SOURCE: "Une Saison en enfer," in Rimbaud, Athlone Press, 1979, pp. 112-35.

In the following essay, Chadwick argues that Rimbaud demonstrated a much firmer sense of artistic control in the two parts of "Délires" than he did in other sections of the poem. The critic further contends that in "Délires I and II, " the principal themes of spiritual alienation, the search for a new verse form, and the impulse to reshape Western society are more fully articulated than in the preceding or following sections.

Publication and Composition

With the exception of a few of his early poems, Une Saison en enfer is the only one of Rimbaud's works to have been published immediately after its composition. But even so, its publication, in the autumn of 1873, was accompanied by a number of complications, not the least of which is that it is not strictly correct to say that...