The first post of Poets and Lovers was a poetic composition by the contemporary British artist Graham Ovenden. Now for the hundredth post, I have chosen another one, from the same collection Waterside Memories. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Tag: nostalgia
De Quincey et la petite fille misérable, d’après Baudelaire
Après le recueil de poèmes Les Fleurs du mal, l’œuvre la plus célèbre de Charles Baudelaire est l’essai Les Paradis artificiels, publié en 1860, consacré à l’usage récréatif des drogues, plus précisément du haschisch et de l’opium. Il connut un large succès, il reste un exposé classique des effets de la drogue, comme l’exaltation, puis la dépendance et la souffrance. D’ailleurs l’expression “paradis artificiels” est couramment utilisée pour désigner l’utilisation de drogues (en particulier hallucinogènes) pour stimuler l’imagination ou enivrer les sens. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
The wretched little girl in De Quincey’s Confessions
The English writer Thomas Penson De Quincey (b. August 15, 1785; d. December 8, 1859) knew fame with his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, published anonymously in two parts in the September and October 1821 issues of the London Magazine, then released in book form in 1822. In 1845, De Quincey published Suspiria de Profundis, advertised as being a sequel to the Confessions. Then in 1856 he revised his Confessions, which became much longer. Since then, the two are usually published together, their complete titles being Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, Being an Extract from the Life of a Scholar, and Suspiria de Profundis: Being a Sequel to the “Confessions of an English Opium-Eater.” CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
Tilly, by Graham Ovenden
I present here a second poem from the collection Waterside Memories by the famous British artist. Filled with nostalgia, it tells about a young girl seen on a beach, who swam naked; she held the promise of the growth of her girlhood, but the poet did not see her any more. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
La gare où le train ne s’arrête jamais
Où es-tu, fille aux grands yeux noirs
De neige, mon bonheur d’un soir ?
Je t’attends, mon amante bleue,
Mon soleil, mon cœur fabuleux. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…
We saw a mermaid, by Graham Ovenden
Today I give a poetic composition by a contemporary British artist. Mostly known as a photographer and painter, Ovenden is also a connoisseur of poetry: for the 7th anniversary post in Pigtails in Paint, he proposed the poem “The Seven Ages of Girlhood” by Ashby-Sterry, which is how I learned about that 19th century poet. Moreover, he also writes some poetry himself, for instance he contributed the poem “A Father to his Seven Year Old Daughter” to that anniversary post. CONTINUE READING / CONTINUER LA LECTURE…