edgar Allan Poe is the insane live in a reality of their own. The narrator states that even though he is dreadfully nervous he is not mad. But then admits that the disease has sharpened his senses.
What was edgar allan poe’s name at his baptism?
Edgar Allan Poe was born Edgar Poe. He was taken in by, but not adopted by, the Allan family of Richmond, Virginia. When he was baptized, he was given the name Edgar Allan Poe, in honor of his foster family.
When did edgar allan poe’s mom die?
1829 (Feb. 28) – Francis Keeling Allan, Poe’s doting foster mother, dies in Richmond. She is buried in the Shockoe Hill Cemetery on March 2.
What was edgar allan poes name at birth?
He was afraid because he owed money under his real name. Early in 1829, Frances Allan died from tuberculosis, leaving Edgar now orphaned by two mothers and deserted by two fathers.
Which three lines in this excerpt from edgar allan poe’s “annabel lee” contain alliteration?
The three lines that read “The angels, not half so happy in Heaven, Went envying her and me— Yes! —that was the reason (as all men know, In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.” contain alliteration.
Who raised edgar allan poe?
The three children were separated and raised by different families. Edgar was taken in by the successful Richmond merchant John Allan, and his frail wife Frances. The Allans had no children of their own. They raised Edgar as part of the family and gave him their middle name, but never legally adopted him.
How did edgar allan poe’s parents die?
His father abandoned the family in 1810, and his mother died a year later from consumption (pulmonary tuberculosis). Poe was then taken into the home of John Allan, a successful merchant in Richmond, Virginia, who dealt in a variety of goods, including cloth, wheat, tombstones, tobacco, and slaves.
Which quotation from “the tell-tale heart” by edgar allan poe brings out the theme of time?
The quotation from “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe that brings out the theme of time is: “And this I did for seven long nights – every night just at midnight”.
Which two lines in this excerpt from “the raven” by edgar allan poe use allusion?
Poe makes frequent use of allusions to Greek and Roman mythology and the Christian Bible. The bust of Pallas refers to the Greek goddess of wisdom, Pallas Athena. Her presence in the chamber evokes rationality and learning, which the raven’s presence literally and figuratively overshadows.
What did edgar allan poe’s mother do for a living?
From the age of 9 until her death at 24, Elizabeth made her living as an actress in theaters from Boston to Charleston. She never failed to delight audiences with her singing, dancing, and comic and dramatic performances. Little is known of her personal life.
What is the theme of alone by edgar allan poe?
The beauty and irony of Alone’s major theme – that of feeling isolated, different, misunderstood – is one that many people can relate to, the very act of expressing these feelings through poetry connects the writer with others who feel the same.
What was edgar allan poe’s name at birth?
Edgar’s middle name of “Allan” was added by John and Frances Allan, who took Poe in as an orphan and served as his foster parents. Although Poe was never legally adopted, he became “Edgar Allan Poe” at his christening on January 7, 1812.
How did edgar allan poe influence american literature?
Edgar Allan Poe is credited with initiating the modern detective story, developing the Gothic horror story, and being a significant early forerunner of the science fiction form.
Who did edgar allan poe marry?
Virginia Eliza Clemm Poe
How old was edgar allan poe in 1835?
Poe (age 26) obtained a license in 1835 to marry his cousin Virginia Clemm (age 13).
The British writer and journalist is one of the most important writers of the first half of the 20th century. His politically engaged essays and novels established his position as a world writer. George Orwell found international recognition with novels such as “The Road to Wigan Pier”, “Show Up for a Breath” or “Animal Farm” from 1945. The anti-utopia and fable are among his central legacies. From the perspective of a microcosm, he satirically portrayed a unique political perspective using animals on a farm. With the chilling novel “1984” he created the scenery of a totalitarian society of the future, which dealt with Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union under the leadership of Stalin…
George Orwell, actually Eric Arthur Blair, was born on January 25, 1903 in Motihari, India.
At the age of eight, his parents urged him to attend the strict elite school Eton. Here he wrote the ironic autobiography “Such, such were the joys”. Orwell then received a scholarship to the renowned Eton College and studied there from 1917 to 1922. After completing his studies, he went to Burma in 1922 as an officer and served there in the “Indian Imperial Police”. In 1927 he resigned in protest against their methods, as he had developed against English imperialism. This was also reflected in his first novels “Burmese Days”, “Shooting an Elephant” and “A Hanging”. The next few years in London and Paris were marked by illness and poverty. After days as a dishwasher and private school teacher, he managed to make a living as a freelance writer. In 1933, Orwell published his debut novel, Down an Out in Paris and London. In it he described his experiences in the hopeless milieu among the homeless. The first work with a political influence appeared in 1934 under the title “Burmese Days”, in which he accused British colonial rule in India and imperialism in general with autobiographical coloring.
In 1936, George Orwell drew level with other politically engaged writers such as Wystan H. Audan or C. Day Lewis and voluntarily joined the Spanish Civil War as a soldier of the republican force. A year later he was seriously injured and had to leave Spain to flee from the communist police. He returned to England. His experiences in Spain found literary processing in 1938 in the title “Homage to Catalonia”. This reflected his deep disappointment with the attitude of the left in Spain and their Stalinist orientation. With the title “The Road to Wigan Per” he took on the description of the inhuman living conditions of the English miners in 1937. During the Second World War he worked for the BBC and was editor-in-chief of the magazine “Tribune”, for which he wrote numerous reports. In 1945 Orwell published the anti-utopia and fable “Animal Farm”, which is one of his most important legacies. From the perspective of a microcosm, Orwell satirically portrayed a unique political perspective through animals on a farm.
From the revolutionary slogan of the animals against their farmer “All animals are equal…” grew out of the new pig rule the addition “…But some animals are more equal than others”. Another literary highlight was his science fiction novel “Nineteen Eight-four” from 1946. His pessimistic view of history was expressed in his novel of the century about a totalitarian world state in which people were deliberately manipulated and monitored and any rebellion was blocked. Based on the Soviet rule and Hitler’s Germany, he created the critical representation of the totalitarian power mechanisms. In the years that followed, “1984” became the epitome of the science fiction novel with philosophical acceptance and undiminished topicality. “Big Brother is watching you” still has its proverbial status in our media age. By this time, Orwell was already suffering from severe lung disease. With works such as “Shooting an Elephant and Other Essays” he was unable to build on his old successes. Orwell destroyed many of his manuscripts during his lifetime. These were therefore never made public.
George Orwell died on January 21, 1950 in London as a result of tuberculosis.
Posthumously, Animal Farm was made into an animated film in 1955. Today, history is an integral part of school curriculum. “1984” was filmed several times. Works such as “Coming up for Air” and “Keep the Aspodostra Flying” also served as the basis for popular literary adaptations.
What was George Orwell famous for?
George Orwell was a novelist, journalist, essayist and critic, best known for his novels Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949).
What is George Orwell’s famous quote?
“Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else.” “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.”
Where is George Orwell from?
George Orwell, pseudonym of Eric Arthur Blair, (born June 25, 1903, Motihari, Bengal, India—died January 21, 1950, London, England), English novelist, essayist, and critic famous for his novels Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-four (1949), the latter a profound anti-utopian novel that examines the dangers of …
What was 1984 by George Orwell about?
In George Orwell’s 1984, Winston Smith wrestles with oppression in Oceania, a place where the Party scrutinizes human actions with ever-watchful Big Brother. Defying a ban on individuality, Winston dares to express his thoughts in a diary and pursues a relationship with Julia.
What name did george orwell want on his tombstone?
When Eric Arthur Blair was getting ready to publish his first book, Down and Out in Paris and London, he decided to use a pen name so his family wouldn’t be embarrassed by his time in poverty. He chose the name George Orwell to reflect his love of English tradition and landscape.
Where and when was george orwell born?
Full name: Eric Arthur Blair
Place of birth: Motihari, India
Who was george orwell?
George Orwell was a novelist, essayist and critic best known for his novels Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. He was a man of strong opinions who addressed some of the major political movements of his times, including imperialism, fascism and communism.
What did george orwell do in burma?
Fresh out of Eton, George Orwell spent five years in Burma as a policeman in the colonial service. He left in 1927, fed up with “the dirty work of Empire,” but the country never quite left him.
The Russian writer is the main representative of socialist realism. Maxim Gorky himself proclaimed this art form at the Congress of the Soviet Union of Writers. His early literary work is influenced by Russian Romanticism. He then turned to realistic storytelling, which helped him to succeed from the start. In the years from 1906 to 1911 Maxim Gorky politicized his works. In it he turned against the petty bourgeoisie. In addition to novels, Gorki also wrote literary and culturally critical essays…
Maxim Gorky was born the son of a carpenter in Nsini Novgorod on March 28, 1868.
His real name is Alexei Maximowitsch Peschkow. Maxim Gorki lost his father when he was only five years old in 1873. He spent his childhood and youth with his grandfather. In the years 1877-1879 he attended a school. Then, with the death of his mother in 1879, according to his grandfather’s will, he had to earn his own living. Over the next few years, Gorki held various jobs, such as baker, errand boy, dock worker and dishwasher.
In 1884 he moved to Kazan with the plan to study at the university. But he abandoned this plan. Gorky made contact with a group of Marxists. In 1888 he was accused of political activity and arrested. There followed constant observations by the police. In the two years 1891 and 1892 he went looking for work and wandered through the Volga region, the Ukraine, the Crimea and the Caucasus. In 1892 his first story “Makar Tschudra” was published under the stage name “Gorki”, which means something like “the bitter one”.
In the years from 1894 to 1901 further stories like “Tschelka” (1894) followed. They are written in the style of Russian Romanticism, despite its “Gorki” label. Tramps and adventurers are mostly the heroes in these works. This made Maxim Gorki one of the first writers in Russia to address the disadvantaged, the proletariat. In 1899 the writer moved to Petersburg. He made close acquaintances with members of revolutionary circles and sided with the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDRP).
Between 1899 and 1900 he met the writers Anton Chekhov and Leo Tolstoy, with whom he became friends. In 1900 he founded the publishing house “Wissen” and became its director. In 1901 his revolutionary poetry work “The Song of the Storm Bird” was published in the Marxist magazine “Leben”. As a result, Gorky was arrested again. In 1902 his first drama entitled “Kleinbourger” came onto the market. The dramatic work “Nachtasyl” followed, which became a worldwide success. “Nachtasyl” was performed in the year of its publication at the Moscow Art Theater and a year later at the Small Theater of Max Reinhardt.
During the period of protest against the government of the Russian tsar, Maxim Gorki made social conditions the subject of his dramas. The writer found sufficient material in the Russian Revolution to determine the literary plots of his works. In 1902 he was admitted to the Russian Academy of Sciences, but a year later the admission was revoked for political reasons. In 1905 Gorky made the acquaintance of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, which then became a friendship. In the same year he took part in the protest actions and was arrested again.
Under pressure from the world public, he was released again. In 1906 he undertook a trip to the USA on behalf of the party with the purpose of providing material and political support for the revolution. It was there that the narrative work “Mother”, a novel about the proletariat, was written. Gorky processed his travel experiences in the title “The City of the Devil”. In the years 1906 to 1913 he had to go into exile on Capri. After that he returned to Russia. Between 1913 and 1923 he published his autobiographical trilogy “Childhood”, “Among Strangers” and “My Universities”. Maxim Gorky spoke out against Russian interference in World War I.
He rejected the assumption of power by the Bolsheviks in November 1917. Gorky publicly criticized Lenin’s widespread acts of terror and persecution. Censorship introduced in 1918 silenced him. In 1919, Maxim Gorky took part in the creation of the Leningrad Gorky Theater. In 1921 the poet went into exile a second time in Sorrento. The novel “The Work of Artamonov” was written in 1925 and, like many other works, deals with the fragility of Russian society. In 1931 he returned to Russia. Due to disagreements with Josef V. Stalin, the writer was forbidden to leave Russia.
In 1934 Gorky became the first chairman of the Russian Writers’ Union. He called for a literature in the spirit of socialist realism. He himself wrote his works in this style and is considered its most important representative with a strong role model character.
Maxim Gorky died in Moscow on June 18, 1936 under mysterious circumstances. These circumstances have not been clarified to this day. The suspicion is still being voiced that the writer was murdered by the Russian secret service.
What was Maxim Gorky famous for?
Gorky’s most famous works are his early short stories, written in the 1890s (“Chelkash”, “Old Izergil”, and “Twenty-Six Men and a Girl”); plays The Philistines (1901), The Lower Depths (1902) and Children of the Sun (1905); a poem, “The Song of the Stormy Petrel” (1901); his autobiographical trilogy, My Childhood.
How was Maxim Gorky involved in the Russian revolution?
He opposed the Bolshevik seizure of power during the Russian Revolution of 1917 and went on to attack the victorious Lenin’s dictatorial methods in his newspaper Novaya zhizn (“New Life”) until July 1918, when his protests were silenced by censorship on Lenin’s orders.
What is the meaning of Maxim Gorky?
Definitions of Maxim Gorki. Russian writer of plays and novels and short stories; noted for his depiction of social outcasts.
Why was Maxim Gorky exiled from Russia?
His efforts, however, were thwarted by figures such as Lenin and Grigory Zinovyev, a close ally of Lenin’s who was the head of the Petrograd Bolsheviks. In 1921 Lenin sent Gorky into exile under the pretext of Gorky’s needing specialized medical treatment abroad.
Pop culture has always loved him. The American singer Patti Smith quoted Rimbaud in her songs and last year she even bought the house in France where he wrote his wildest poems. Bob Dylan, the Doors or Kurt Cobain and before that Benjamin Britten, Luigi Nono and Paul Hindemith included the poetry of the young Frenchman in their music, as did Fernand Léger in his work. Rimbaud had not the slightest interest in the glittering world of the general public. He was more of the nerd who created his work lonely and mostly alone, immersed himself in the abysses of poetry and came to completely new insights.
Arthur Rimbaud (1854–1991) was aware early on of his destiny as a gifted man. As the best student on a regular basis, often outperforming his classmates in competitions, he was the pride of his mother, who was hoping for a great career for her offspring. He grew up in the French provinces near the Belgian border, in Charleville on the banks of the Meuse. Because his father left the family early, Rimbaud grew up with his mother Vitalie and his siblings in a Catholic upbringing. He didn’t have to spend any time studying at school, he was able to do everything immediately; he won prize after prize at school and excelled at composing Latin and Greek poetry. Since everything was so easy for him, he quickly began to search for more – defiance and rebellion arose in him, which Rimbaud indicated in his youthful poem “Seven Years Old Poet”: “The mother closed the exercise book, Very proud and simple / She now stood up and went. Oh, she didn’t notice/ what his clear forehead, his black eyes said,/ how disgust gnawed at the child’s soul./ during the day, yes, he’s very obedient, clever/ he is; and yet, many a dark, strange trait/ He often speaks of evil hypocrisy…” He realizes that he is different, and what happens in these few lines is typical of all of Rimbaud’s later poetry: his work circles about his own person, he does not disregard himself and thus creates himself as his work.
This gesture is reinforced by Georges Izambard, who, a few years older than Rimbaud himself, comes to Rimbaud’s school in 1870 and becomes his teacher. The well-read Izambard opened up a new literary world for Rimbaud, into which the fifteen-year-old with the angelic face dives willingly. The two soon see each other outside of school; Rimbaud uses the teacher’s apartment, to which he has a key, as a reading refuge. Here he also finds books that his mother finds unfathomable and from which she wanted to protect him. When he brought home “The Miserables” by Victor Hugo, she felt compelled to write a letter of complaint to Izambard because “great caution is required in the choice of books to put into the hands of children”. Izambard, however, was undeterred after a conversation with his mother and gave his pupil what he wanted to read.
During these months a second feature of Rimbaud’s, his wanderlust, became apparent. When his younger brother managed to register as a volunteer in 1870, Rimbaud also believed he could leave home and boarded a train to Paris without a ticket, which resulted in a brief stay in prison. Izambard redeemed it with money. It was the first of several escapes and a prelude to Rimbaud’s stays in Africa, the idea of which he developed when he later roamed the docks of London with his poet friend Verlaine and heard stories from the sailors about distant lands. But at the age of 16 and 17, the young poet had his darkest experiences.
Rimbaud saw himself as a seer. He considered himself superior to contemporary poets and despised their rhymes. “I am someone else”, he wrote in the “Letter of a Seer” to Izambard: “It is wrong to say: I think, one should rather say: one thinks me.” A higher voice speaks through the poet, that is to say, even against his will – making verses is not workshop art, as it is still often understood today – the conscious creation of poems. But Rimbaud used all available means to let himself be carried into a mood of eternity, with drugs and alcohol, but especially with occult literature. He had not yet discovered Christianity as a possible path, but his inner struggle for God began to show itself.
The search for the new poetry also included his discovery of Baudelaire (1821–1867), about whom Rimbaud writes: “But since seeing the invisible and hearing the unheard is something other than the descriptive rendering of dead things, Baudelaire is the first seer , king of poets, a true god. Unfortunately, he lived in too artificial an environment, and his much-vaunted literary form is banal. Unknown discoveries call for new literary forms.” And Rimbaud goes on to explain: “If all the old fools had not clung to the wrong conception of self, we would not need to sweep away the millions of skeletons who from time immemorial have amassed the products of their one-eyed intellect , which they are still proud of.” Rimbaud wanted to destroy the ego in order to build a new life, a new world, on its ashes. And he gave himself up to this search unreservedly, unlike Baudelaire, who, although he also threw himself into intoxication and drugs, but whose Catholicism led him to warn those around him against excess. But Rimbaud wanted to become the highest sage at all costs, “le supreme savant”.
Irish Rimbaud biographer Enid Starkie has followed his dark ways, who believed the world hungered for a new poet to guide humanity. Thus Rimbaud came across the writings of magicians and alchemists, from whom he hoped liberation for mankind and inspirational confusion of the senses. Among the authors he read was the historian Jules Michelet, who saw European history as dominated by wizards and witches rather than by the church. This also included the Kabbalist Éliphas Lévi, according to whom the magician had to reach the “point central” that enabled him to become a “thaumaturge” and thus become the master of the world. For a time, Rimbaud really believed he was on this path with his poetry, because nature obeyed him with the creation of new plants, colors and worlds. He hoped to be able to reconcile Christ and Satan, which Michelet thought only the church had stopped until now, and Rimbaud believed that this would bring about a new world order. Similar to what Picasso would later say, “For me, a picture is the sum total of destruction”, Baudelaire already had the art of “deforming” the real. Rimbaud made this the main thing, so that the orders change, “plains, deserts, horizons become the red dress of thunderstorms”, where a July morning tastes of wintry ash, or would the poets only have the “roses, those puffed-up roses/ Red on Laurel stems / And thousands of swollen octaves”. With Mallarmé, too, it is not about superficial understanding, but rather about the meaning of the poem, about which he wrote in an essay in 1896: “To name a thing means to spoil three-quarters of the enjoyment of a poem; enjoyment consists in gradual guessing; suggesting the thing, here lies the goal.” In German poetry, Georg Trakl and Gottfried Benn will follow Rimbaud.
The intensive mixing of alchemical knowledge and insights into poetry led Rimbaud to the poem “Vowels”: “A black E white I red U green O blue – vowels/ One day I will reveal your dark origins:/ A: black velvety armor of dense flocks of mosquitoes / Those whizzing over cruel stinks, shadowy parts.// E: Brightness of vapors and taut lines/ Spears of proud glaciers, shining princes blow from umbels/ I: Blood spat out purple, laughter of the fair ones/ In anger and in the drunkenness of torments… The colors dissolve images and reassemble them – in alchemy the completed work was seen as God’s vision. And yet the poems are a unique document of homelessness, which for Rimbaud even encompasses the Christian world.
Rimbaud’s collection of poems A Time in Hell (Une Saison en Enfer), in which he fought out his struggle for God, is most relevant to this feeling. It was probably above all his pride and his youthful defiance that led him to rebel against the faith. But the contradiction stands entirely under the auspices of faith, and he was never really able to escape from this. He dealt with God, faith and life in these poems. The French poet Paul Claudel wrote about Rimbaud: “Arthur Rimbaud is not a poet, he is not a writer. He is a prophet upon whom the Spirit descended, not like David, but like Saul. Such was this horror, this curse, from which he, like Jonah, sought to escape by blasphemy and flight.” A boy of 18 brings us “the most heartbreaking sob that mankind has heard since the days of Ephraim and Judah, the message of paradisiacal purity, in the midst of a dull world wallowing in an outrageous materialism.”
Rimbaud was baptized and he felt the original sin in himself. In his rebellion against God’s love, he recognizes his weakness: “The skin on my head is shrinking. Mercy! Lord I’m scared. I’m thirsty, I’m so thirsty! Oh! childhood, the grass, the rain, the sea over the pebbles, moonlight when the bell struck twelve… The devil sits in the belfry, at this hour. Maria! Holy Virgin! … Terrible, my stupidity!”
Rimbaud sees himself in another hell for all his vices, for anger, arrogance, laziness, and is afraid of losing eternity forever if he persists in his defiance. At the end of the “time in hell” he gains hope and sees a new morning, and so a poem is called, “Morning”: “When will I, across all shores and mountains, greet the birth of the new work, the new one Wisdom, the flight of tyrants and demons, the end of superstition and worship – first! – Christmas on earth?” Rimbaud hoped for universal love, which, in contrast to the idea of progress in industrialization, should lead to progress in sympathy and compassion for people.
And yet he wanted to turn his back on Europe, the West. He starts anew with the indigenous peoples of Africa, where he assumed the original life to be, just as he had been looking for the origins of poetry before. His past was repugnant to him, after the failed hope of being able to realize a poet’s life in Paris. The perpetually impoverished Rimbaud, in his tattered clothes, had quickly come across as a tramp in Parisian society, and he did nothing to dispel that impression. The fact that he interjected “merde” after every verse at a poetry reading led to his being banned from the house – he was marginalized, but he felt poetically superior and his contemporaries felt that. The belated disgust after being seduced by Verlaine and their two trips to London made it even easier for Rimbaud to say goodbye.
At the age of 19, Rimbaud gave up his poetry and began his life as a wanderer between the worlds. He visited Cairo, Alexandria, Java and tried his luck as a trader in Ethiopia, Abyssinia and Yemen. In the meantime, he tried to become a roofer, bricklayer, blacksmith or glassblower on his travels, had books sent to him from home to familiarize himself with them, but he failed, just like he did as a dealer, because he simply didn’t have the necessary experience and negotiating skills. But now, in the real world beyond poetry, a whole new trait in Rimbaud became clear. He was what he often wrote about in his poetry, the compassionate, generous man. In the regions of Africa where he stayed he was well known as the one who gave away his money to the poor and who was so soft on supplicants that he hardly had enough for himself and never nearly managed to make ends meet he had always wished for. And so he had to work hard, often at great risk to his own life, when he rode through desert regions for weeks with a caravan of camels because he wanted to do business with a tribal chief, who was then three days’ journey away when Rimbaud was at his goal arrived. “I do good,” he once said in Harar, Ethiopia, “when the opportunity presents itself, it is indeed my only pleasure.”
Rimbaud fell ill. At first only the knee hurt, then the leg with unbearable pain. He had to leave Africa, traveled to Marseille, where the leg was amputated at the Immaculate Conception Hospital. He never recovered and drove home in agony until he was convinced that only the warmth of Africa could heal him. So he traveled south again with his sister Isabelle, but only ended up in the same hospital as far as Marseille. She prayed with him a lot and after the absolution the priest who had been waiting outside said to her: “What did you tell me, child? Your brother don’t believe? I have seldom seen a faith as strong as his.” Rimbaud kept asking his sister if she believed, and she said yes, one must believe. He: “Then the room has to be prepared. The priest comes back with the sacrament. You’ll see how it will be. They bring candles and beautiful lace. White blankets still belong everywhere. Am I so ill?” This conversion has been the ultimate surrender of his pride. In his last days, the hardness is said to have fallen off him and his face to have taken on the expression of spirituality.
Rimbaud died on November 10, 1891. He no longer wanted to answer the letters from Paris that the enthusiastic discoverers of his work had written to him in his last months to celebrate him as the great poet of our time. Poetry had become too far away for him, and his hope of drawing a new will to live from “new love, precisely from charity” was too close, as his biographer Yves Bonnefoy describes Rimbaud’s struggle against the misery of life.
What is Rimbaud famous for?
Arthur Rimbaud, in full Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud, (born October 20, 1854, Charleville, France—died November 10, 1891, Marseille), French poet and adventurer who won renown in the Symbolist movement and markedly influenced modern poetry.
What is Arthur Rimbaud most famous poem?
In a burst of self-confidence, Rimbaud composed “Le Bateau ivre” (“The Drunken Boat”). This is perhaps his finest poem, and one that clearly demonstrates what his method could achieve.
Who shot Arthur Rimbaud?
On the morning of 10 July 1873, Paul Verlaine left the Brussels hotel room he shared with his lover, Arthur Rimbaud, and bought a gun. Returning to find Rimbaud packing his bags, he fired two shots, bringing a tempestuous love affair between two of France’s greatest literary heroes to a dramatic close.
What was the prophecy of Rimbaud?
In the May 15, 1871 letter he says that “Viendront d’autres horribles travailleurs” (Other horrible workers will come along)—a prophetic assertion of his role as initiator of a process that would continue long after he himself had ceased writing.
Why did Verlaine shot Rimbaud?
Verlaine bought the 7mm six-shooter in Brussels on the morning of 10 July 1873, determined to put an end to a torrid two-year affair with his teenage lover. The 29-year-old poet had abandoned his young wife and child to be with Rimbaud, who would later become a symbol of rebellious youth.
Was Rimbaud a genius?
But Rimbaud ran away from his deeds as a literary genius and homewrecker for a life as a marginally successful gunrunner in Africa. By the time of his death at 37, his books A Season in Hell and Illuminations were already gaining status as treasures of Western literature.
Why is Rimbaud so good?
Two qualities that mark almost all aspects of these works are youthful passion and aggression. In addition, Rimbaud’s writing is also rich in symbolism and metaphor, so skilfully applied that many a poet still adopts his techniques. Another feature of his work is a gleeful arrogance worthy of his young age.
What happened to Rimbaud?
He received the last rites from a priest before dying on 10 November 1891, at the age of 37. The remains were sent across France to his home town and he was buried in Charleville-Mézières.