Cellulely

Many 21st-century readers and appreciators of French author Paul Verlaine and his poetry will be delighted to learn of the discovery, in December 2004, of a "lost" manuscript by Paul Verlaine, entitled Cellulairement. Cellulely (or "Behind Bars") is the first known English translation to come out. It contains many poems later included in Sagesse, Parall lement, and Jadis et Nagu re.

Cellulely is all the more striking and full of wonderment given the circumstances under which the poems in question were written (prison, religious conversion), and the notorious events leading up to those circumstances (Rimbaud, fog of absinthe, pistol). Famous events, and turning points, in the life of the poet.

Readers of Cellulely will also be interested to know that these are some of the same poems that are referred to on several occasions in Verlaineʼs autobiographical work, My Prisons, also available in English translation by Sunny Lou Publishing.

Lady mouse scampers,

Black in the grey of evening,

Lady mouse scampers

Grey in the black of night.

One sounds the bell,

Sleep, good prisoners

One sounds the bell:

You must go to sleep.