art critic

Description

Here's a virtual movie of the great Charles Baudelaire reading his beautiful Poem come ode to Decadence "La Destruction" Charles Pierre Baudelaire (French: [ʃaʁl bodlɛʁ]; April 9, 1821 -- August 31, 1867) was a French poet who produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du mal (The Flowers of Evil), expresses the changing nature of beauty in modern, industrializing Paris during the 19th century. Baudelaire's highly original style of prose-poetry influenced a whole generation of poets including Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud and Stéphane Mallarmé among many others. He is credited with coining the term "modernity" (modernité) to designate the fleeting, ephemeral experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility art has to capture that experience. Kind Regards Jim Clark All rights are reserved on this video recording copyright Jim Clark 2013 La Destruction Sans cesse à mes côtés s'agite le Démon; II nage autour de moi comme un air impalpable; Je l'avale et le sens qui brûle mon poumon Et l'emplit d'un désir éternel et coupable. Parfois il prend, sachant mon grand amour de l'Art, La forme de la plus séduisante des femmes, Et, sous de spécieux prétextes de cafard, Accoutume ma lèvre à des philtres infâmes. II me conduit ainsi, loin du regard de Dieu, Haletant et brisé de fatigue, au milieu Des plaines de l'Ennui, profondes et désertes, Et jette dans mes yeux pleins de confusion Des vêtements souillés, des blessures ouvertes, Et l'appareil sanglant de la Destruction! Destruction Always the Demon fidgets here beside me And swims around, impalpable as air: I drink him, feel him burn the lungs inside me With endless evil longings and despair. Sometimes, knowing my love of Art, he uses Seductive forms of women: and has thus, With specious, hypocritical excuses, Accustomed me to philtres infamous. Leading me wayworn into wastes untrod Of boundless Boredom, out of sight of God, Using all baits to compass my abduction, Into my eyes, confused and full of woe, Soiled clothes and bleeding gashes he will throw And all the grim regalia of Destruction. — Roy Campbell, Poems of Baudelaire (New York: Pantheon Books, 1952)