Poète maudit
A
poète maudit (
French: accursed poet) is a
poet living a life outside or against society. Abuse of drugs and alcohol, insanity, crime, violence, and in general any societal sin, often resulting in an early death are typical elements of the biography of a
poète maudit.
The first
poète maudit, and its prototype, was
François Villon (1431-c. 1474) but the phrase wasn't coined until the beginning of the
19th century by
Alfred de Vigny in his 1832 drama
Stello, in which he calls the poet "la race toujours maudit par les puissants de la terre."
Charles Baudelaire,
Paul Verlaine and
Arthur Rimbaud are considered typical examples.
Les poètes maudits is a work by
Paul Verlaine that was published in 1884.
The work is a homage to
Tristan Corbière,
Arthur Rimbaud,
Stéphane Mallarmé,
Marceline Desbordes-Valmore,
Villiers de l'Isle-Adam and Pauvre Lelian (
Paul Verlaine).
*
Verlaine's work in French (pdf)
