Preamble

Every week I will publish a poem or prose excerpt from another author, quoted in my novel The Shadow of the Fireflies.

Each of my chapters begins and closes with a poem or prose, either written by me, or from known and lesser-known texts of poets, novelists and talented writers.

I choose each time with great care, either the words and the sounds, or the excerpts, for their power and their meaning, or their symbolic in relation to the narration and the ambiance of my novel.

I do not give any key, I only offer ways to awaken your curiosity, your critical mind, and your senses. Only you can make the journey.

This week I wanted to start the series with the theme of freedom. Here is an excerpt from the poem “Freedom” ( “Liberté”) by Paul Éluard, which appears in an epigraph of one of the chapters of the Shadows of the Fireflies.

“Liberté” by Paul Éluard, Epigraph quoted in the novel The Shadow of the Fireflies

“On every puff of the auror
On the Sea on the boats
On the demented mountain
I write your name

On the moss of the clouds
On the sweats of the storm
On thick and bland rain
I write your name

On the sparkling forms
On the coloured bells
On the physical truth
I write your name

On the awaked paths
On the deployed roads
In the places that overflow
I write your name ”

Excerpt from the poem “Freedom” / “Liberté”, by Paul Éluard, quatrains 8 to 11. Original translation by Maïm Garnier.

READ Also

• The shadow of the fireflies, synopsis of the novel
• Write a good book: How to take the reader
• The Outrecuidance of The Giants, poem
• Aedh Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven, Poem By Yeats

Resources

• About the surrealist poet Paul Eluard, on Poetry Foundation.
• Paul Éluard, surrealist poet, official website (in french)
• Read the whole Freedom poem on Poem hunter.
• Surrealism movement, on The art Story.