SOURCE: Ross, Kristin. “Rimbaud and the Resistance to Work.” Representations, no. 19 (summer 1987): 62-86.

In the following essay, Ross examines Rimbaud's resistance to the bourgeois work ethic in his life and in his writings.

The origin of the Commune dates back in effect to the time of Genesis, to the day when Cain killed his brother. It is envy that lies behind all those demands stuttered by the indolent [des paresseux] whose tools make them ashamed, and who in hatred of work prefer the chances of combat to the security of daily work.

—Maxime du Camp¹

“Ideology” is perhaps the fact that each person does what he or she is “supposed to do”. … Ideology is just the other name for work.

—Jacques Rancière²

In his essay “Le Chant des sirènes,” Maurice Blanchot places Rimbaud's Une Saison en enfer within a curious constellation of texts, in the community...