Arthur Rimbaud

About Arthur Rimbaud

Arthur Rimbaud, the French Symbolist poet, is ranked #948 in historical importance by MIT's Pantheon project, cementing his legacy primarily through his revolutionary poetic work written during his brief adolescence. Despite dying at only 36 in 1891, his influence on modern literature, particularly the prose poem and Surrealism, is profound, often cited as a bridge between 19th-century Romanticism and 20th-century literary innovation.

In 2025, Rimbaud received 377K annualized Wikipedia views, suggesting that his historical weight translates to a near-perfect "1x" modern attention gap, meaning the internet attention roughly matches his cultural standing relative to other highly-ranked figures. This contrasts sharply with other influential writers like Jack London (#952 importance), who captured 654K views. However, he commands significantly more attention than figures ranked much higher in importance, such as Karl Benz (#193 importance), who only garnered 53K views in the same year, indicating a relative overperformance in the digital sphere for a writer of his era.

The data shows a slight positive trend for Rimbaud, with his 2025 view count increasing by +2.6% year-over-year, and Q1 to Q3 momentum holding steady at +1%, suggesting sustained, if modest, contemporary interest in his challenging and iconoclastic literary output.