ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on Paul Claudel who, was born on 6 August 1868. His natal place was the village of Villeneuve-sur-Fre, a dot on the landscape of France in the dpartement of Aisne which reaches from the Ardennes to the valley of the Marne. In Mon Pays, Claudel set out to describe the village atmosphere and in so doing revealed his own profound sense of rooting in the history of France. When Claudel began to write poetry, Arthur Rimbaud's influence would soon show itself not only as a metaphysical urge but stylistically too in the audacious metaphors, striking shifts of linguistic register, and quasi-magical sonority almost beyond analysis that they have in common. Strange as it may seem, Claudel felt more at ease in China, his new job as a consular representative of France, which lasted from 1895 to 1900. For his reactions to Asian societies, a good deal more discriminating than those of most Western travellers at the time.
