VILLON—VERLAINE.

"Paul Verlaine," by Bechhofer Roberts ("Ephesian")-Jarrolds Ltd.

Verlaine, one of the truest and most disreputable of modern French poets, lived from 1844 to 1896. His wife, from whom he had been separated for 24 years, died in 1914, leaving a book of memoirs which alone made possible an accurate study of the man, and was published in 1933. Mr. Roberts may, therefore claim that his book is "the first in English to attempt anything like a comprehensive study of Verlaine's life." In French there is "Verlaine tel qu'il fut," 1933, by M. Porche, with whom Mr. Roberts often disagrees, useful as he has found him.

No pretence is here made to palliate the sins of Verlaine. Mr. Roberts does attribute most of his weakness to congenital disease and the indulgence of his mother, but in the main he seeks to show what an amusing rascal the poet really was, to bring out the entertainment in his gloriously irresponsible career. This is not unfair to Verlaine. Few, reading over his love poems, can believe that the man was ever entirely sincere and serious, none can believe in the sentiments of his letters. The truth was, of course, that he abandoned reality by soaking himself all his life in absinthe, he embraced phantasmagoria instead of things, and was only himself in a certain impish humour.

The whole story is also a revelation to the Briton of French Bohemian moral filth. Baudelaire led the way; Verlaine, closely followed by his protege Rimbaud, explored the depths. He has, for example, two series of poems on unnatural passion. Rimbaud specialised in cloacal wit and humour. It is hardly to be wondered at that their association was suspect—a question which Mr. Roberts seems to decide quite justly. But if Verlaine liked the mud, he also breathed pure mountain air. At one stage, the middle, he became intensely religious, and wrote fine devotional poems, while his love-poems to his fiancee have a spiritual infusion. He could enter into all kinds of experiences, even if no lasting mark was left on him.

Having begun life as a Paris official, in an easy-going department from which he could absent himself for days at a time, to haunt cafes, fraternise with fellow-poets, form the Parnassian group, indulge in unsavoury adventures, he lost this one claim to respectability in the troubles of the Siege of Paris. Already married, he deserted his wife, visited England, wandered about Europe, landed himself in gaol, and acquired a bad reputation. The satanic Rimbaud was his constant companion, until a quarrel in London drove him to look for a new protege. He afterwards collected and published Rimbaud's poems. Next came an attempt to regain a social footing, with religious help. All this time Verlaine was supported in every way by his mother. When she died he slipped back into the gutter. Then, surprisingly enough, his early poetry rescued him. He was sought out as a great poet, and, though always drunk and homeless, except for hospitals, assumed the robes of the dead Victor Hugo and laid down the law to his kind. This is the most comical picture of all, and Verlaine knew it. He ended life with two female companions, to whom he spasmodically proposed in turns, and after his death one of them kept herself luxuriously in drink by selling hundreds of pens, each as the one with which he wrote his last poem —a trick he would have applauded.

 smh 30/4/1938,