This English-language study from the early 1960s looks at Rimbaud's life and writing for general readers. It follows his childhood in the Ardennes, his sudden arrival in Paris, his poems and prose works, and his long years of travel and trade abroad. The author considers how he changed ideas of what poetry could do, and how his image as a rebel has been shaped by later writers and artists. It serves as a clear introduction to a writer whose short career still raises many questions.