Le Bateau ivre
Encyclopedia
"Le Bateau ivre" is a 100-line verse-poem written by Arthur Rimbaud
, then aged 16, in the summer of 1871 at his childhood home in Charleville
in Northern France. Rimbaud included the poem in a letter he sent to Paul Verlaine
in September 1871 to introduce himself to Verlaine. Shortly afterwards, he joined Verlaine in Paris and became his lover.
The poem is arranged in a series of 25 alexandrine
quatrains with an a/b/a/b rhyme-scheme. It is woven around the delirious visions of the eponymous boat, swamped and lost at sea. It was considered revolutionary in its use of imagery and symbolism. One of the longest and perhaps best poems in Rimbaud's œuvre, it opens with the following quatrain:
Rimbaud biographer Enid Starkie
describes the poem as an anthology of memorable images and lines. The voice is that of the drunken boat itself. The boat tells of becoming filled with water, thus "drunk." Sinking through the sea, the boat describes a journey of varied experience that includes sights of the purest and most transcendent (l'éveil jaune et bleu des phosphores chanteurs, "the blue and yellow awakening of singing phosphorescence") and at the same time of the most repellent (nasses / Où pourrit dans les joncs tout un Léviathan, "nets where a whole Leviathan was rotting"). The marriage of exaltation and debasement, the synesthesia, and the mounting astonishment make this hundred-line poem the fulfillment of Rimbaud's youthful poetic theory that the poet becomes a seer, a vatic being, through the disordering of the senses. To these attractions are added alexandrines of immediate aural appeal: Fermentent les rousseurs amères de l'amour! ("fermenting the bitter blushes of love").
The boat's (and reader's) mounting astonishment reaches its high point in lines 88-89: Est-ce en ces nuits sans fonds que tu dors et t'exiles / Million d'oiseaux d'or, ô future Vigueur? ("Is it in these bottomless nights that you sleep and exile yourself / a million golden birds, oh future Strength? ) Afterwards the vision is lost and the spell breaks. The speaker, still a boat, wishes for death (Ô que ma quille éclate! Ô que j'aille à la mer! "O that my keel would break! O that I would go to the sea!" ). The grandiose aspirations have deceived, leaving exhaustion and the sense of imprisonment. In this way, "Le Bateau Ivre" proleptically recapitulates Rimbaud's poetic career, which dissipated when he discovered that verse could not provide the universal understanding and harmony that it had seemed to when he was younger.
Le Bateau Ivre remains one of the gems of French poetry and of Rimbaud's poetic output. Vladimir Nabokov
translated it to Russian in 1928, but Théodore de Banville
disliked the poem. French poet-composer Léo Ferré
set it to music and sang it in the album Ludwig-L'Imaginaire-Le Bateau ivre (1982).
Arthur Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet. Born in Charleville, Ardennes, he produced his best known works while still in his late teens—Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an infant Shakespeare"—and he gave up creative writing altogether before the age of 21. As part of the decadent...
, then aged 16, in the summer of 1871 at his childhood home in Charleville
Charleville-Mézières
Charleville-Mézières is a commune in northern France, capital of the Ardennes department in the Champagne-Ardenne region. Charleville-Mézières is located on the banks of the Meuse River.-History:...
in Northern France. Rimbaud included the poem in a letter he sent to Paul Verlaine
Paul Verlaine
Paul-Marie Verlaine was a French poet associated with the Symbolist movement. He is considered one of the greatest representatives of the fin de siècle in international and French poetry.-Early life:...
in September 1871 to introduce himself to Verlaine. Shortly afterwards, he joined Verlaine in Paris and became his lover.
The poem is arranged in a series of 25 alexandrine
Alexandrine
An alexandrine is a line of poetic meter comprising 12 syllables. Alexandrines are common in the German literature of the Baroque period and in French poetry of the early modern and modern periods. Drama in English often used alexandrines before Marlowe and Shakespeare, by whom it was supplanted...
quatrains with an a/b/a/b rhyme-scheme. It is woven around the delirious visions of the eponymous boat, swamped and lost at sea. It was considered revolutionary in its use of imagery and symbolism. One of the longest and perhaps best poems in Rimbaud's œuvre, it opens with the following quatrain:
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Rimbaud biographer Enid Starkie
Enid Starkie
Enid Mary Starkie CBE, Litt.D , was an Irish literary critic, known for her biographical works on French poets. She was a Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford, and Lecturer and then Reader in the University.-Early life:She was the eldest daughter of Rt. Hon...
describes the poem as an anthology of memorable images and lines. The voice is that of the drunken boat itself. The boat tells of becoming filled with water, thus "drunk." Sinking through the sea, the boat describes a journey of varied experience that includes sights of the purest and most transcendent (l'éveil jaune et bleu des phosphores chanteurs, "the blue and yellow awakening of singing phosphorescence") and at the same time of the most repellent (nasses / Où pourrit dans les joncs tout un Léviathan, "nets where a whole Leviathan was rotting"). The marriage of exaltation and debasement, the synesthesia, and the mounting astonishment make this hundred-line poem the fulfillment of Rimbaud's youthful poetic theory that the poet becomes a seer, a vatic being, through the disordering of the senses. To these attractions are added alexandrines of immediate aural appeal: Fermentent les rousseurs amères de l'amour! ("fermenting the bitter blushes of love").
The boat's (and reader's) mounting astonishment reaches its high point in lines 88-89: Est-ce en ces nuits sans fonds que tu dors et t'exiles / Million d'oiseaux d'or, ô future Vigueur? ("Is it in these bottomless nights that you sleep and exile yourself / a million golden birds, oh future Strength? ) Afterwards the vision is lost and the spell breaks. The speaker, still a boat, wishes for death (Ô que ma quille éclate! Ô que j'aille à la mer! "O that my keel would break! O that I would go to the sea!" ). The grandiose aspirations have deceived, leaving exhaustion and the sense of imprisonment. In this way, "Le Bateau Ivre" proleptically recapitulates Rimbaud's poetic career, which dissipated when he discovered that verse could not provide the universal understanding and harmony that it had seemed to when he was younger.
Le Bateau Ivre remains one of the gems of French poetry and of Rimbaud's poetic output. Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...
translated it to Russian in 1928, but Théodore de Banville
Théodore de Banville
Théodore Faullain de Banville was a French poet and writer.-Biography:Banville was born in Moulins in Allier, Auvergne, the son of a captain in the French navy. His boyhood, by his own account, was cheerlessly passed at a lycée in Paris; he was not harshly treated, but took no part in the...
disliked the poem. French poet-composer Léo Ferré
Léo Ferré
Léo Ferré was a Franco-Monegasque poet, composer, singer and musician.Born in Monaco, Ferré mixed love and melancholy with moral anarchy, lyricism with slang, rhyming verse with prose monologues...
set it to music and sang it in the album Ludwig-L'Imaginaire-Le Bateau ivre (1982).
See also
- Ship of foolsShip of FoolsThe ship of fools is an allegory that has long been a fixture in Western literature and art. The allegory depicts a vessel populated by human inhabitants who are deranged, frivolous, or oblivious, passengers aboard a ship without a pilot, and seemingly ignorant of their own direction...
, an allegory in western art depicting a ship of madmen, who sail oblivious of their destination.