Cartas do Visionário e Mais Nove Poemas

About Lettres du Voyant:

Les « Lettres du voyant » sont le nom sous lequel l'histoire littéraire a pris l'habitude de désigner deux lettres écrites par Arthur Rimbaud en mai 1871, dans lesquelles il développe une critique radicale de la poésie occidentale depuis l'antiquité et défend l'émergence d'une nouvelle raison poétique.
La première (et la plus courte) de ces deux lettres fut écrite le 13 mai 1871 et adressée à Georges Izambard, l'ancien professeur de Rimbaud au collège de Charleville. Le fac-similé de cette lettre fut publié pour la première fois, à l'initiative de son destinataire, en octobre 1928 dans la Revue européenne. Elle contient le poème Le Cœur supplicié.
La seconde lettre dite « du voyant » fut adressée le 15 mai 1871 au poète Paul Demeny, à qui Rimbaud avait confié quelques mois plus tôt une copie de son œuvre poétique antérieure, en vue d'une publication. Son contenu fut révélé au public par Paterne Berrichon en octobre 1912 dans La Nouvelle Revue française. Elle contient les poèmes Chant de guerre parisien, Mes petites amoureuses et Accroupissements. C'est là qu'apparait également la formule, restée fameuse, « Je est un autre » ("Car Je est un autre. Si le cuivre s'éveille clairon, il n'y a rien de sa faute.")

( http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lettres_du_voyant )


About Voyelles:

Voyelles, est un sonnet en alexandrins d'Arthur Rimbaud écrit à Paris dans les premiers mois de 1872^[1] et publié pour la première fois dans la revue Lutèce, le 5 octobre 1883. C'est un des plus célèbres poèmes de Rimbaud.

Historique

Il existe deux versions manuscrites anciennes du sonnet, une de la main de Rimbaud donnée à Émile Blémont et conservée au Musée Rimbaud de Charleville-Mézières et une autre recopiée de la main de Verlaine. Leur différence tient presque essentiellement dans la ponctuation^[2]. C'est Verlaine qui publie pour la première fois le sonnet des Voyelles, dans le numéro du 5-12 octobre 1883 de la revue Lutèce.

Interprétations

De très nombreux auteurs ont développé des théories diverses sur les sources et la signification de ce poème qui est sans doute le plus commenté de tous ceux de Rimbaud. Partant de l'influence des abécédaires enfantins sous forme de cubes de couleur illustrés qu'à peut-être manipulé Rimbaud dans son enfance, passant par les visions qui s'imposent au voyant de l'Alchimie du Verbe et créent un nouveau symbolisme, ou allant jusqu'à des lectures ésotériques et occultistes alambiquées.
Jean-Jacques Lefrère fait remarquer que l'adjectif définissant telle couleur ne contient jamais la voyelle qui est censée l'évoquer. L'ordre de présentation des voyelle, A... E... I... U... O... inverse les deux dernières pour terminer sur O, l'oméga respectant dans le poème la progression de l'alpha à l'oméga.

( http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyelles_(sonnet) )


About Les Poètes de Sept Ans:

Les Poètes de sept ans est un poème en alexandrins d'Arthur Rimbaud daté par lui du 26 mai 1871^[1] et figurant dans la lettre qu'il adresse à Paul Demeny le 10 juin^[2].

Présentation et contexte

Le poème comporte 64 vers alexandrins divisé en 6 paragraphes de longueur inégale : 4 - 12 - 14 - 13 - 11 et 10 vers. Il se présente comme une sorte d'étude biographique, écrite à l'imparfait et à la troisième personne. Le manuscrit du poème se trouve dans la lettre que Rimbaud envoie le 10 juin à Paul Demeny, poète et éditeur parisien. Dans cette lettre, le poète demande à Demeny de « brûler tous les vers qu['il] fu[t] assez sot pour [lui] donner » précédemment. De cette manière Rimbaud voulait-il ouvrir une nouvelle période de sa vie de poète, optant pour un nouveau style, plus personnel, incisif et radical ?. Suivant cette option, Les Poètes de sept ans serait un poème de transition important dans son œuvre. La période de sa rédaction correspond aux semaines qui suivent la fin de la Commune de Paris, il suit les deux Lettres du voyant des 13 et 15 mai et précède de peu le manifeste poétique qu'est le sonnet Voyelles et le chef-d'œuvre qu'est Le Bateau ivre.

Mise en musique

Le poème a été mis en chanson par Léo Ferré en 1964 dans son album Verlaine et Rimbaud.

( http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Po%C3%A8tes_de_sept_ans )


About Les Remembrances du Vieillard Idiot:

Les Remembrances du vieillard idiot est un poème d’Arthur Rimbaud, intégré dans l’Album zutique, recueil constitué en 1871 et 1872 par plusieurs poètes, notamment Verlaine, Rimbaud, Léon Valade, Jean Richepin et quelques autres moins connus.
Les textes ainsi réunis (lire sur wikisource) sont pour la plupart des parodies de poètes contemporains, parfois intentionnellement tournés en ridicule, parfois imités avec talent et adresse.
Les Remembrances du vieillard idiot appartiennent à la première catégorie. Le poème, qui comporte 40 alexandrins souvent désarticulés de façon caricaturale, est fictivement signé du nom de François Coppée, suivi des initiales, A.R., de son véritable auteur.
Dans la forme à la fois prosaïque et fortement rythmée de François Coppée, le poème évoque les souvenirs (c’est le sens du nom archaïque remembrances) érotiques de l’enfance du « vieillard idiot » : avec une certaine crudité lexicale, il énumère quelques aspects des premiers émois sexuels d’un jeune villageois, à qui on peut, sans doute imprudemment, être tenté de trouver quelques points communs avec le jeune Rimbaud.

( http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Remembrances_du_vieillard_idiot_(Rimbaud) )


More Info (& Related): http://www.ocomuneiro.com/angelonovo/cartasvisionario.html - http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Bateau_ivre - http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma_Boh%C3%A8me

Iluminações - Uma Cerveja no Inferno (Illuminations - Une Saison en Enfer)

About Illuminations:

Illuminations is an uncompleted suite of prose poems by the French poet Arthur Rimbaud, first published partially in La Vogue, a Paris literary review, in May–June 1886. The texts were reprinted in book form in October 1886 by Les publications de La Vogue under the title Les Illuminations proposed by the poet Paul Verlaine, Rimbaud's former lover. In his preface, Verlaine explained that the title was based on the English word illuminations, in the sense of coloured plates, and a sub-title that Rimbaud had already given the work. Verlaine dated its composition between 1873 and 1875.^[1]
Rimbaud wrote the majority of poems comprising Illuminations during his stay in the UK with Verlaine at his side. The texts follow Rimbaud's peregrinations in 1873 from Reading where he had hoped to find steady work, to Charleville and Stuttgart in 1875.^[2]

Content, style, and themes

The text of Illuminations is generally agreed to consist of forty-two poems.^[3] In large part due to the circumstances surrounding the publication of the poems of Illuminations, there is no consensus as to the order in which Rimbaud intended the poems to appear. Nevertheless, certain conventions stand among the many editions of the text. For example, the various publications of Illuminations almost invariably begin with "Après Le Deluge".^[4] Despite this ostensible controversy, a large number of scholars have declared the order of Illuminations to be irrelevant. Perhaps translator Bertrand Mathieu best distilled the major reasons for this contention: "No single poem really depends on the others or counts on them to achieve its own perfections. Each is intrinsic (we don't know the exact sequence and we don't need to know it)."^[5]
The collection consists overwhelmingly of prose poems, which make of up forty of the forty-two poems. The two exceptions are "Marine" and "Mouvement", which are vers libre.^[6] These two poems are remarkable not only as exceptions within Illuminations itself, but as two of the first free verse poems written in the French language.^[7] Within the genres of prose poetry and vers libre, the poems of Illuminations bear many stylistic distinctions. Though influenced by the earlier prose poems of Charles Baudelaire, the prose poems differ starkly from Baudelaire's in that they lack prosaic elements such as linear storytelling and transitions. Because of these differences, Rimbaud's prose poems are denser and more poetic than Baudelaire's.^[8] These differences also contribute to the surrealist quality of Illuminations. Though Rimbaud predated surrealism, he is said to have written in a surrealistic style due to the hallucinatory, dreamlike aspect of many of the poems.^[9] Another aspect of Rimbaud's style, which also contributes to the visionary quality of the poems, is his use of words for their evocative quality rather than their literal meaning.^[10] In addition to these stylistic qualities, Illuminations is rich with sensory imagery.^[11] A puzzling aspect of Rimbaud's style is his use of foreign words within the French text of Illuminations. For example, the poem "Being Beauteous" has an English title, even in the original French. Rimbaud biographer Graham Robb suggests that the presence of words from languages like English and German are due in part to Rimbaud's travels. Apparently, as he learned languages, Rimbaud kept lists of words he wished to use in poems.^[12]
Because the poems of Illuminations are so diverse and self-contained, they cover a wide range of themes. One theme evident throughout the text is protest. This theme permeates the first poem, "Après Le Deluge", and continues throughout many of the poems in the work. In Illuminations, Rimbaud seems to protest almost everything the society in which he lives has to offer.^[13] Another major theme in Illuminations is the city, most evident in the poem "Ville". This theme features prominently in at least six of the poems of Illuminations, and is mentioned in many others. In these poems, Rimbaud expresses a simultaneous attraction and horror towards the modern city.^[14] Other major themes include anguish, ecstasy, metamorphosis, nature, walking and travel,^[15] creation and destruction.^[13]

Writing Les Illuminations


No one knows exactly when Rimbaud’s Les Illuminations was written. It can be ascertained, from examination of the poems, that they were not all written at the same time.^[16] It is known that the poems were written in many different locations, such as Paris, London, and Belgium. Rimbaud was also involved in various relationships while he was composing these writings. He lived with Paul Verlaine and his small family in Paris from September 1871 to July 1872, with a short stint in Charleville in March, April, and May.^[17] The two travelled from Belgium to London in August 1872. It was this trip to London that provided Rimbaud with the backdrop of a British city for many of his poems. The two spent the following year together in London, with Rimbaud visiting Charleville twice. During these months with Verlaine, Rimbaud grew and matured.^[18] The majority of the poems included in Les Illuminations were written in 1873, the happiest year of Rimbaud’s and Verlaine’s friendship.^[16]
When his relationship with Verlaine ended, Rimbaud went to live with Germain Nouveau in London in 1874, revising old poems and writing new ones later included in Les Illuminations. Rimbaud’s relationship with Nouveau remains mysterious because of the lack of information about their life together. Although little is known about this year in his life, it is certain that in February 1875 Rimbaud had given the manuscript sub-titled Les Illuminations to Verlaine.^[17]

Publication and critical response

Two versions of Illuminations were published in 1886, each version arranging texts in orders different to the previous edition.^[19] Earning his living as a trader in the Horn of Africa at this time,^[20] Rimbaud was never personally involved in the publication of either edition.^[21] He did not leave Africa until 1891 when he was sick to the point of death.^[17]

Publication history

On Verlaine's release from prison in February 1875, Rimbaud entrusted him with the manuscript known today as Illuminations with the mission to mail it to Germain Nouveau in Brussels. Intent on an extended tour of Europe,^[22] Rimbaud had asked Nouveau to secure a Belgian publisher in his absence.^[23] Soon after sending the manuscript to Nouveau, however, Verlaine was seized with remorse: Why had he not searched for a publisher himself? At Verlaine's request, Nouveau returned the manuscript two years later at a meeting in London in 1877.^[24] With a view to publishing the complete works, Verlaine inserted into the original manuscript poems written in 1872 along with texts Rimbaud had given to Nouveau. Several months later, Verlaine loaned the manuscripts to the composer Charles de Sivry (the half-brother of Verlaine's estranged wife, Mathilde Mauté) with the aim of their being set to music. Learning that her half-brother was in possession of Rimbaud's texts, Mathilde expressly forbade de Sivry to return the manuscripts to Verlaine or to anyone else likely to publish them. It was not until nine years later, in 1886, after Mathilde had divorced Verlaine and remarried, that she rescinded her publication ban. Still seeking revenge over the destruction of her marriage by Rimbaud, Mathilde prohibited Verlaine from ever regaining possession of his former lover's manuscripts.^[25]
De Sivry confided Rimbaud's texts to Louis Cardonel with the proviso that Verlaine was not to be involved in their publication. Cardonel approached Gustave Kahn, editor of the literary magazine La Vogue, who agreed to publish the work along with a sonnet by Rimbaud in 1886.^[26] At Kahn's request, art critic and journalist Felix Fénéon arranged the order of the texts by respecting pages that linked the end of a text and the start of another. Inserted at random were verse poems and a few isolated pages. Despite these preparations, only 35 out of a total of 42 texts were published in La Vogue between May 13 and June 21 due to an obscure dispute between those associated with the project.^[27] Later in the year, Kahn commissioned Verlaine to write a preface to the still untitled suite of poems for their publication in book form by Les publications de La Vogue in October 1886.^[19] Verlaine gave them their collective name Illuminations or "coloured plates", a title that Rimbaud had earlier proposed as a sub-title.^[28] The publishers' dispute ultimately resulted in a dividing up of the manuscripts and their dispersal.^[26] Rimbaud died without the benefit of knowing that his manuscripts had not only been published but were lauded and studied, having finally gained the recognition he had strived for.^[29]
In 1895, an edition claiming to be the "complete works" of Rimbaud, with a new preface by Verlaine, was published by Vanier éditions. Since then, there have been many publications of Rimbaud’s Illuminations, both in the original French and in translation.

Critical opinion

Rimbaud was the subject of an entire chapter in Paul Verlaine’s Les Poètes Maudits, showing the older poet's devotion to and belief in his young lover. He also wrote an introduction to the Illuminations in the 1891 publication, arguing that despite the years past in which no one heard from Rimbaud his works were still relevant and valuable.^[29]
Albert Camus, famed philosopher and author, hailed Rimbaud as "the poet of revolt, and the greatest".^[30]

Translations

Translation history

Arthur Rimbaud's Illuminations, initially written and published in the late 19th century, has been translated numerous times since its original composition. Translators (and often poets in their own right) have undertaken this task repeatedly throughout the last century, producing many distinct, original, and innovative versions of the French collection of prose poetry. Some of the most popular translations include those by Louise Varèse (1946/revised 1957), Paul Schmidt (1976), Nick Osmond (1993),^[31] Dennis J Carlile (2001), Martin Sorrell (2001), Wyatt Mason (2002), and the collaborative team composed of Jeremy Harding & John Sturrock (2004).^[32] All of these translators have worked to introduce Illuminations to a new generation, each having their own angle in their presentation of the work. Variations in cross-language (French to English) translation, differences in the ordering of texts, discrepancies in the inclusion/exclusion of certain "proems," and incorporation of forwards/introductions written by the specific translators all account for the ability of these works to offer new meaning to Illuminations.

Analysis of translations

The translation of Illuminations from French to English proves a daunting task for the translator. They may either choose to remain as close to the original as possible, often creating ambiguity due to discontinuity; to indulge in their creative liberties as a translator and elaborate/explain in the translation; or to find a medium amongst these two methodologies. Various translators have interpreted their roles in the presentation of Illuminations to the public in a different light, thus producing multiple versions of the collection of prose poems.
In the Wyatt Mason translation (2002), much of the Introduction to his version of Illuminations focuses on the biographical details of Rimbaud's life.^[33] The intrigue surrounding the poet's scandalous character incites a desire in readers to better understand what inspired Rimbaud, what made him tick. Mason's methodology of focusing so extensively on Rimbaud's life leads readers to conclude his translation functions as a tool of conveying what emotions and feelings Rimbaud was experiencing at the time of his writing.
In the Nick Osmond translation (1993), a thorough read of the Introduction again provides background information and proves useful in examining his purpose for translating.^[31] Focusing extensively on the lengthy and uncertain publication process surrounding the original "proems," Osmond attempts to organize the works into distinct groups, establishing some definitive order. Because no one truly knows how Rimbaud intended them to be arranged in a collective work, this decision is left up to the translator. As Osmond suggests, different ordering gives rise to different meaning in the poems. Thus, ordering provides another mechanism through which translators have the ability to formulate the message they wish to convey in their particular piece of literature.
In the Jeremy Harding & John Sturrock translation (2004), the reader is the focus of the work.^[34] Parallel text has been adopted to make the reading more manageable for the literary audience, and although this is known to "cramp" a translator's style, Harding & Sturrock chose to do so for the sake of their readers.^[34] In addition, this translation takes much liberty in the sounds established through cross-language barriers. Instead of focusing on keeping the syllable count consistent with the French when translated to English, the translators chose to use words sounding more pleasant to the 'English ear'.^[34] Also interesting, this translation includes only half of the forty-two prose poems known to make up Illuminations, proving further liberties have been taken in its formation.^[32]
Standing the test of time and ensuring the work's longevity in the literary world, Rimbaud's Illuminations has been translated repeatedly and introduced to new generations of individuals. Each translator, like each poet, writes with a purpose. The various versions of Illuminations in publication will continue to draw on different aspects of the original and evoke different responses from readers.

Influence and legacy

Professor at the University of Exeter, Martin Sorrell argues that Rimbaud was and remains influential in not "only literary and artistic" circles but in political spheres as well, having inspired anti-rationalist revolutions in America, Italy, Russia, and Germany.^[35] Sorrell praises Rimbaud as a poet whose "reputation stands very high today", pointing out his influence on musician Bob Dylan and writers Octavio Paz and Christopher Hampton (cf. his 1967 play on Rimbaud and Verlaine, Total Eclipse, later made into the movie of the same name).^[35]
Symbolism: The Paris literary review La Vogue was the first to publish Illuminations.^[36] Knowing little about Rimbaud, the editor Gustave Kahn mistakenly introduced him as “the late Arthur Rimbaud", thereby facilitating his adoption by the Symbolists as a legendary poetic figure.^[11] Rimbaud's style and syntactical choices pointed to Symbolist tendencies, including the use of abstract plural nouns.^[37]
Dadaism: In its rejection of the sensible and logical, Dadaism embraced Rimbaud’s ability to write in abstractions and impossibilities. This supports Rimbaud’s role in revolutions as the Dadaist movement was a protest movement against capitalist ideals believed to be at the root of all war.^[38]
Surrealists: Rimbaud’s poetry was "Surrealist before the word was invented or became a movement".^[39] Although Surrealists often disowned all art before their time, Rimbaud is one of the few predecessors the group acknowledged. Like Dadaists, Surrealists do not accept rationality as they believe it to be the cause of unhappiness and injustice.^[40] Rimbaud’s passion to change life is echoed in the Surrealist's call to change reality through (only currently) impossibilities. A main difference, however, is that Rimbaud did not “abandon himself passively” to automatic writing like many Surrealist writers.^[41]
Rimbaud's life and works have inspired many musicians. Vocal works (operas and short songs), symphonies, trios, piano pieces, and rock songs exist, taking as their subjects Illuminations and Rimbaud's earlier work, A Season in Hell.
British composer Benjamin Britten (1913–1976) set a selection of Illuminations to music.^[42] Les Illuminations for tenor or soprano and strings, Op. 18 uses nine prose poems: "Fanfare", "Villes", "Phrase", "Antique", "Royauté", "Marine", "Interlude", "Being Beauteous", "Parade", and "Départ". The Decca Record Co. (London) released a historic recording featuring Britten conducting the work, with Britten's lifelong companion Peter Pears singing the tenor part (Britten had dedicated his setting of the song "Being Beauteous" to Pears).
American composer Harold Blumenfeld (b. 1923) devoted an entire decade immersing himself in Rimbaud,^[43] producing four compositions, namely: La Face Cendreé, Ange de Flamme et de la Glace, Illuminations, and Carnet de damné. Three of these works are based on prose poems from Illuminations. La Face Cendreé is a work for soprano, cello, and piano; it takes the prose poems "Aube" and "Being Beauteous" as subject. Ange de Flamme et de la Glace, a work for medium voice and chamber ensemble, is based on the prose poem "Barbare". Blumenfeld's two-part orchestral work, Illuminations, is based on five prose poems from Rimbaud's work: "Mystique", "Diluvial", "Après le déluge", "À Une Raison", and "Soir Historique".
Other composers inspired by Rimbaud are Bulgarian composer Henri Lazarof (b. 1932) and German composers Georg Katzer (b. 1935) and Andreas Staffel (b. 1965). Henri Lazarof's Fifth Symphony uses two French texts, one by Lazarof himself and the other by Rimbaud.^[44] Georg Katzer's Trio for Oboe, Cello, and Piano uses an essay by Rimbaud.^[45] Andreas Staffel's work Illumination is for piano, based on Rimbaud's Illuminations.^[46]
Hans Krása's 3 Lieder After Poems by Rimbaud,^[47] was composed in the confines of the Terezín ghetto (Theresienstadt) in Czechoslovakia. The Bohemian composer Hans Krása (1899–1944) was a pupil of celebrated composers Zemlinsky and Roussel. These "Rimbaud Songs" are set for baritone, clarinet, viola, and cello. On the last page of Krása's original manuscript was a rehearsal schedule in the concentration camp: four were held in the Magdburg Barracks and one in the Dresden Barracks.
Rock musicians Bob Dylan,^[48] Jim Morrison, and Patti Smith have expressed their appreciation for Rimbaud (the latter calling Dylan the reincarnation of the French poet).^[49] The essay "Rimbaud and Patti Smith: Style as Social Deviance" by Carrie Jaurès Noland features a critical analysis of Rimbaud's influence on Patti Smith's work.^[50] Bob Dylan's song "You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go" makes a direct reference to Rimbaud and his companion Paul Verlaine. Wallace Fowlie's book, Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet, attempts to draw parallels between the lives and personalities of Rimbaud and Jim Morrison, demonstrating how the latter found Rimbaud a constant source of inspiration. Fowlie argues that some of Morrison's "lost writings" (a volume of poetry published posthumously, entitled Wilderness) bear strong resemblance to pieces from Illuminations.^[51]


Extracts Taken From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminations_(poems)

More Info: http://librivox.org/illuminations-by-arthur-rimbaud/ - http://www.amazon.com/Illuminations-Arthur-Rimbaud/dp/0393341828


About A Season in Hell:

Une Saison en Enfer (A Season in Hell) is an extended poem written and published in 1873 (see 1873 in poetry) by French writer Arthur Rimbaud. It is the only work that was published by Rimbaud himself. The book had a considerable influence on later artists and poets, for example the Surrealists.

Background

According to some sources, Rimbaud's first stay in London in late 1872 and early '73 converted him from an imbiber of absinthe to a smoker of opium. According to biographer, Graham Robb, this began "as an attempt to explain why some of his [Rimbaud's] poems are so hard to understand, especially when sober".^[1] The poem was by Rimbaud himself dated April through August 1873, but these are dates of completion. He finished the work in a farmhouse in Roche, Ardennes.
There is a marked contrast between the hallucinogenic quality of Une Saison's second chapter, "Mauvais Sang" ("Bad Blood") and even the most hashish-influenced of the immediately preceding verses he wrote in Paris. Its third chapter, "Nuit de l'Enfer" (literally "Night of Hell"), then exhibits a refinement of sensibility. The two sections of chapter four apply this sensibility in professional and personal confession; and then, slowly but surely, at age 19, he begins to think clearly about his real future; the introductory chapter being a product of this later phase.

Format

The poem is loosely divided into nine parts, some of which are much shorter than others. They differ markedly in tone and narrative comprehensibility, with some, such as "Bad Blood," 'being much more obviously influenced by Rimbaud's drug use than others, some argue.

• Introduction (sometimes titled with its first line, "Once, if my memory serves me well...") (French: Jadis, si je me souviens bien...) - outlines the narrator's damnation and introduces the story as "pages from the diary of a Damned soul."

• Bad Blood ("Mauvais sang") - describes the narrator's Gaulish ancestry and its supposed effect on his morality and happiness.

• Night in hell ("Nuit en enfer") - highlights the moment of the narrator's death and entry into hell.

• Delirium 1: The Foolish Virgin - The Infernal Spouse ("Délires I: Vierge folle - L'Époux infernal") - the most linear in its narrative, this section consists of the story of a man, enslaved to his "infernal bridegroom" who deceived him and lured his love with false promises. He treats quite transparently his relation with Verlaine.

• Delirium 2: Alchemy of Words ("Délires II: Alchimie du verbe") - the narrator then steps in and explains his own false hopes and broken dreams. This section is broken up much more clearly than many other sections, and contains many sections in verse.

• The Impossible ("L'impossible") - this section is vague, but one critical response sees it as the description of an attempt on the part of the speaker to escape from hell.

• Lightning ("L'éclair") - one critic states that this very short section is also unclear, although its tone is resigned and fatalistic and it seems to indicate a surrender on the part of the narrator.

• Morning ("Matin") - this short section serves as a conclusion, where the narrator claims to have "finished my account of my hell," and "can no longer even talk."

• Farewell ("Adieu") - this section seems to allude to a change of seasons, from Autumn to Spring. The narrator seems to have been made more confident and stronger through his journey through hell, claiming he is "now able to possess the truth within one body and one soul."

Meaning and philosophy

For Wallace Fowlie writing in the introduction to his 1966 University of Chicago (pub) translation, "the ultimate lesson" of this "complex"(p4) and "troublesome"(p5) text states that "poetry is one way by which life may be changed and renewed. Poetry is one possible stage in a life process. Within the limits of man's fate, the poet's language is able to express his existence although it is not able to create it."(p5)
Academic critics have arrived at many varied and often entirely incompatible conclusions as to what meaning and philosophy may or may not be contained in the text, and will continue to do so.
Among them, Henry Miller was important in introducing Rimbaud to America in the sixties. He once attempted an English translation of the book and wrote an extended essay on Rimbaud and A Season in Hell titled The Time of the Assassins. It was published by James Laughlin's New Directions, the first American publisher of Rimbaud's Illuminations.
Wallace in 1966, p5 of above quoted work, "...(a season in Hell) testif(ies) to a modern revolt, and the kind of liberation which follows revolt".

References in popular culture

The 1970 film about Rimbaud (Terence Stamp) and Verlaine (Jean-Claude Brialy) usually known as Una Stagione all'inferno has the French title Une saison en enfer.^[2]
The book is referenced numerous times in the 1983 movie Eddie and the Cruisers and its sequel, and lends its name to the fictitious band's second album. The first movie gives a very brief account of Rimbaud's life as an artist (albeit without any mention of the affair with Paul Verlaine or other pertinent historical details).
The book was featured in one Law & Order episode where it plays a vital part in solving the murder crime.
The art world curator and fundraiser Bette Porter, a fictional character on The L Word, references a piece of artwork titled "A Season in Hell," supposedly one of the most important pieces of the last half-century, during a board meeting with her museum in Season 2 of the series.
The French poet-composer Léo Ferré set to music, sang and told the whole poem in the album Une saison en enfer (1991).
The book was referenced in the Felt song, "Sunlight Bathed the Golden Glow" from their 1984 album, The Strange Idols Pattern and Other Short Stories, with the lyric "you're reading from A Season in Hell but you don't know what it's about".
Spanish band Fangoria titled their 1999 album "Una Temporada en el Infierno" (Spanish for Une Saison En Enfer).
In Pollock (film) (2000), Lee Krasner (played by Marcia Gay Harden) quotes Season In Hell when she first receives a visit from Pollock (played by Ed Harris) in her studio:

• To whom shall I hire myself out?
• What beast must I adore?
• What holy image is attacked?
• What hearts must I break?
• What lie must I maintain? In what blood tread?"

Peruvian Rock Band La Liga del Sueño used part of the "Bad Blood" section as lyrics in the eponymous song "Mala Sangre" featured in their album Mundo Cachina.
The experimental metal band The Ocean have a song named "Une Saison en Enfer" on the 2006 album Aeolian.
The extreme gothic metal band Theatres des Vampires have a song named "Une Saison en Enfer" on the 2001 album Bloody Lunatic Asylum. They also have one sentence from "Jadis, si je me souviens bien . . ." in the booklet of their first album Vampyrìsme, Nècrophilie, Nècrosadisme, Nècrophagie and in a song of their second album The Vampire Chronicles.
Moby's 2008 album Last Night includes the track "Hyenas" in which a female voice reads the first several lines of "A Season in Hell" in the original French.
In the game Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World, an antagonist, named Alice, has attacks that are all named after famous literary works. (e.g. The Red and the Black is a historical French novel, A Season in Hell is a French poem etc.)
A Season in Hell is quoted in the novels The Ghosts of Watt O'Hugh^[3] by Steven S. Drachman and As Simple As Snow^[4] by Gregory Galloway. Watt O'Hugh is a 2011 novel that features J.P. Morgan as a principal character. In the novel, Morgan reads Une Saison on Enfer in his study, moments before being visited by the ghost of his first wife. The novel was named one of the best of 2011 by Kirkus Reviews.^[5]
The 1983 musical film Eddie and the Cruisers referenced Rimbaud's inner turmoil in a story about a musician that was trying to complete the perfect album and disappeared when the record company rejected it. Eddie Wilson, the lead character in the story, is introduced to Rimbaud by a young man who joins his band. In an argument among the band about a song that Eddie doesn't think sounds quite right and can't exactly explain why, the young man quotes the English translation of Rimbaud's long form poem, demonstrating an example of a Cesure,^[6] or meaningful silence, which puts into words the explanation that Eddie cannot. The album that is rejected by the record label, which Eddie was inspired to make after being impressed by Rimbaud's work, is called "A Season In Hell." After a fight with a record label executive, Eddie tears out of the studio angrily, ends up driving his car over a bridge guardrail and is presumed to be dead. This leads to rumors that he faked his death, effectively shunning his art as Rimbaud did.
In the comic series Spawn issues 117-120 are entitled "A Season in Hell."

Translations

During one of her lengthy hospitalizations in Switzerland, Zelda Fitzgerald translated Une Saison en Enfer. Earlier Zelda had learned French on her own, by buying a French dictionary and painstakingly reading Raymond Radiguet's Le Bal du Comte d'Orgel.


Extracts Taken From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Season_in_Hell

More Info: http://www.amazon.com/Season-Hell-New-Directions-Paperback/dp/0811201856 - http://www.assirio.pt/livros/ficha/-b-iluminacoes-b-uma-cerveja-no-inferno?id=11236880

Cover of the first edition October 1873

Cantos de Maldoror seguidos de Poesias (Les Chants de Maldoror & Poésies)

About The Songs of Maldoror by Comte de Lautréamont:

Les Chants de Maldoror (The Songs of Maldoror) is a poetic novel (or a long prose poem) consisting of six cantos. It was written between 1868 and 1869 by the Comte de Lautréamont, the pseudonym of Isidore Lucien Ducasse. Many of the surrealists (Salvador Dalí, André Breton, Antonin Artaud, Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray, Max Ernst, etc.) during the early 20th century cited the novel as a major inspiration to their own works.

Theme and composition

Les Chants de Maldoror is a poem of six cantos which are subdivided into 60 verses of different length (I/14, II/16, III/5, IV/8, V/7, VI/10). The verses were originally not numbered, but rather separated by lines. The final eight stanzas of the last canto form a small novel, and were marked with Roman numerals. Each canto closes with a line to indicate its end.
It is difficult to summarize the work because it does not have specific plot in the traditional sense, and the narrative style is non-linear and often surrealistic. The work concerns the misanthropic character of Maldoror, a figure of absolute evil who is opposed to God and humanity, and has renounced conventional morality and decency. The iconoclastic imagery and tone is typically violent and macabre, and ostensibly nihilistic. Much of the imagery was borrowed from the popular gothic literature of the period, in particular Lord Byron's Manfred, Charles Robert Maturin's Melmoth the Wanderer and Goethe's Faust. Of these figures, the latter two are particularly significant in their description of a negative and Satanic anti-hero who is in hostile opposition to God. The last eight stanzas of the final canto are in a way a small novel dealing with the seduction and murder of a youth.
At the beginning and end of the cantos, the text often refers to the work itself. Lautréamont also references himself in the capacity of the author of the work. Isidore is recognized as the "Montevidean". In order to enable the reader to realise that he is embarking on a "dangerous philosophical journey", Lautréamont uses stylistic means of identification with the reader, a procedure which author Baudelaire already used in his introduction of Les Fleurs du Mal. He also comments on the work, providing instructions for reading. The first sentence contains a "warning" to the reader:

God grant that the reader, emboldened and having become at present as fierce as what he is reading, find, without loss of bearings, his way, his wild and treacherous passage through the desolate swamps of these sombre, poison-soaked pages; for, unless he should bring to his reading a rigorous logic and a sustained mental effort at least as strong as his distrust, the lethal fumes of this book shall dissolve his soul as water does sugar.

Influence

Les Chants de Maldoror is considered to have been a major influence upon French Symbolism, Dada, and Surrealism. Several editions of the book have included lithographs by the French symbolist painter Odilon Redon. Surrealist painter Salvador Dalí also illustrated one edition of the book. The Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani used to carry a copy around in Montparnasse and quote from it. The outsider artist Unica Zürn was also influenced by it in writing her The Man of Jasmine. William T. Vollmann mentioned it as the work that most influenced his writing.


Extracts Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Chants_de_Maldoror

More: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12005 - http://www.maldoror.org/chants/index.html - http://www.amazon.com/Maldoror-Chants-Comte-Lautreamont/dp/0811200825#_

O Spleen de Paris - pequenos poemas em prosa (Le Spleen de Paris)

About Paris Spleen by Baudelaire:

Le Spleen de Paris, also known as Paris Spleen or Petits Poèmes en prose, is a collection of 51 short prose poems by Charles Baudelaire. The collection was published posthumously in 1869 (see 1869) by Baudelaire's sister, and is associated with the modernist literary movement.
Baudelaire mentions he had read Aloysius Bertrand's Gaspard de la nuit (considered the first example of prose poetry) at least twenty times before starting this work. Though inspired by Bertrand, Baudelaire's prose poems were based on Parisian contemporary life instead of the medieval background which Bertrand employed. He told about his work: "These are the flowers of evil again, but with more freedom, much more detail, and much more mockery." Indeed, many of the themes and even titles from Baudelaire's earlier collection Les Fleurs du mal are revisited in this work.
These poems have no particular order, have no beginning and no end and they can be read like thoughts or short stories in a stream of consciousness style. The point of the poems is "to capture the beauty of life in the modern city," using what Jean-Paul Sartre has labeled as being his existential outlook on his surroundings.
Written twenty years after the fratricidal June Days that ended the ideal or "brotherly" revolution of 1848, Baudelaire makes no attempts at trying to reform society he has grown up in but realizes the horrors of the progressing modernizing of Paris. In poems such as "The Eyes of the Poor" where he writes (after witnessing an impoverished family looking in on a new cafe): "Not only was I moved by that family of eyes, but I felt a little ashamed of our glasses and decanters, larger than our thirst...", showing his acknowledgment of the poor conditions in his city, and also showing the feelings of despair that accompanies the acknowledgement.
The title of the work refers not to the abdominal organ (the spleen) but rather to the second, more literary meaning of the word, "melancholy with no apparent cause, characterised by a disgust with everything".^[1]

Table of Contents (from Raymond N. Mackenzie's 2008 translation)

To Arsène Houssaye
1. The Foreigner
2. The Old Woman's Despair
3. The Artist's Confession
4. A Joker
5. The Double Room
6. To Each His Chimera
7. The Fool and Venus
8. The Dog and the Vial
9. The Bad Glazier
10. At One in the Morning
11. The Wild Woman and the Little Mistress
12. Crowds
13. The Widows
14. The Old Mountebank
15. Cake
16. The Clock
17. A Hemisphere in Her Hair
18. Invitation to the Voyage
19. The Toy of the Poor
20. The Fairies' Gifts
21. The Temptations: Or, Eros, Plutus, and Fame
22. Evening Twilight
23. Solitude
24. Plans
25. Beautiful Dorothy
26. The Eyes of the Poor
27. A Heroic Death
28. Counterfeit Money
29. The Generous Gambler
30. The Rope
31. Vocations
32. The Thyrsus
33. Get Yourself Drunk
34. Already!
35. Windows
36. The Desire to Paint
37. The Favors of the Moon
38. Which is the Real One?
39. A Thoroughbred
40. The Mirror
41. The Port
42. Portraits of Mistresses
43. The Gallant Marksman
44. The Soup and the Clouds
45. The Firing Range and the Graveyard
46. Loss of a Halo
47. Mademoiselle Bistouri
48. Any Where Out of the World
49. Let's Beat Up the Poor!
50. Good Dogs

A Few Notable Works in "Le Spleen de Paris"

In “Let us beat up the poor,” Baudelaire makes up a parable about economic and social equality: no one is entitled to it; it belongs to those who can win it and keep it. And he taunts the social reformer: “What do you think of that, Proudhon?” (Hill, 36.)
"At One in the Morning" is like a diary entry, a rundown of the day's events. In it, Baudelaire recognizes that he is part of a society full of hypocrites. His individual self becomes "blurred...by a hypocrisy and perverseness which progressively undermine the difference between the self and others." This is at least partly what Baudelaire meant by "a modern and more abstract life."^[2]
"The Thyrsus" is a piece addressed to composer Franz Liszt. The ancient Greek thyrsus had connotations of "unleashed sexuality and violence, of the profound power of the irrational." Baudelaire believed the thyrsus to be an acceptable object of representation for Liszt's music.
In "The Bad Windowpane Maker" Baudelaire speaks of a "kind of energy that springs from ennui and reverie" that manifests itself in a particularly unexpected way in the most inactive dreamers. Doctors and moralists alike are at a loss to explain where such mad energy so suddenly comes from to these lazy people, why they suddenly feel the need to perform such absurd and dangerous deeds. (Hill, 56.)
The prefatory letter Baudelaire wrote to Arsene Houssaye, the editor of La Presse, was not necessarily intended to be included in the publication. When Baudelaire drew up his table of contents for the projected book form, he did not include the letter. It is possible, then, that the letter only appeared in La Presse as a means of flattery to ensure that Houssaye would publish the poems. (Mackenzie, xiii) Nevertheless, it allows us to understand Baudelaire's thinking about the genre of prose poetry:

Who among us has not dreamed, in his ambitious days, of the miracle of a poetic prose, musical without rhythm or rhyme, supple enough and jarring enough to be adapted to the soul's lyrical movements, the undulations of reverie, to the twists and turns that consciousness takes?

Major Themes in Le Spleen de Paris

Pleasure

Le Spleen de Paris explores the idea of pleasure as a vehicle for expressing emotion. Many of the poems refer to sex or sin explicitly (i.e. "Double Bedroom," "A Hemisphere in a Head of Hair", "Temptations"); others use subtle language and imagery to evoke sensuality (i.e. "the Artist’s Confiteor"). In both cases, the diction is undeniably sexual; for example, in "Double Bedroom," “Muslin rains abundantly over the windows and around the bed in a snowy cascade. Within this bed is ensconced the Idol, queen of dreams.”^[3] Baudelaire’s obsession with pleasure reflects his love for scandal and wickedness, as well as his philosophy that by seeking pleasure, man taps into his authentic “evil” self.^[4]

Sobriety and Intoxication

Many of Baudelaire’s prose poems openly advocate drinking and intoxication, such as "Be Drunk." Intoxication (or any equal pleasure such as creative work, sex, virtue, etc.) creates a euphoria and timelessness that allows you to transcend the limitations of time and truly live "in the moment." In "Be Drunk," the speaker commands the reader to engage in something intoxicating: "You must be drunk always... Time crushes your shoulders and bends you earthward, you must be drunk without respite."^[5] Sobriety, in contrast, forces you to address the harsh realities of the world around you. However, this interpretation has recently been challenged by some critics, who claim that Baudelaire was actually being ironic in his advocacy for drunkenness. Maria Scott, a literary scholar, claims that Baudelaire believed "artificial toxication was... far inferior to 'successive work' and the 'regular exercise of will,' that artificial stimulants... actually amplify time."^[6] Thus, it is debatable whether intoxication refers to literal drunkenness as an escape or if symbolizes the pleasure found in writing and expressing oneself.

The Artist/Poet

In Le Spleen de Paris, the concept of artist and poet intermingle. Baudelaire saw poetry as a form of art, and thus in many of the prose poems the artist is a substitute for a traditional poet or speaker. In "the Desire to Paint," the artist attempts to depict his beautiful muse with images, just as the poet attempts to express his emotions with language. The relationship between the artist and poet reflects the need to evoke a particular feeling or idea, and this thread is carried through almost every single poem in the text. Ultimately, the artist and the poet become one, since they share the same purpose - to describe beauty. In this sense, the work itself (and every individual poem within) is beautiful, a "work of art" due to its innovative, interesting form. Thus, the poem, according to Baudelaire, is as much an "aesthetic experience" as it is a literary one.^[7]

Women

Women are both admired and ridiculed in Le Spleen de Paris. Some poems, such as "the Desire to Paint," reflect female power and sexuality in a somewhat positive manner. However, a larger portion of the poems in Baudelaire's work debase women as evil, gaudy, and cold. Many are represented as prostitutes, and according to scholars, "the courtesan would seem to be a virtual incarnation, for Baudelaire, of all that is artificial and misleading."^[8] In "the Rope," the speaker's apprentice hangs himself, and his mother comes to collect the rope. The speaker is shocked to discover that she did so not to "preserve them as horrible and precious relics," but to sell them for a morbid profit.^[9] Baudelaire rejects the concept of maternal love and replaces it with a cold economic reality. Still, women are inherently sexual, and in some regards, Baudelaire admires their sensual beauty (connects back to themes of intoxication, pleasure).

Mortality and the Passage of Time

Many of Baudelaire's prose poems are dominated by the concept of time, usually negatively. The speaker in Le Spleen de Paris fears the passage of time and his/her own mortality. As a result, intoxication, women, pleasure, and writing are all forms of escape from this unavoidable hell. "Be Drunk" and "Already!" exemplify Baudelaire's infatuation with the idea of time. In "Already!" the speaker is incapable of matching the infiniteness and simplicity of nature, and at the end, comes face to face with his own death: "I felt pulled down deathwards; which is why, when companions said, 'At last!' I could only cry, 'Already!"^[10] Also, this theme supports Baudelaire's admiration of art and poetry because although man cannot defeat time and death, a work of art can. Art, poetry, life, and death are inextricably linked within Baudelaire's poems, and perhaps reflect a personal obsession with mortality.

The City

For Baudelaire, the setting of most poems within Le Spleen de Paris is the Parisian metropolis, specifically the poorer areas within the city. Notable poems within Le Spleen de Paris whose urban setting is important include “Crowds” and “The Old Mountebank.” Within his writing about city life, Baudelaire seems to stress the relationship between individual and society, frequently placing the speaker in a reflective role looking out at the city. It is also important to note that Baudelaire’s Paris is not one of nice shops and beautiful streets. Instead, Baudelaire focuses on dirty, poverty-stricken areas of Paris with social problems rather than the Paris of the upper class.

Poverty/Class

In connection with the theme of the Parisian metropolis, Baudelaire focuses heavily on the theme of poverty and social class within Le Spleen de Paris. Important poems from the collection which embody these themes include “The Toy of the Poor,” “The Eyes of the Poor,” “Counterfeit Money,” and “Let’s Beat Up the Poor.” In these poems Baudelaire introduces slightly differing views of the urban poor. In “The Toy of the Poor” Baudelaire heavily stresses the need for equality between social classes in Paris. In comparison, “Counterfeit Money” and “Let’s Beat Up the Poor” seem to use a sarcastic tone to instill empathy in the reader for those people in poverty. In Michael Hamburger’s introduction to his translation, Twenty Prose Poems of Baudelaire, the scholar notes a highly sympathetic view of the poor in Le Spleen de Paris. Baudelaire seems to relate to the poor and becomes an advocate for them in his poetry.

Religion/Good vs. Evil

Many poems in Le Spleen de Paris incorporate a central theme of religion or the relationship between good and evil in human nature. “Cake,” which centers on a moral battle addressing the question of whether humans are inherently good or evil stands out as an especially important poem within the collection. “Loss of a Halo” also incorporates similar themes, literally discussing the role of angels as well as the relationship between mankind and religious ideology, questioning the goodness of Christian ideals. Along these lines, Baudelaire repeatedly addresses the theme of sin within his poetry as well as questioning how the hierarchy of class could affect the hierarchy of goodness, implying that those of higher social class tend not to be morally superior to those of lower classes. Many critics of Baudelaire address the prominent role of religion in the poet’s life and how that might have affected his writing. Some suspect that since Baudelaire internalized Christian practices, he thought himself capable of accurately portraying God in his writing. Yet by representing God’s message within his poetry, Baudelaire placed himself in a position of patriarchal authority, similar to that of the God depicted in Christianity.

Poet/Reader Relationship

The following passage is taken from the preface to the 2008 Mackenzie translation of Le Spleen de Paris, entitled “To Arsène Houssaye”

My dear friend, I send you here a little work of which no one could say that it has neither head nor tail, because, on the contrary, everything in it is both head and tail, alternately and reciprocally. Please consider what fine advantages this combination offers to all of us, to you, to me, and to the reader. We can cut whatever we like—me, my reverie, you, the manuscript, and the reader, his reading; for I don’t tie the impatient reader up in the endless thread of a superfluous plot. Pull out one of the vertebrae, and the two halves of this tortuous fantasy will rejoin themselves painlessly. Chop it up into numerous fragments, and you’ll find that each one can live on its own. In the hopes that some of these stumps will be lively enough to please and amuse you, I dedicate the entire serpent to you. (Mackenzie 3)

While writing Le Spleen de Paris, Baudelaire made very conscious decisions regarding his relationship with his readers. As seen in the preface to the collection, addressed to his publisher, Arsène Houssaye, Baudelaire attempted to write a text that was very accessible to a reader while pulling the most appealing aspects of both prose and poetry and combining them into the revolutionary genre of prose poetry. For Baudelaire, the accessibility of the text and ability for a reader to set down the book and pick it up much later was crucial, especially considering his implied opinions of his readers. Baudelaire’s tone throughout the preface, “The Dog and the Vial” as well as other poems throughout Le Spleen de Paris seem to illustrate Baudelaire’s opinions of superiority over his readers. In “The Dog and the Vial,” a man offers his dog a vial of fancy perfume to smell and the dog reacts in horror, instead wishing to sniff more seemingly unappealing smells, specifically excrement. The poem concludes with the frustration of the speaker with his dog, expressed as the speaker states: “In this respect you, unworthy companion of my sad life, resemble the public, to whom one must never present the delicate scents that only exasperate them, but instead give them only dung, chosen with care” (Mackenzie 14). One can extrapolate this poem to apply more figuratively to the larger themes of the poet-reader relationship, in which Baudelaire deprecates his readers, viewing them as unintelligent and incapable of appreciating his work.

Style

Le Spleen de Paris represents a definitive break from traditional poetic forms. The text is composed of "prose poems," which span the continuum between "prosaic" and "poetic" works. The new, unconventional form of poetry was characteristic of the modernist movement occurring throughout Europe (and particularly in Paris) at the time.^[11] In the preface to Le Spleen de Paris, Baudelaire describes that modernity requires a new language, "a miracle of a poetic prose, musical without rhythm or rhyme, supple enough and striking enough to suit lyrical movements of the soul, undulations of reverie, the flip-flops of consciousness," and in this sense, Le Spleen de Paris gives life to modern language.^[12] Baudelaire's prose poetry tends to be more poetic in comparison to later works such as Ponge's Le parti pris des choses, but each poem varies. For an example of a more poetic poem, see "Evening Twilight"; for a prosaic example, see "The Bad Glazier."

Translations

It is rather beneficial to find proper translations to Baudelaire's poetry. However, each translation provides a different facet of the poem. Thus, it is important to acknowledge the differences between both the translators and their translations. If a reader is searching for translations in bulk, a collection of translations from a variety of translators can be found in "Fleurs du mal." Translations from William Aggeler, Roy Campbell, Robert Lowell, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Lewis Piaget Shank provide different interpretations and styles of the same poem.
A suggested translator, however, is Edna St. Vincent Millay. Her translations are separate works themselves as they provide distinct insights into her own personal interpretations of both Baudelaire's poems and Baudelaire himself. She speaks about her own personal beliefs about his work in regard to his mental state and personal life in the preface of her collection: "Baudelaire's 'flowers of evil' are flowers of doubt, flowers of grief... forced on the sterile bought of the mind's unblossomy decay." Furthermore she describes Baudelaire as "tortured" and "idealistic." It is important to note that Millay's perspective is amplified in her translations; however, her translations are interesting and thought provoking nonetheless. Millay's translations are recommended in comparing translations, debating translations, and defending translations, as it has such a strong, clear opinion.

Publication history, influences, and critical reception

Baudelaire’s Le Spleen de Paris is unique in that it was published posthumously by his sister in 1869, two years after Baudelaire died. In fact, it was not until his waning years, plagued by physical ailments and the contraction of syphilis that he created a table of contents for the book. Baudelaire spent years 1857-1867 working on his book of poems that chronicled daily life in the city of Paris. These poems aimed at capturing the times in which they were written, from the brutally repressed upheavals of 1848 (after which the government censored literature more than ever), the 1851 coup d’état of Louis Bonaparte and generally Paris of the 1850s, demolished and renovated by Napoleon III’s prefect, Baron Haussman. In displaying the social antagonisms of the age, Baudelaire drew influence from many great artists of the time. In fact, an active critical essayist himself, his critical reviews of other poets “elucidate the recesses of the mind that created Les Fleurs du Mal and Le Spleen de Paris.”
Influence: While there is much speculation regarding direct influence and inspiration in the creation of Le Spleen de Paris, the following colleagues seem to have clearly influenced the book of small poems:
Edgar Allan Poe: “Indeed, Poe illustrates his claim with several examples which seem to summarize with uncanny precision the temperament of Baudelaire himself (Poe 273-4). The affinity between the two writers in this regard seems beyond dispute…Moreover, ‘Le Démon de la perversité is less a tale than a prose poem, and both its subject-matter and its movement from general considerations to specific examples leading to an unexpected conclusion may have influenced Baudelaire in his creation of Le Spleen de Paris.”
Aloysius Betrand’s “Gaspard de la nuit”: Baudelaire himself is quoted as citing this work as an inspiration for Paris Spleen
Gustave Flaubert: Magazine article “No ideas but in Crowds: Baudelaire’s Paris Spleen” cites similarities between the writers in that like Baudelaire, Flaubert held the same motives and intentions in that he too wanted “ to write the moral history of the men of my generation--or, more accurately, the history of their feelings."
Critical Reception:
The way in which the poem was received certainly lends to understanding the climate in which Baudelaire created Le Spleen de Paris, in that “It appears to be almost a diary entry, an explicit rundown of the day’s events; those events seem to be precisely the kind that Charles Baudelaire would have experienced in the hectic and hypocritical world of the literary marketplace of his day.”
Notable Critical Reception: In order to truly understand how Le Spleen de Paris was received, one must first be acquainted with Baudelaire’s earlier works. The repressions and upheavals of 1848 resulted in massive censorship of literature, which did not bode well for Baudelaire’s perhaps most famous work, Les Fleurs du Mal. Society was so shocked by the satanic references and sexual perversion in the book that at the time it was a critical and popular failure. This put the anticipated reception of Le Spleen de Paris at a disadvantage. Like “Flowers of Evil,” it wasn’t until much later that Paris Spleen was fully appreciated for what it was, a masterpiece that “brought the style of the prose poem to the broader republics of the people.” That being said, just four years after Arthur Rimbaud used Baudelaire’s work as a foundation for his poems, as he considered Baudelaire a great poet and pioneer of prose.
Appearance in Media: A 2006 film "Spleen," written by Eric Bomba-Ire, borrowed its title from Baudelaire's book of prose poems. Baudelaire expressed a particular feeling that he called Spleen which is a mixture of melancholy, rage, eros, and resignation, which ties in well with the movie's darkly woven tale of love, betrayal and passion.^[13]

Extracts Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Spleen_de_Paris

More: http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Petits_Po%C3%A8mes_en_prose - http://archive.org/details/petitspomesenp00baud