Selected Poems

Gérard de Nerval was the pen-name of Gérard Labrunie (1808-1855), essayist, translator, poet, playwright, and travel writer. He was a major figure during the era of French Romanticism, and is best known for his novellas and poetry, especially the collection Les Filles du feu (The Daughters of Fire), which contained a set of eight novellas, including Sylvie, and a selection of poems including El Desdichado. Nerval played a major role in introducing French readers to the works of German Romantic authors, including Goethe and Schiller, initially through his prose translation of the first part of Goethe’s Faust. His later work, merging poetry and journalism in a fictional manner, influenced Proust, particularly Sylvie which explored the theme of time lost and recalled. His last novella, Aurélia ou Le Rêve et La Vie, which drew on his interest in the significance of dreams, also influenced André Breton and the Surrealist movement.

At college, he met Théophile Gautier, who became a lifelong friend, and later, in 1836, accompanied Gautier on a trip to Belgium. In 1840 he took over the latter’s column in La Presse.

He began to experience serious mental health problems in 1841. In December 1842, Nerval departed for the Near East, later publishing articles deriving from his travels, and the work translated here, Voyage en Orient, which expanded on his journey. Between 1844 and 1847, Nerval travelled to Belgium, the Netherlands, and London, writing about his experiences. At the same time, he was writing novellas and opera librettos, and translating the poems of his friend Heinrich Heine, publishing a selection of translations in 1848. His last years were troubled by severe emotional and financial problems, and he sadly took his own life in January 1855. In 1867, Gautier wrote a touching reminiscence of him, ‘La Vie de Gérard’, which was included in his Portraits et Souvenirs Littéraires of 1875.

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