The Flowers of Evil

By Charles Baudelaire

Baudelaire was a slow and very attentive worker. However, he often was sidetracked by indolence, emotional distress and illness, and it was not until 1857 that he published Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), his first and most famous volume of poems. Some of these poems had already appeared in the Revue des deux mondes (Review of Two Worlds) in 1855, when they were published by Baudelaire's friend Auguste Poulet Malassis. Some of the poems had appeared as "fugitive verse" in various French magazines during the previous decade.
The principal themes of sex and death were considered scandalous for the period. He also touched on lesbianism, sacred and profane love, metamorphosis, melancholy, the corruption of the city, lost innocence, the oppressiveness of living, and wine. Notable in some poems is Baudelaire's use of imagery of the sense of smell and of fragrances, which is used to evoke feelings of nostalgia and past intimacy.
The book, however, quickly became a byword for unwholesomeness among mainstream critics of the day. Some critics called a few of the poems "masterpieces of passion, art and poetry," but other poems were deemed to merit no less than legal action to suppress them. J. Habas led the charge against Baudelaire, writing in Le Figaro: "Everything in it which is not hideous is incomprehensible, everything one understands is putrid." Baudelaire responded to the outcry in a prophetic letter to his mother:
    "You know that I have always considered that literature and the arts pursue an aim independent of morality. Beauty of conception and style is enough for me. But this book, whose title (Fleurs du mal) says everything, is clad, as you will see, in a cold and sinister beauty. It was created with rage and patience. Besides, the proof of its positive worth is in all the ill that they speak of it. The book enrages people. Moreover, since I was terrified myself of the horror that I should inspire, I cut out a third from the proofs. They deny me everything, the spirit of invention and even the knowledge of the French language. I don't care a rap about all these imbeciles, and I know that this book, with its virtues and its faults, will make its way in the memory of the lettered public, beside the best poems of V. Hugo, Th. Gautier and even Byron."
|Wikipedia|

• Language: English
• Publisher: Raanan Editeur
• Release date: Jun 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9782714905758

Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) was a French poet. Born in Paris, Baudelaire lost his father at a young age. Raised by his mother, he was sent to boarding school in Lyon and completed his education at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris, where he gained a reputation for frivolous spending and likely contracted several sexually transmitted diseases through his frequent contact with prostitutes. After journeying by sea to Calcutta, India at the behest of his stepfather, Baudelaire returned to Paris and began working on the lyric poems that would eventually become The Flowers of Evil (1857), his most famous work. Around this time, his family placed a hold on his inheritance, hoping to protect Baudelaire from his worst impulses. His mistress Jeanne Duval, a woman of mixed French and African ancestry, was rejected by the poet’s mother, likely leading to Baudelaire’s first known suicide attempt. During the Revolutions of 1848, Baudelaire worked as a journalist for a revolutionary newspaper, but soon abandoned his political interests to focus on his poetry and translations of the works of Thomas De Quincey and Edgar Allan Poe. As an arts critic, he promoted the works of Romantic painter Eugène Delacroix, composer Richard Wagner, poet Théophile Gautier, and painter Édouard Manet. Recognized for his pioneering philosophical and aesthetic views, Baudelaire has earned praise from such artists as Arthur Rimbaud, Stéphane Mallarmé, Marcel Proust, and T. S. Eliot. An embittered recorder of modern decay, Baudelaire was an essential force in revolutionizing poetry, shaping the outlook that would drive the next generation of artists away from Romanticism towards Symbolism, and beyond. Paris Spleen (1869), a posthumous collection of prose poems, is considered one of the nineteenth century’s greatest works of literature.

Book preview

��[abook_preview_excerpt.html]VAr�6���]h��[TJ)���r���+G,9$�04.�[�G��I^�`�\�J-�����ٻ��������G��6[ t��|x�^oL��GtX)�L�h���S��d�Hғ��y��>p��¤q���$�ɦ4s�^bi���G�(I�+�i���%�|�P��lo�kȄ���9�;8�A~݂����s"D�Il˔�~�-�P6G���'��V�?ܼ�D�}��J��艂d:���+q�8�D�S&�k�R} )��JJц
�Ky��X�D��u�����i�v���:�!�d�фd
B�c֐���:N���n<��в=qG~%~��)��u|^�޼���=H��x4�x��>�L�Am�( ~����C4]}9���)��;hP�@n&(���HNN�α�i1!Kp�%�QP�pQC�C�WEi��A�,J,R�^�� �h͜4G������۠3�-�� 3r۔R���Y��*��^@�b�#B�d3o�Ib��)�4����ܗ�xM�_R[�Q��(���%Y�R2R��ğ_b�k���=+sj()�7�uR��,)z�Ŕ����x�P��N|3�)�<皿j![�i�@��]��� ���6�u a�'q�_Nk��G�L�
����Մ�1��6*�F���&�)cs
�l��Z��g� ���cKM��fN9{�B�a��F��.v[i_G�ԉ��R9�r*��a���Z CL��j��LO)-���?DI֔�JC�6�3��۝H��� ��Rk�]�ێZ's�����ҭ�[�Z;���<�VR��֡�N�E�����d��̀N��~J�| �������&����B����̰�V[�F4S٭�룥�.�������yե#x�GkPw�2[g���C��$s���s8 �S�Lׂ��ʷ�������q�0���V�g��8��z���Ϝ�T�� � �d�SS躛qZgc^��dW�F��Y���J����j<Ͷg�� Km���2mA�P���ٞ�F��\�î�J���.]�l{�)X,^6�gl5���FYt|�M�����͝��&��ކ��ҭ�Ya=��.�n�ն��8����{[ ���-+r��OE���"�G���U�%�XV 0�f���]�� `d�6����~�ql��@�S����;v������>�M"͕0[�����5��:RUjSG����{��m��ֵ#uM}��*� ���);��h����OV;�"��H�8(䉾�}�늴�9s����N��2