Henri Michaux, for many years known only to a small circle of poetry lovers and connoisseurs, has become one of the major figures of contemporary francophone poetry. During his life Michaux hid behind his work, avoiding fame, rarely giving interviews or allowing photographs of himself to be taken. He broke this self-imposed silence in 1959, when he published an autobiographical sketch titled "Quelques renseignements sur cinquante-neuf années d'existence" (Some Information on Fifty-Nine Years of Existence). This brief and often elliptical text, in which he refers to himself in the third person, remains the only reliable document originating from the author himself that recounts the important events in his life. Michaux's work has come to be recognized only gradually, through an ever-increasing appreciation of its qualities by critics and contemporary poets. From his first writings he exposes the limitations of language, subjecting its structure to a multitude of...