Renée Vivien

Renée Vivien (born Pauline Mary Tarn; 11 June 1877 – 18 November 1909) was a British poet who wrote in the French language. A high-profile lesbian writer in Paris during the Belle Époque era, she is widely considered to be one of the first noteworthy lesbian poets of the twentieth century. Her work has recently received more attention due to a revival of interest in Sapphic verse. Many of her poems are autobiographical, pertaining mostly to Baudelarian themes of extreme romanticism and frequent despair. Apart from poetry, she wrote several works of prose, including L'Etre Double (inspired by Coleridge's Christabel), and an unfinished biography of Anne Boleyn, which was published posthumously. She has also been the subject of multiple biographies, most notably those by Jean-Paul Goujon, André Germain, and Yves-Gerard Le Dantec.