Comte de Lautréamont

The Comte de Lautreamont was the pen name of Isidore Lucien Ducasse, born in 1846 in Montevideo, Uruguay, to French parents. Almost nothing is known of his inner life; he is one of literature's great enigmas. He was sent to France for his education, attending lycees in Tarbes and Pau before moving to Paris, where he lived in obscurity and apparent poverty. He published the first canto of The Songs of Maldoror in 1868 and the complete work in 1869, though the publisher, alarmed by its content, refused to distribute it. He also wrote Poesies, a pair of brief, cryptic prefaces that appear to repudiate everything Maldoror represents. He died in Paris in 1870 at the age of twenty-four, during the siege of the city in the Franco-Prussian War. The cause of his death is unknown. This author hub collects 1 work in the Canon Compass ranking, led by The Songs of Maldoror.