Charles Baudelaire
Charles Pierre Baudelaire (UK: /ˈboʊdəlɛər/, US: /ˌboʊd(ə)ˈlɛər/;[1] French: [ʃaʁl(ə) bodlɛʁ] ; 9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet who also worked as an essayist, art critic and translator. His poems are described as exhibiting mastery of rhyme and rhythm, containing an exoticism inherited from Romantics, and are based on observations of real life.[2]
"Baudelaire" redirects here. For other uses, see Baudelaire (disambiguation).
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Pierre Baudelaire
9 April 1821
Paris, France
31 August 1867 (aged 46)
Paris, France
Poet, art critic, philosopher
1844–1866
His most famous work, a book of lyric poetry titled Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), expresses the changing nature of beauty in the rapidly industrialising Paris caused by Haussmann's renovation of Paris during the mid-19th century. Baudelaire's original style of prose-poetry influenced a generation of poets including Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud and Stéphane Mallarmé. He coined the term modernity (modernité) to designate the fleeting experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility of artistic expression to capture that experience.[3] Marshall Berman has credited Baudelaire as being the first Modernist.[4]