My First Encounter with Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire is a name I had not heard of in my three and a half years of college. Baudelaire was a French poet and translator who wrote and lived in the 1800’s in Paris. I have just finished reading his book Paris Spleen. Throughout this book, Baudelaire complains about the city live and the crowds it produces. There are stories of people getting lost due to the anonymity of growing cities. The theme that is most recognizable is that of the passage of time. Baudelaire explains mortality and pushes people to go out and seize the moment and to look at how they are spending their lives.
Looking beyond the interesting stories Baudelaire tells, the reason this book impacted my life is the style that the chapters are in. Each chapter is three pages or shorter, with most of them being about a page in length. There is no linear connection between each chapter; each one seems to tell its own story, and all are potentially interchangeable with one another. Clearly Baudelaire did not haphazardly place the pieces of the book together. He laid each part next to each other with intention and precision. On first read, I did not think much about the way the book was written, but if you keep in mind that Baudelaire had a plan, there are many more layers to the story and one can analyze the book further and further.

I plan to keep this form of prose poetry in mind when I am approaching a writing assignment. I find it to be a challenge to keep the chapters short and concise, especially because in many cases, writing can drag on forever. Authors have so much to say and want to provide every detail they can, but maybe there is a benefit to keeping it short sometimes.

If you want to read an example of Baudelaire's work, here you go.