“To review is to feed an appetite made for meat with frivilous bon-bons.”
Such was Baudelaire’s firm opinion of that art which first made him well-liked and respected in Paris. Both charletans and great men sought the stamp of his critique on their artistic and literary efforts. Only rascally musicians were immune to courting Charles’ views on their own merits; and this is simply because they were often too drunk to care–quite often at Charles’ apartments! Even the most negative review would be salted with some inestimable phrase divining the purveyor’s inherent genius; and this was more valuable than a symphony of unvaried praise from the army of newspaper reviewers.
It is best that I burn these unpublished drafts of reviews, for Baudelaire himself condemned the practice of reviewing–its evility was evident enough in the ease with which one is paid to opinionize. Forced by mounting court fees (and his mistress’ need for Egyptian eyeliner) to continue reviewing, and even rev up his output, Baudelaire poured his ire and despair (and hosannahs and hallelujahs) upon hack and fantastic craftsmen alike. All were subject to his inestimable eye and the unquiting tip of his quill. The family purse was tightened even more resolutely against his Vandal-like depredations following the public humiliation of being condemned in court–for his genius was stamped by the public prudes of the judiciary as ‘immoral.’ The sentiment was widely echoed, and the few who defended him did so in private, in personal correspondence they refused to have published. Because others kept their opinions to themselves, Baudelaire must cast his half-baked bread upon the waters!
Indeed, Baudelaire came to consider all the consequences of pecuniary opining a part of his personal catastrophe. If he was paid to think, how could he truly posses his own thoughts? He thought, in fact, that one day the world would realize that men are but paper figures, made more real by the reflected glory of the opinions of others than by what they have in reality made of themselves; and, reciprocally, they would value their own opinions of others more than those others, whatever their true merits might be; it was all, more or less, a transaction of commerce. And so, to the barbeque of souls, my little men! Puff, flame, and fade away…. Until even your afterimage is more imaginary than actual….
Young Franscois is no doubt abed by now, and his mother has washed the day’s fantasies from her face. Soon I will join her in the oblivion of sleep, her unconsious hand placed to my lips. So end my daily prayers–I who have no God, and am alone.
In the end, Baudelaire, too, prefered to be alone.
“He who would be great must of necessity be solitary. Only solitude reveals a man to himself, whatever riots of ugliness that mirror contains. When your mistress speaks, stuff your ears with cotton! Lash yourself to the mast of solitude should that siren Politics cry out from some dim shore. The attractive lassitude of an idea is more dangerous than a hundred years of sleep–ask Rip Van Winkle. Eject them all from the singular egg of your time-capsule: women, politics, ideas!”
And reviewing dabbled dangerously in all these things, and was reviled. He thought he might while away his time doodling translations of Edgar Poe; such money was, perhaps, more honest than the francs he forged with his reviewer’s invective. At least he could kick the dozing composers off his couch with a clear conscience!
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