Not quite sure how I felt about this. There were moments of real beauty that completely drew me in, and there were others in which I become frustrated by Miller's fanboy hyperbole. I think this would be great to re-read once I've read more of Rimbaud's work, at least then I may understand Miller's sentiment a little more. I do love how Miller writes however, and the book is a nice little addition to any fan's library.

"In Rimbaud, I see myself as in a mirror." So writes Henry Miller in his study of French symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud. Not a clinical dissection of Rimbaud but a meditation on the plight of the creative artist in an increasingly ambivalent world.

I would have preferred to give this book a 2 star rather the a 3 star, but I feel like I should have liked it more... Ok, fine, I should give it 2 stars. It's the same problem as Shakespeare, and I decided a long time ago what to do about this problem: just admit that it's just not my thing.

I'm glad that I read it, and it was very short, so not much of a commitment. There were good parts: Henry Miller's visuals of the "Season in Hell" were great, and it was definitely interesting to hear about this beleaguered poet, dying of bone cancer after having his leg removed, fifteen years after he wrote his last verse. I imagine that if I knew French, the book would have been more meaningful; or if I had read any Rimbaud, which apparently is impossible to translate into English.

The root of the problem isn't Rimbaud, because the book was only partially about him. The problem is that I absolutely do not care about the artist's dilemma at all, and that was the main focus of the whole book. All of the agony, the contemplation on why artists can't seem to be successful professionally, how they can't seem to care about the same things normal people do.... Very boring. It's not that I didn't give it a chance. It's just overwrought and uninteresting. Honestly, the Wikipedia page about Rimbaud was so much more interesting than the book was.

Also, as a side note, at one point Henry Miller says that Rimbaud has a weighty secret, and implies that he also has a secret. It seems ironic that, fifty years later, the consensus seems to be that Rimbaud was gay. It was clearly not a conclusion that Henry Miller made, regardless of his level of obsession.

لم يعجبني في الكتاب نبرة التفخيم في الحديث عن رامبو ومآثره، وهو ما لم أعرفه عن هنري ميللر كروائي، بالإضافة إلى الإفراط في استخدام الاستعارات والتشبيهات التي تميل إلى الكتابات الصوفية، خاصة في ناحيتي الغموض والتقديس.

وأعجبني في الكتاب الشغف الذي كُتِبَ به، لدرجة أنك تستطيع التهامه في جلسة واحدة. كما أنه دفعني إلى إعادة النظر في شأن الشاعر ورغبَّني في قراءة "فصل في الجحيم" ثانية، مع رسائله هو وفان جوخ.

كتاب جدير بالقراءة إذ أن هنري ميللر يسبر أغوار شخصية الشاعر رامبو ويغوص في أعماق كل شاعر مرهف الأحاسيس، كما أنه يعطينا دروساً روحية في مجتمع طغى عليه الجانب المادي...

" كل رسالة من عالم الروح المتألق تشق صدعا في جدار القبر"

تصلح كمقدمة عن أدب آرثر رامبو ولكن تُعتبر مشوشة قليلاً لمن لم يقرأ لهذا الأديب أو يتعرف على حياته ..

إنه آرثر رامبو، الشاعر الفرنسي الشاب في القرن التاسع عشر، الذي بدأ يكتب في عمر السادسة عشر، وتوقف تماما عن الكتابة في عمر العشرين تقريبا .. ورحل وعمره سبعة وثلاثين عاما



رامبو .. شاعر ذو نزعة بارتلبية بامتياز .. في هذا الكتاب تعرف عنه الكثير من هنري ميللر نفسه الأديب الأمريكي الشهير، الذي وجد نفسه الوجه الآخر لرامبو، في غربته، وحزنه، وتمرده، وتعبه، وهدوءه الصاخب، وصخبه المبدع ..

ولكن ما الفائدة ؟

طوال قرائتي عن رامبو، أفكر في حياتهم، هؤلاء الأدباء من النوعية نفسها من التعاسة المجسدة في وجوه شاردة وأقلام صارخة، أمثال بيسوا، وكافكا، ونيتشه، ورامبو، وزيفايغ، وغيرهم ... هؤلاء الذين اختصر كافكا حالهم بقوله (أنا أعاني بينما أنتم تمتدحون كتاباتي)!

هل اختاروا التعاسة بإرادتهم ؟
هل هي نصيب؟
هل هي ثمن الإبداع وضريبته؟
لا أدري ...

ولكن تأتي في ذهني عبارة نسبت لرامبو، وربما هو قائلها حقا، ربما تختصر نفسيتهم كلهم في بضع كلمات بسيطة ..

اوقفوا هذا العالم، أريد النزول
!!

"Anyone looking in [Miller's] essay for a detailed critical account of Rimbaud's work, or a study of his life, will be disappointed. That kind of thing can be safely left to Enid Starkie. Miller is using Rimbaud as a pretext to deliver his own judgements on the world and to affirm that the boy poet was a prophet of the final collapse of civilization in the twentieth century. The essay was written in 1946, after the potential of the atomic bomb of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and Miller can be excused for believing that the collapse of civilized order was coming, if not the extinction of mankind itself. Rimbaud as a prophet of breakdown - the time of the assassins - and Miller, feeling himself to be something of a prophet too, found an affinity with the poet."

Forty-five commenters' wildly differing interpretations of Rimbaud and Miller made me dizzy. It reminded me of the literary wilderness of bullshit. What difference does it make? It's whatever you want to believe. And when you get to the end of the rainbow you'll look back and wonder: Gee, what was that all about? "...Like a goat attacking a carpet" as Henry would say.

SPRZEDAM !

2 essays by Miller on Rimbaud. Absolutely stunning, Miller’s genius and passion and depth of understanding of life and soul and God and art shine through. Am mind blown and not sure I even fully understood all I read there.