VERLAINE, Paul (1844-1896)

VERLAINE, Paul (1844-1896)

Autograph letter signed « P. Verlaine » to Armand Gouzien
Paris-Montmartre, [September-October 1871], 2 p. in-8° in black ink on laid paper
Some ink stains, central fold reinforced with tape on second folio

At the time of his very first encounters with Rimbaud, the young Verlaine evokes the difficult pregnancy of his wife Mathilde, who is about to give birth to their son Georges

« Mon cher Gouzien,
Je suis véritablement navré de vous faire faux-bond aujourd’hui. Voici mon excuse. Ma femme qui est enceinte a été hier au soir et toute cette nuit horriblement souffrante et moi sur pied et sur les dents. Dans ces conditions il m’a été de toute impossibilité de me livrer à un travail intellectuel quelconque. Pour vous prouver toute ma bonne volonté, je vous envoie ci-jointe quelques l’informe ébauche de ma lettre projetée. Voyez si par hasard vous n’en pourriez rien tirer.
Je me propose de vous aller voir demain matin à l’effet de bien m’entendre avec vous sur l’esprit politique les nuances et les choses à mettre ou ne pas mettre, étant donné l’esprit de la rédaction.
Et vous pourrez compter sur la lettre d’après-demain. Ne me tenez pas trop rigueur et croyez-moi toujours bien vôtre.
P. Verlaine
14, rue Nicolet, Paris-Montmartre »

This letter can be dated with certainty between September and October 1871, because of the address from which it was sent and the fact that Mathilde Mauté, 17 years old, had not yet given birth. Rimbaud’s irruption into the life of the Verlaine-Mauté couple, however, marks their inevitable descent into hell. After various epistolary exchanges between the two poets, Rimbaud received hospitality at the Mautés’ home on September 10, 1871, on the second floor of 14, rue Nicolet in Montmartre. Things quickly escalate due to the numerous misdeeds of the two companions. A fortnight later, Rimbaud was forced to leave the Mautés’ accommodation, scandalized by his attitude. With his new friend gone, Verlaine became all the more irascible, as he hinted at in this letter: “I am on my feet and on my teeth.”
His drunkenness and physical violence against Mathilde follow one another. At the end of October, a few days before giving birth, Verlaine even went so far as to throw his wife out of bed, whose reflection on Rimbaud’s “indelicacy” had displeased him. Little Georges was born on 30 October without the presence of Verlaine, who was absent all day.

Armand Gouzien (1839-1892) was the director of the Revue des lettres et des arts. Verlaine produced “Les Loups” and “Un Grognard”, later collected in Jadis et Naguère. He had a good enough opinion of Verlaine as a journalist to invite him to contribute to Le Gaulois, in which he himself reported on the Fêtes galantes.