Stefan Zweig's copy of Rimbaud, Une Saison en - British Library

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STEFAN ZWEIG'S COPY OF RIMBAUD, UNE SAISON EN
ENFER (1873)
IN 1908 Stefan Zweig was given a copy of the
first edition of Rimbaud's Une Saison en enfer;
the volume now forms part of the Zweig
Collection in the British Library.^ The verso
of the front wrapper bears the inscription:
A Monsieur
Stefan Zweig,
en souvenir des journees
passees avec E Verhaeren
au Caillou & a Angre
Mons, le 8. X. '08
Bien cordialement,
O. Van den Daele
Aware of the rarity of this item, Zweig wrote
on the inside of its box:
Chris Michaelides
Originalausgabe. Die gesammte Auflage wurde bis
auf ungefahr sieben Exemplare vom Verfasser vernichtet:
dies eines der erhaltenen Rarissimum [sic]
der franzosischen Literatur.^
Une Saison en enfer has the peculiar distinction
of being the only book that Rimbaud
himself had published. The work was written
between April and August 1873, the turbulent
period which saw his disastrous last stay in
London with Verlaine, and their final separation
after the incident in Brussels in which
Verlaine shot and wounded Rimbaud; it was
completed by Rimbaud at Roche, his family's
farmhouse near Charleville.-* The volume was
printed in Brussels during September and
October by the Alliance typographique, a workers'
co-operative probably known to Rim-
199
baud through his contacts with Verlaine's
socialist friends in London and Brussels.**
Rimbaud distributed half a dozen copies to
friends: four went to J-L. Forain in Paris, for
Forain himself, Jean Richepin, Raoul Ponchon,
and possibly Raoul Gineste; two were given
to friends in Charleville, Ernest Delahaye and
Ernest Millot, and one was sent to Verlaine,
by then in prison at Mons for his attack on
Rimbaud.^
In 1883, in his 'Poetes maudits', Verlaine
wrote that Une Saison en enfer had been
completely forgotten because its author, having
lost interest in it, had not taken the trouble to
promote it:'^ Verlaine himself tried to remedy
this neglect by publishing the work in La Vogue
in 1886.^ Verlaine's view was elaborated when,
after Rimbaud's death in 1891, a legend that
the poet had destroyed the entire edition began
to gain currency, the gesture being interpreted
as a youthful renunciation of literature on the
part of the eighteen-year old poet.® This legend
was created at first by the bibliophiles who
owned one of the rare copies and reinforced
by the recollection of Rimbaud's youngest
sister, Isabelle, that, soon after the printing of
the work, Rimbaud returned to Roche and
burned all the copies in his possession, together
with all his manuscripts.^ Paterne Berrichon,
who published the first full-length biography
of Rimbaud in 1897, the year of his marriage
to Isabelle, takes up this story but adds that

Rimbaud saved a few copies for distribution to realizing their importance.^^ When this was
triends in Paris.'** In his 1912 study of the poet, revealed to him:
Berrichon places the holocaust after Rimbaud's . . . il lacha les exemplaires de la precieuse edition
return from Paris, the indifference and hostility au compte-goutte.'^ J'en detiens un—comme il s'en
which he had met there determining him to doit. Emile Verhaeren, Stefan Zweig, Viele-Griffin
abandon literature." ^^ quelques autres ecrivains ou amateurs de ma
This was the accepted view until 1914, connaissance en ont re9u un'cadeau'.
when, in a lecture delivered to the Societe des Pierard's version would seem to be more
bibliopbiles et iconophiles de Belgique, Leon convincing as an explanation ofthe long interval
Losseau, a lawyer from Mons, announced his between Losseau's discovery in 1901 and its
discovery in 1901 ofthe entire print-run ofthe revelation in 1914. Losseau's explanation ofthe
original edition of Une Saison en enfer in delay is hardly helped by his expressed inthe
workshop of the Alliance typographique in tention of distributing copies to the Societe des
Brussels.'^ Losseau claimed that, by checking bibliophiles beiges seant a Mons and this body
the printer's account books, he had established was, in any case, limited by its rules to fifty
that Rimbaud had made an initial payment for members.^'' However, if Pierard's account is
the printing but had failed to settle the account the right one, the inscription on Zweig's copy
and that, of the five hundred copies printed, demonstrates that the discovery ofthe edition
he had received no more than a dozen author's must have occurred in or before October 1908.
copies. The rest remained forgotten in the Whatever the exact sequence of events, both
printer's storeroom until they were accidentally accounts agree that the presentation of a copy
discovered twenty-eight years later. After an of Une Saison en enfer to Zweig was made at
unspecified number of copies, badly damaged the instance of a third party, and Pierard more
by water, had been burnt, Losseau was left or less names himself as the instigator of
with 425 copies, which, with the half dozen Losseau's gifts. Here Pierard's claim is borne
given away to friends by Rimbaud, comprised out by the signature 'O. Van den Daele' in
the surviving edition. Zweig's copy. Van den Daele was Pierard's
Losseau states, rather unconvincingly, that teacher and friend, and the dedicatee of Pierhis
main reason for buying the edition was to ard's first poems,'London Sketches';'^ perhaps
present copies of it to his fellow members of he was also the friend with whom Pierard
the Societe des bibliophiles beiges seant a Mons discovered the edition in Losseau's attic.
when they next met at his house. To do this Zweig's copy was given to him as a souvenir
he had had to wait until 24 November 1912!^^ ofthe days spent in the company of Verhaeren
In the meantime he gave copies to a few close at Caillou qui Bique, a hamlet near Angre, in
friends, whom he swore to secrecy, and, upon the Walloon district (fig. i). Zweig first met
a request made to him, distributed others to Verhaeren in 1902 and soon became his close
Emile Verhaeren, Maurice Maeterlinck, Viele- friend and disciple.'^ Their friendship, which
Griffin, and Stefan Zweig.'"^ was to last until the outbreak of the First World
This account by Losseau has been contested War,^^ was mutually beneficial: Zweig, through
by Louis Pierard, the Belgian journalist, poet, his translations of Verhaeren's poems and plays
and art critic. In an article published in 1942, made his name, hitherto confused with that of
Pierard claimed that 'around 1912' he and a Verlaine, familiar to German readers,^^ while
friend discovered, in the attic of Losseau's Verhaeren introduced his young disciple to
house, over 250 copies of Une Saison en enfer Parisian literary and artistic circles. During the
which'Losseau had bought as part ofthe entire period of their friendship, Verhaeren spent the
stock of the Alliance typographique, without winter months in Paris and the rest of the year
200

Fig. I. Zweig (centre) with the Verhaerens at
Caillou qui Bique, from E. Rieger, Stefan
Zweig (Berlin, 1928)
at Caillou. Zweig admired this equilibrium of
a life shared between the big city and the
countryside, Verhaeren the citizen ofthe world
complementing the hermit of Caillou qui Bique
in total communion with Nature. In his Erinnerungen
an Emile Verhaeren, written soon after
the poet's tragic death in 1916 and privately
printed in 1917, Zweig lovingly evokes Verhaeren's
house at St. Cloud, near Paris, and
his cottage at Caillou,^^ He spent five summers
at Caillou as Verhaeren's guest and these he
always remembered with a gratitude close to
veneration, the more so after the destruction
of the cottage in 1917. He relates that the
cottage at Caillou became a place of pilgrimage
for Verhaeren's friends and that
celui qui etait re^u ici, etait un ami et un hote
201
qui ne faisait que passer, fugitif, mais devenait partie
de la maison, partageait le pain, les heures et le
silence."
Pierard, a native of near-by Frameries, lived
until 1911 at Mons, where he was involved in
the publication of Antee and La Societe nouvelle,
both of them reviews to which Verhaeren was
an occasional contributor. He was introduced
to Verhaeren while still at school, probably by
Van den Daele, and, like Zweig, he quickly
became a privileged visitor at Caillou.^ In
1907 he dedicated his Images boraines to Verhaeren
and, in an article published in La Societe
nouvelle in 1908, he describes Verhaeren reciting
his recently completed play Helene de
Sparte to a gathering of friends at the cottage:
. . . et Verhaeren commence sa lecture, le corps
arque, le cou aux veines saillantes tendu, le bras
allonge, ainsi que !e representerent Van Rysselberghe
et Montald. C'est surtout la main nerveuse,
fine et agile, qui lit Helene de Sparte cependant que
les mots ^emissants, que les vers fougueux se
pressent aux levres du poete.
L'oeuvre, que M. Valere Brussov traduit en russe
pour Viessy et, en allemand, M. Stefan Zweig, est
achevee depuis peu . . .^^
One of Zweig's most precious memories from
Caillou is of an amusing incident during a
reading of this play, possibly the same
occasion.^"^
Zweig's friendship with Pierard began at
Caillou but continued long after Verhaeren's
death in 1916. The choice of Zweig as one of
the privileged recipients of copies of the first
edition of Une Saison en enfer was an appropriate
one, and Pierard must have known of
Zweig's interest in Rimbaud. In 1905 Zweig
had published a study of Verlaine, which
included a chapter on his relationship with
Rimbaud,^*^ and in 1907 he wrote a criticalbiographical
foreword to a German translation
of Rimbaud's poems.^^ In these works Zweig,
who had read Berrichon's biography and his
edition ofthe poet's letters,^^ and who had also
met Georges Izambard, Rimbaud's schoolmaster,
in Paris, seems to be familiar with the

theory that Rimbaud had abandoned literature
at eighteen. Curiously though, he appears to
be unaware of the fact, mentioned by Berrichon,
that Rimbaud did have Une Saison en
enfer printed and then, supposedly, destroyed
the edition.^° The gift of the volume was to
put him right on that score, and by the time
he wrote the note which accompanies his copy,
Zweig also knew about the copies sent out by
Rimbaud, though evidently not about those in
Losseau's possession.
Despite his great admiration for Rimbaud's
poetry and the fascination that the poet's
tremendous vitahty and adventurous life held
for him, Zweig never wrote a full biography of
Rimbaud. Yet, in a letter dated 23 September
1924, thanking Pierard for a copy of his biography
of Van Gogh, he writes, 'La vie de
Rimbaud exceptee, nuUe autre biographie
moderne me semble aussi grandiose et emouvantc'.^'
In the same letter, which is suffused
with Zweig's affection for Verhaeren, he mentions
the pleasure that a recent meeting with
Verhaeren's widow gave him and urges Pierard
to take the initiative in having a monument
erected to Verhaeren in Belgium. He also adds
that the book gave him great pleasure, not only
because of its excellence,'. . . mais aussi comme
souvenir de la belle epoque passee pres de
Verhaeren', thus echoing the inscription on the
book given to him at a time and in a world
irretrievably lost.
Thanks are due to Dr. Graham Kent and Mr.
David Paisey for their help in the preparation of
this article.
1 A. Rimbaud, Une Saison en enfer (Brussels,
1873). Zweig 202. The copy is in a full leather
binding by E. A. Enders, Leipzig.
2 'First edition. The entire edition was destroyed
by the author with the exception of about seven
copies. This is one oUhe rarest books in French
literature.'
3 Pierre Petitfils, Rimbaud (Paris, 1982), pp. 201-
27.
4 Arthur Rimbaud, Une Saison en enfer, edition
critique par Pierre Brunei (Paris, 1987), p. 181.
202
5 Petitfils, Rtmbaud, p. 230.
6 Les Poetes maudits de Paul Verlaine, introduction
et notes par Michel Decaudin (Paris, 1982),
p. 36. Verlaine's articles originally appeared in
Lutece, in 1883, before they were published in
book form in 1884.
7 La Vogue, nos. 8-10 (6-27 Sept. 1886). The
work was also included in collections of Rimbaud's
poems and prose poems published in
1892 (with a note by Verlaine) and 1898.
8 Arthur Rimbaud, Reliquaire. Poesies, preface
de Rodolphe Darzens (Paris, 1891), pp. x, xi.
Darzens seems to have been the first to mention
Rimbaud's destruction of the edition, locating
three extant copies, his own, Jean Richepin's
and Verlaine's. C. Maurras, in his obituary note
on Rimbaud, published in the Revue encyclopedtque,
no. 26, tom. ii (Jan. 1892), adds another
copy, owned by Raoul Gineste, to those mientioned
by Darzens.
9 See her letters to Louis Pierquin in Arthur
Rimbaud, Oeuvres completes, edition etablie, presentee
et annotee par Antoine Adam. Bibliotheque
de la Pleiade no. 68 (Paris, 1972), pp.
722, 732-3. Isabelle, who only found out about
her brother's literary reputation after his death,
and thereafter became his hagiographer, tried,
unsuccessfully, to prevent the publication of her
brother's works on the grounds that he had
never intended them for publication.
10 P. Berrichon, La Vie de Jean-Arthur Rimbaud
(Paris, 1897), pp. 94-5, 98-9-
11 P. Berrichon, Jean-Arthur Rimbaud, le poete
ii8s4-fS73) (Paris, 1912), pp. 294-5.
12 Leon Losseau, La Legende de la destruction par
Rimbaud de I'editwn prmceps de Une Saison en^
enfer. Extrait de I'Annuaire de 1915 de la Societe
des bibliophiles et iconophiles de Belgique (Brussels,
1916). One consequence of Losseau's discovery,
and of the subsequent destruction of the myth
about Rimbaud's adieu a la litterature, was the
revision ofthe dating ofthe Illuminations, which
are now generally considered to have been
written after Une Saison en enfer.
13 Bulletin, Societe des bibliophiles beiges seant a
Mons, i, 5e fasc. (1914), P- 213. Losseau, La
Legende, p. 3, gives the date as 24 December
1912.
14 Losseau, ibid., p. 16.
15 L. Pierard, 'L'edition originale d'C/»f Saison en
enfer\ Poesie 42, i, pp. 14-15-
16 Losseau was to continue to give away copies of

Une Saison en enfer for many years—he donated
a copy to the Bibliotheque nationale in 1938. A
copy he gave to Jules Mouquet was purchased
by the British Library in 1982 (C.i29.m.i3.).
This copy has two interlaced Ls stamped in the
upper blank margin of the front wrapper and
below the last line of text; on the first page it
has the inscription 'A Monsieur Jules Mouquet,
l'editeur des Vers de college d'Arthur Rimbaud'
(Mouquet's edition was published in 1933). It
is in a fine binding by Rose Adler, signed and
dated 1948. Reproduced in Martin Breslauer,
Fine Bindings Catalogue 104, part II, (1981),
col. pi. xiii.
17 Bulletin, i, ler fasc. (1908), p. [3].
18 Revue de Belgique, Annee 37 (Oct. 1905), pp.
105-11.
19 Robert Dumont, Stefan Zweig et la France
(Paris, 1967), pp. 31-88, discusses the friendship
between the two men, Verhaeren's influence on
Zweig and Zweig's writings on the poet. See
also D. A. Prater, European of yesterday: a
biography of Stefan Zweig (Oxford, 1972), pp.
22-98 passim.
20 Zweig was deeply hurt by Verhaeren's expression
of bitter anti-German feelings in works such as
La Belgique sanglante and Les Ailes rouges de la
guerre, written after the German invasion of
Belgium.
21 For a list of Zweig's translations of Verhaeren's
works see Randolph J. Klawiter, Stefan Zweig:
a bibliography. University of North Carolina
Studies in the Germanic Languages and Literatures,
no. 50 (Chapel Hill, 1965), pp. 70-71. In
1912, Zweig also organized Verhaeren's highly
successful lecture tour in Hamburg, Berlin,
Vienna and Munich. See Prater, European of
Yesterday, pp. 42-4.
IN April 1987 the Modern British Section
of the British Library acquired a rare and
important copy of W. H. Auden's Poems of
1928. This was Auden's first published work,
privately printed by his fellow poet and undergraduate
Stephen Spender during the Oxford
W. H. AUDEN'S POEMS OF 1928
Joanna Leevers
203
22 Zweig, Erinnerungen an Emile Verhaeren
(Vienna, 1917). All references are to the French
edition Souvenirs sur Emile Verhaeren (Brussels,
23 Zweig, ibid., p. 76.
24 See Zweig's contribution in La nervie, numero
special consacre a Louis Pierard, 1930, i, pp.
20-21. See also Trois cent trente-deux lettres a
Louis Pierard, precedees de Memoires exterieurs
par Marianne Pierson-Pierard, Lettres modernes,
Avant-siecle, 11 (Paris, 1971), p. 16.
25 Louis Pierard, 'Le Wallon a l'Orange', La Societe
nouvelle, i4e annee, tom. ii (2e serie, vol. xxx,
oct.-dec. 1908), p. 81. The German premiere of
Helene de Sparte {Helena's Heimkehr), in Zweig's
translation, was given on 13 October 1910, at
the Stuttgarter Hoftheater, nearly two years
before its Paris premiere, on 4 May 1912, at the
Chatelet.
26 Zweig, Souvenirs sur Emile Verhaeren, p. 137.
27 Stefan Zweig, Paul Verlaine. Die Dichtung, Eine
Sammlung von Monographien, vol. xxx (Berlin-
Leipzig, 1905). All references are taken from the
English edition, Paul Verlaine (Boston, Dublin
& London, 1913), where 'The Rimbaud Episode'
is on pp. 38-50.
28 Arthur Rimbaud, Gedichte [tr. from the French
by K. L. Ammer {pseud, of Karl Klammer)],
(Leipzig, 1907).
29 Zweig, Verlaine (1913), p. 49, note. Berrichon's
Lettres de Jean-Arthur Rimbaud was published
in 1899.
30 Zweig, ibid., p. 41: 'he never had a single line
printed by his own efforts, he was utterly
regardless ofthe fleeting examples of his gigantic
power'.
31 Pierson-Pierard, op. cit., p. 346.
summer vacation. It is a surprisingly small
volume measuring only 12 x 95 cm., bound in
limp orange covers; the title-page reads: W.
H. AUDEN [long rule] POEMS [short rule]
S.H.S.: 1928. Its pagination is pp. [i-iv, 1-2]
3-37 [38-40]^ and a printed erratum slip is