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The King in Yellow ▾
contents
  1. The Repairer of Reputations “Ne raillons pas les fous; leur folie dure plus longtemps que la nôtre. … Voila toute la différence.”
  2. The Mask Camilla You, sir, should unmask. Stranger Indeed? Cassilda Indeed it’s time. We all have laid aside disguise but you. Stranger I wear no mask. Camilla Terrified, aside to Cassilda. No mask? No mask! The King in Yellow, Act I, Scene 2
  3. In the Court of the Dragon “Oh, thou who burn’st in heart for those who burn In Hell, whose fires thyself shall feed in turn; How long be crying—‘Mercy on them.’ God! Why, who art thou to teach and He to learn?”
  4. The Yellow Sign “Let the red dawn surmise What we shall do, When this blue starlight dies And all is through.”
  5. The Demoiselle d’Ys “Mais je croy que je Suis descendu on puiz Ténébreux onquel disoit Heraclytus estre Vereté cachée.” “There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: “The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid.”
  6. The Prophets’ Paradise “If but the Vine and Love Abjuring Band Are in the Prophets’ Paradise to stand, Alack, I doubt the Prophets’ Paradise, Were empty as the hollow of one’s hand.”
  7. The Street of the Four Winds “Ferme tes yeux à demi, Croise tes bras sur ton sein, Et de ton cœur endormi Chasse à jamais tout dessein.” “Je chante la nature, Les étoiles du soir, les larmes du matin, Les couchers de soleil à l’horizon lointain, Le ciel qui parle au cœur d’existence future!”
  8. The Street of the First Shell “Be of Good Cheer, the Sullen Month will die, And a young Moon requite us by and by: Look how the Old one, meagre, bent, and wan With age and Fast, is fainting from the sky.”
  9. The Street of Our Lady of the Fields “Et tout les jours passés dans la tristesse Nous sont comptés comme des jours heureux!”
  10. Rue Barrée “For let Philosopher and Doctor preach Of what they will and what they will not—each Is but one link in an eternal chain That none can slip nor break nor overreach.” “Crimson nor yellow roses nor The savour of the mounting sea Are worth the perfume I adore That clings to thee. The languid-headed lilies tire, The changeless waters weary me; I ache with passionate desire Of thine and thee. There are but these things in the world— Thy mouth of fire, Thy breasts, thy hands, thy hair upcurled And my desire.”
English ▾

The King in Yellow

Robert W. Chambers

free · 72,234 words · 8 h 27 m audiobook, read by volunteers for LibriVox · first published 1895

text from Standard Ebooks

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Dedicated
to
My Brother

Along the shore the cloud waves break,
The twin suns sink behind the lake,
The shadows lengthen
In Carcosa.

Strange is the night where black stars rise,
And strange moons circle through the skies
But stranger still is
Lost Carcosa.

Songs that the Hyades shall sing,
Where flap the tatters of the King,
Must die unheard in
Dim Carcosa.

Song of my soul, my voice is dead;
Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed
Shall dry and die in
Lost Carcosa.

Cassilda’s Song in The King in Yellow, Act I, Scene 2

The Repairer of Reputations

“Ne raillons pas les fous; leur folie dure plus longtemps que la nôtre. … Voila toute la différence.”

restoring your place…

fetching the rest…

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thank you for reading

The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers. The text is in the US public domain, from the Standard Ebooks edition. Served from our own copy; read on their site for the full edition with images and typography.

Narrated by Peter Yearsley, Maria Celano, Betsie Bush, and Sandra in Wales, United Kingdom for LibriVox, also public domain.

First published in 1895.

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