margarete's review against another edition
3.0
And since then I've been bathing in the Poem...
3.5 stars, i didn't like the poems in A Season in Hell as much as i enjoyed Illuminations. but adored A Drunken Boat and overall find myself often floored by the turns of phrase and diction
3.5 stars, i didn't like the poems in A Season in Hell as much as i enjoyed Illuminations. but adored A Drunken Boat and overall find myself often floored by the turns of phrase and diction
magnetgrrl's review against another edition
4.0
I have an awesome dual language edition of this and I totally recommend anyone try to get it, if you read French. Rimbaud's imagery is amazing. He can be a bit obnoxious though, in that tortured 19 year old genius kind of way. Also, he's incredibly self-absorbed... maybe that's necessary for poets, I don't know.
novelesque_life's review against another edition
3.0
2.5 STARS
Read for Sealey Challenge
August 10 - 2 stars for A Season in Hell
August 11 - 3 stars for Illusions
Read for Sealey Challenge
August 10 - 2 stars for A Season in Hell
August 11 - 3 stars for Illusions
caliesha's review against another edition
3.0
Via Patti Smith's intro: "In his own private Gethsemane [Rimbaud] is at once saviour and betrayer, extending one hand as he's lying withdraws the other."
3.5 stars
3.5 stars
jcschildbach's review against another edition
3.0
I'm not a big poetry person, and read this because my kid bought it...probably because of the Patti Smith foreword. Perhaps unfortunately, it comes with a biography section that really makes Rimbaud sound like a dick (he did some deeply heinous crap). It's hard to read through the story of his life and then judge his poetry on its merits (but, again, I'm not a poetry person, so have a hard time judging it on its merits). Anyway, there were phrases and passages that jumped out at me due to their sheer power (in the English, I don't know French, which is included here). The work is good. The biography biased me against it. My difficulty with poetry makes me think I might have liked the work more if I was going over it in a class with someone who was passionate about the content. So...
jaqueline's review against another edition
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
bibilly's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
só deus sabe o que se passa na mente do palhaço. na minha, porém, a personagem da virgem tola nos primeiros Delírios é Paul Verlaine, e a do demônio, Rimbaud.
soinavoice's review against another edition
2.0
2.5 stars, because I actually really enjoyed The Drunken Boat--a lot of beautiful language, and really vivid, startling imagery, though I don't think Louise Varese's translation did it a lot of favours. Certainly worth a second read. But Season in Hell itself was... utterly incomprehensible to me. Barely one degree above gibberish. Part of the problem there may, again, have been the translation, although I tried to follow along in the French where possible and that also I found confounding. This wasn't a case of "I get what's going on here but it's not for me." I genuinely just... don't understand this poem. It felt a little like witnessing someone shout into the wind in an unfamiliar language--you get there's a lot of emotion involved, but apart from that it's in every way inaccessible to you. Idk. I hate feeling I've so completely missed a work which so many artists I admire have loved but I just... did not get this one at all.