Charles Baudelaire – “I received the wages of opium”
« These are the Notices , The Raven , The Angel of the Bizarre , Eleonora , and Event in Jerusalem .
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« These are the Notices , The Raven , The Angel of the Bizarre , Eleonora , and Event in Jerusalem .
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Charles Baudelaire (1821.1867)
Autograph letter signed to his publisher Auguste Poulet-Malassis.
One page in-8°. (Paris) 14 (December 1859).
Autograph address. Postmark and cancellations. / Pléiade Correspondence Volume I.
« I received the wages of opium… »
A very fine letter from Charles Baudelaire to his publisher regarding his translations of Edgar Allan Poe and his work on Opium.
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“ You don’t even allow yourself the banal satisfaction of reproaches . You are a perfectly generous friend, and absolutely, in every circumstance, however unpleasant, you can count on my devotion. But in your hasty departure, you forgot to send me back, fully signed by you, the receipt which implies both that I received payment for Opium and that I forwarded it to you. Now, I am dining at De Calonne’s tomorrow evening, and the first thing he will ask me is if I have this receipt. What is this new misfortune? We will have to discuss the advisability of bringing a lawsuit (on my behalf) against Michel Lévy. It concerns Notices , The Raven , The Angel of the Bizarre , Eleonora , and Event in Jerusalem . Tomorrow I will see Pincebourde. Answer soon. CB .”
In this letter, Baudelaire uses the expression "opium's wages" to refer to his text " Enchantments and Tortures of Opium, " which would appear a few weeks later in La Revue Contemporaine on January 15, 1860; a journal edited by Alphonse de Calonne. This text would later be incorporated into his work Artificial Paradises .
Baudelaire also mentions his legal troubles with the publisher Michel Lévy, who refused to allow the reprinting of his works on Edgar Allan Poe. Finally, the poet refers to René Pincebourde, head clerk at Malassis's.