Patti Smith publishes a superb enriched edition of “A Season in Hell” by Arthur Rimbaud

All admirers of Patti Smith know it: struck by the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud at the age of 16, the American singer, musician and poet has never ceased since then to highlight him, but also to highlight her not in his own people, to travel the countries he had surveyed, to explore the places where he had lived, written and suffered. A passion that even pushed her to buy the family farm of Rimbaud’s mother in Roche (Ardennes), near Charleville-Mézières, the very place where the poet wrote A season in Hell, at the age of 19. We are therefore not surprised that Gallimard has entrusted Patti Smith with the expanded reissue of this collection of nine feverish prose texts, whose 150th anniversary is being celebrated this year.

An edition enriched with images and memories

In A Season in Hell 1873 – fifth title in the illustrated “Blanche” collection which invites contemporary artists to create around a text of their choice – Patti Smith, who launched the fiery marriage of raw rock and poetry, is in her element and works wonders. She accompanies the full text with drawings, photos, and above all writings which shed light on the poet’s journey and bear witness to the intimate relationship she has maintained for 60 years with The man with the soles of wind, died in 1891 at the age of 37. A selection of additional poems by Rimbaud that have “built and inspired throughout his life”, as well as letters from the traveling poet to his family, complete the work.

Patti Smith recounts the genesis, the journey then the disinterest with which it was received A season in Hell, self-published in 1873, which she describes as the “pamphlet” of“an adolescent who recognized and rejected all mirrors, fought all demons, unmasked the archangels and prophesied the modern era.” She remembers his disappointment, in 1973, to find only indifference in Charleville-Mézières, where Rimbaud was born and buried, during his very first pilgrimage in the footsteps of the poet, on the occasion of the centenary of the publication of the same work.

The word wielded like a weapon

It traces the history of the six-shot revolver with which Verlaine injured Rimbaud in the wrist, “object of his beautiful torment“, July 10, 1873, and describes the emotion of having held this weapon in his bare hands”who precipitated life” of the two poets and lovers. She entrusts her identification to the author of the Illuminations when, loving freedom like him, she set off on the road at the age of 20, “with my own burst pockets“, and remembers the courage that his “perfect poems“, as My Bohemian.

She’s calling back “spiritual filiation” And “poetic affinity” with Arthur Rimbaud whom she shared with the young Bob Dylan. She details the wandering life of the poet-adventurer, his wanderings, from Vienna to Abyssinia. As a musician, she underlines the musicality of the verb that this “avenging angel” wielded like a weapon. She was at his bedside when he dictated his final text on his deathbed.

Guardian and “invisible companion”

Sensitive and inspired, this edition is above all an invitation to read and reread, to immerse oneself again in the intoxicating and often cryptic verb of Rimbaud, which, timeless, speaks to the heart and whispers to the mind of everyone: “I wrote silences, nights, I noted the inexpressible. I was staring dizzy.”

“Arthur Rimbaud’s poems have always been with me”, summarizes Patti Smith. “They contain traces of his insolence, virulent memories, prophetic powers, the sensual torpor of youth. I have read and reread them. I have held the gun, swept the grave and today I find myself being the guardian of the land that once belonged to his mother. I have been faithful, always following in her footsteps, invisible companion.” Rimbaldian, she will be to the end.

“A Season in Hell 1873 and other poems – Photographs, writings and drawings by Patti Smith” (176 pages, format 25 x 32.5 cm – Gallimard, €45) was published on September 28, 2023