Skip to content

Portrait of Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire

(1821–1867) Essayist France

454 quotes in 1508 categories

Charles Baudelaire’s 454 verses linger in the shadows of urban life, blending melancholy with a sharp modernist eye. His poetry invites readers to confront beauty, decay, and the restless soul of the city.

Rate this collection: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ No ratings yet

Charles Baudelaire was an essayist from France, best known for Les fleurs du mal.

Quick Facts About Charles Baudelaire

Born: April 9, 1821
Died: August 31, 1867
Nationality: France
Profession: Essayist
Notable works: Les fleurs du mal
Known for: Les Fleurs du mal, Les Paradis artificiels, Le Spleen de Paris, The Albatross, Le Peintre de la vie moderne

About Charles Baudelaire

Charles-Pierre Baudelaire was a French poet, essayist, translator and art critic. His poems are described as exhibiting mastery of rhythm and rhyme, containing an exoticism inherited from the Romantics, and are based on observations of real life.

Biography source: Wikipedia

Awards & Honors

Concours général

Quotes by Charles Baudelaire

Sexuality is the lyricism of the masses.

Charles Baudelaire

Masses

Image

Everything for me becomes allegory

Charles Baudelaire

Allegory

Image

Discover day to day excitement.

Charles Baudelaire

Day to day

Image

Wine transforms moles into eagles.

Charles Baudelaire

Eagles

Image

A Dandy does nothing.

Charles Baudelaire

Dandy

Image

Evil comes up softly like a flower.

Charles Baudelaire

Come up

Image

I am the vampire at my own veins.

Charles Baudelaire

My own

Image

“Music pierces the sky.”

Charles Baudelaire

Music

Image

... cats, so strong and gentle, the pride of the household...

Charles Baudelaire

Cat

Image

Genius is simply childhood, rediscovered by an act of will.

Charles Baudelaire

Childhood

Image

“Race of Cain, ascend to heaven, And cast God down upon the earth!”

Charles Baudelaire

Cain

Image

The devil's finest trick is to persuade you that he does not exist.

Charles Baudelaire

Devil

Image

“Listen, my dear-- with soft step the night hears.”

Charles Baudelaire

Hears

Image

For me, Romanticism is the most recent and the most current expression of beauty.

Charles Baudelaire

Aesthetics

Image

It's the devil who pulls the strings that make us dance

Charles Baudelaire

Dance

Image

Beauty is the sole ambition, the exclusive goal of Taste.

Charles Baudelaire

Ambition

Image

Thanks be to God, Who gives us sufferingas sacred remedy for all our sins,that best and purest essence which preparesthe strong in…

Charles Baudelaire

Delight

Image

To the solemn graves, near a lonely cemetery, my heart like a muffled drum is beating funeral marches.

Charles Baudelaire

Cemetery

Image

It is the hour to be drunken! to escape being the martyred slaves of time, be ceaselessly drunk. On wine, on poetry,…

Charles Baudelaire

Drunk

Image

Alas! Man's vices, horrible as they are supposed to be, contain the positive proof of his taste for the infinite.

Charles Baudelaire

Alas

Image

Even as a child I felt in my heart two opposite emotions: the horror of life and the ecstasy of life.

Charles Baudelaire

Children

Image

Life has but one true charm: the charm of the game. But what if were indifferent to whether we win or lose?

Charles Baudelaire

Charm

Image

What strange phenomena we find in a great city, all we need do is stroll about with our eyes open. Life swarms…

Charles Baudelaire

Cities

Image

The true voyagers are those who go for the sake of traveling . . . and without quite knowing why, they say,…

Charles Baudelaire

Depart

Image

“Conceive a canvas for a lyrical or fairytale buffoonery, for a pantomime, and translate it into a serious novel. Drown everything in…

Charles Baudelaire

Great day

Image

I have to confess that I had gambled on my soul and lost it with heroic insouciance and lightness of touch. The…

Charles Baudelaire

Cards

Image

France at the dinner table in faraway places; but here, among ourselves, in the family, let us face the facts: France is…

Charles Baudelaire

Dinner table

Image

The artist is today and has been for many years, despite his absence of merit, simply a spoiled child. So many honors,…

Charles Baudelaire

Absence

Image

There are women who inspire you with the desire to conquer them and to take your pleasure of them; but this one…

Charles Baudelaire

Conquer

Image

Where are the dogs going? you people who pay so little attention ask. They are going about their business. And they are…

Charles Baudelaire

Animal

Image

Ah! Seigneur! donnez-moi la force et le courage De contempler mon coeur et mon corps sans de go u" t. Lord! give…

Charles Baudelaire

Body

Image

Certes, je sortirai quant a' moi satisfait D'un monde o u' l'action n'est pas la soeur du re" ve. Indeed, for my…

Charles Baudelaire

Action

Image

“It is this admirable, this immortal, instinctive sense of beauty that leads us to look upon the spectacle of this world as…

Charles Baudelaire

Beauty

Image

Dandyism is the last flicker of heroism in decadent ages… Dandyism is a setting sun; like the declining star, it is magnificent,…

Charles Baudelaire

Age

Image

“Be always drunken. Nothing else matters: that is the only question. If you would not feel the horrible burden of Time weighing…

Charles Baudelaire

Drunken

Image

My concern today is with the painting of manners of the present. The past is interesting not only by reason of the…

Charles Baudelaire

Art

Image

“Spleen Je suis comme le roi d'un pays pluvieux, Riche, mais impuissant, jeune et pourtant très vieux, Qui, de ses précepteurs méprisant…

Charles Baudelaire

Blood

Image

“With heart at rest I climbed the citadel's Steep height, and saw the city as from a tower, Hospital, brothel, prison, and…

Charles Baudelaire

Beauty

Image

All forms of beauty, like all possible phenomena, contain an element of the eternal and an element of the transitory - of…

Charles Baudelaire

Absolutes

Image

“This life is a hospital in which each patient is possessed by the desire to change beds. One wants to suffer in…

Charles Baudelaire

Desire to change

Image

Charles Baudelaire by topic

Art (43) Poetry (41) Men (41) Love (40) Beauty (40) Life (36) Nature (28) Artist (28) Time (25) Wine (20) Inspirational (19) Soul (18) Pleasure (17) Spirituality (16) Heart (16) Joy (13) Dreams (13) Way (12) Poet (12) Giving (12) Children (12) Beautiful (12) Should (11) Ifs (11) Humans (11)