I was in secondary school. Our French teacher assigned us to learn a poem of our choosing by heart and to recite it in front of the class. I wasn’t really excited by the exercise, but I thought let’s find a poem that I really like. After a few searches, I stumble upon Tout homme a ses douleurs. Mais au yeux de ses frères from André Chenier and thought that’s the one I am going to recite! I practised it and was ready for D-Day.

The day I recited the poem, my French teacher did not react at first and seemed to have appreciated my recitation, which was later confirmed by the grade I got for it. Later the same day, some of my classmates came to me to say that it was really good. I didn’t really pay attention to that, but later realised that I might be good at that. Now, a few years later I rethink of all of this and realise that I like to recite texts and perhaps that I should learn to become better at it with the ultimate goal to recite poems of my own.

So almost several years later, I re-recited that poem and recorded it: