A Season in Hell

A Season in Hell is an extended poem in prose written and published by French writer Arthur Rimbaud. The book had a considerable influence on later artists and poets, including the Surrealists. Critic Mathieu describes A Season in Hell as "a terribly enigmatic poem", and a "brilliantly near-hysterical quarrel between the poet and his 'other'." He identifies two voices at work in the surreal narrative: "the two separate parts of Rimbaud’s schizoid personality—the 'I' who is a seer/poet and the 'I' who is the incredibly hardnosed Widow Rimbaud’s peasant son. One voice is wildly in love with the miracle of light and childhood, the other find all these literary shenanigans rather damnable and 'idiotic'."