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by Arthur Rimbaud (1854 - 1891)

Villes
 (Sung text for setting by B. Britten)
 See original
Language: French (Français) 
Our translations:  CHI ENG JPN SPA
Ce sont des villes ! C'est un peuple pour qui se sont montés ces
Alleghanys et ces Libans de rêve !  Des chalets de cristal et de bois
qui se meuvent sur des rails et des poulies invisibles. Les vieux
cratères ceints de colosses et de palmiers de cuivre rugissent
mélodieusement dans les feux.  ...  Des cortèges de Mabs en robes rousses, opalines,
montent des ravines. Là-haut, les pieds dans la cascade et les ronces,
les cerfs tettent Diane. Les Bacchantes des banlieues sanglotent et la
lune brûle et hurle. Vénus entre dans les cavernes des forgerons et
des ermites. Des groupes de beffrois chantent les idées des
peuples. Des châteaux bâtis en os sort la musique inconnue.  ...  Le paradis
des orages s'effondre. Les sauvages dansent sans cesse la fête de la
nuit.  ... 

Quels bons bras, quelle belle heure me rendront cette région d'où
viennent mes sommeils et mes moindres mouvements?

Composition:

    Set to music by (Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976), "Villes", op. 18 no. 2 (1939), published 1940 [ high voice and strings ], from Les Illuminations, no. 2

Text Authorship:

  • by Arthur Rimbaud (1854 - 1891), "Villes (Ce sont des villes !)", appears in Les Illuminations

Go to the general single-text view

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • CHI Chinese (中文) (Yen-Chiang Che) , "城市", copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • ENG English (Ahmed E. Ismail) , "Towns", copyright © 2004, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • JPN Japanese (日本語) (Naoyuki Okada) , copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • SPA Spanish (Español) (José Miguel Llata) , "Ciudades", copyright © 2014, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 31
Word count: 339

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

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