TRANSLATOR'S NOTE

Specimens of Rimbaud's work have been added as an appendix to this biography, thanks to the interest and the co-operation of a number of writers who have made trans- lations at various times and given permission for their use here.A great debt is owing to Dr. James Sibley Watson, for his translation of the Season in Hell, originally pub- lished in The Dial, 1920, and reprinted here. The version is a faithful one; the apparent excesses of rhetoric are no more startling than in the original French of Rimbaud's farewell to literature. Almost as much of Rimbaud's char- acter may be gathered from a study of The Drunken Boat, which has received a most remarkable rendering into Eng- lish verse by Mr. Lionel Abel, who has permitted the pub- lication of his work here. Our gratitude is also due to Mr. Joseph T. Shipley and Mr. T. Sturge Moore, for their excellent English versions of a poet who has been long considered untranslatable.