Poems by Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire is one of the greatest French poets. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil), was deemed scandalous at the time because of its themes of sex and death, lesbianism, corruption, wine, and the oppressiveness of living. Its powerful imagery and ravaging use of the senses had many name him an unequaled master; the effect on fellow artists was "immense, prodigious, unexpected, mingled with admiration and with some indefinable anxious fear", while the regime of the Second Empire had Baudelaire prosecuted and fined for his "insult to public decency". Baudelaire's style had a tremendous influence on French poetry and also on English writers; he was a pioneering translator, and created strong ties with the Anglo-Saxon literature.

We have selected for you 16 of his most striking poems in the most precise translation available: A Former LifeBeautyCorrespondencesDon Juan in HadesExotic PerfumeThe BalconyThe BeaconsThe Dance of DeathThe Death of LoversThe Evil MonkThe IrreparableThe Living FlameThe Sadness of the MoonThe Sick MuseThe TemptationThe Venal Muse