Monsieur Charles Baudelaire

   I am STILL on that French hype but this will be in English. Last week, a friend introduced me to Charles Baudelaire's poetry (some of the ones in Les Fleurs du mal- literally 'The Flowers of Evil' en anglais) and I have become slightly obsessed. This obsession is not all my own doing; after Baudelaire was mentioned to me, his work came up TWICE in two separate mock interviews that I had over the weekend to prepare me for the big 'un and I think this is a sign from God that there is a huge chance that Monsieur B might be mentioned in my actual interview.

  Two poems that I particularly love at the moment are 'L'Albatros' and 'Au Lecteur'. It pains me to admit that I only recently found out what an albatross is. In L'Albatros, Baudelaire uses the metaphor of the huge seabird to describe how mankind can often take something beautiful and make it ugly with their criticisms and cruelty. The poem's final stanza compares poets to albatrosses and how they too are majestic but man can take this majesty away with insults and boos. Deep.

  Au Lecteur is Baudelaire listing all the common sins of humanity such as avarice, stubbornness and associating with the devil before concluding (again in the final stanza) that man's biggest sin is 'Ennui', which can be interpreted as either boredom or misery. According to Baudelaire, everyone suffers from this, even the poet himself.

  As lame as this might sound, examining these poems has made me even more excited for French at degree level as I will probably be doing Baudelaire in my first year wherever I go. Also, the fact that I liked and could understand the poems (after a while) has affirmed that studying French is definitely for me.

Francophile out.