In the golden autumn of French Renaissance literature, one name shines with particular brilliance: Pierre de Ronsard, the master lyricist who transformed French poetry and established himself as the supreme voice of his generation. Born in September 1524 at the Château de la Possonnière in the Vendômois region of France, Ronsard would live until December 27, 1585, leaving behind a literary legacy that would influence…
“I will ask you only one thing, reader: to pronounce my verses well and fit your voice to their passion, and not read them in the manner of a letter.”
Neighbourhood:
Italian Renaissance Poets, Love Poets, Political Poets, Renaissance Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Sensuality, Tenderness
Paul Verlaine was born Paul-Marie Verlaine on 30 March 1844 in Metz, then a French garrison city in Lorraine, and died in Paris on 8 January 1896. Few poets have made a more decisive contribution to the sound, atmosphere, and inward freedom of modern French verse, and few have lived so visibly within the contradictions that their work explores. Verlaine could write with extraordinary delicacy about rain, moonlight, p…
Neighbourhood:
Decadent Poets, French Symbolists, Symbolist Poets
Emotional landscape: Sensuality, Tenderness, Wonder
