Renée Vivien (London, 1877 – Paris, 1909), born Pauline Mary Tarn, nicknamed “Sappho 1900,” was a British French-speaking poet of the Belle Époque Parnassian movement. She was the daughter of an American woman and a wealthy British man (John Tarn) who died in 1886, leaving her an inheritance that kept her out of poverty. She traveled extensively throughout the world; Japan, Mytilene, and Constantinople were among her favorite destinations. In 1899, she settled permanently in Paris and adopted a pen name: René Vivien, which she later feminized to Renée. Her first collection, Études et préludes [Studies and Preludes], was published in 1901. From 1901 to 1909, Renée’s intense literary and poetic output was punctuated by suicide attempts. Renée experienced Baudelaire’s spleen, took drugs, and drank more and more alcohol alone. Renée Vivien was the first French-speaking poet to openly express her physical love for women, and the second French-speaking woman, after Madame Dacier in the 17th century, to translate Sappho’s work into French. Her poetic collection Cendres e Poussières [Ashes and Dust] (1902), which includes the poem “Devant la Mort” (“Face to Death”), deals with feminist themes, especially independence and emancipation from men.