Charles BAUDELAIRE juggles between Edgar Poe and his prose poems.

Charles Baudelaire (1821.1867)

Autograph letter signed to Louis Marcelin.

Two pages in-8° on letterhead from the Hôtel du Grand Miroir in Brussels

Autograph address. Missing on the 4th ^leaf without affecting the text.

Brussels. July 4, 1864.

Unpublished letter to the Pléiade correspondence.

“I was obliged to temporarily let go of the prose poems . »

Magnificent and important letter from the poet successively evoking his conferences on Edgar Allan Poe, the temporarily interrupted writing of his Little Prose Poems for the benefit of his pamphlet against Belgium.

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“Dear Sir, here is the manuscript promised for so long, and completely revised. If I kept it here for two months, it was because I intended to give readings on Edgar Poe , and I needed all my work in front of me. As we have agreed, you will cut where you want, and I recommend the tests again.

Now, I want to talk to you again about Mr. Jousset [Auguste Jousset, master of the Dieppe hotel who helped Baudelaire financially], whom I have charged with giving you these two packages, and to whom I owe money. It would please him and do me a great service to give him the approximate price of the three pieces. If it is a violation of the custom established for you, violate the custom for me , I will be able to thank you for it. We had calculated that the work of 1300 to 1500 lines should represent a sum of 325 to 375 ^francs , perhaps a little more.

I was forced to temporarily let go of the prose poems because I want to use my trip and I have started a work on Belgium . I have to go to Namur, Liège, Ghent, Bruges and Antwerp. Everywhere there are superb monuments and abominable people. – but towards the end of the month, I will return to the poems , and I will sort things out for you; that is to say, I will choose those which by their nature can be adapted to your Review , like the two which you have kept.

If you had anything to write to me, I will never be out of Brussels for more than three days. But in closing, I ask you again to do everything you can to relieve Mr. Jousset. Please accept, dear Sir, the assurance of my perfect feelings.

Charles Baudelaire. Hotel du Grand Miroir. Mountain Street. Brussels.

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. In April 1864, heavily in debt, Baudelaire left for Belgium to undertake a lecture tour, but his talents as an enlightened art critic met with little success. He then settled in Brussels and, in June 1864, initiated the writing of a fierce pamphlet against his short-lived host country. Undressed Belgium will remain unfinished. The first extracts were published posthumously in 1887, then in their entirety, in 1952, under the title Pauvre Belgique .

. Émile Planat, known as Louis Marcelin (1825-1887), founder in 1862 and director of La Vie parisienne , had included in his review several texts by Baudelaire: chapter prose: The Eyes of the Poor and The Projects (July 2 and August 13, 1864) and, by Jules Claretie, the sonnet On the beginnings of Amina Boschetti (October 1, 1864).

. Le Spleen de Paris , also known under the title Petits Poèmes en prose , was published posthumously, in 1869, on the initiative of Charles Asselineau and Théodore de Banville, in the fourth volume of the Complete Works of Baudelaire, by Michel Lévy. The fifty pieces making up this collection were written between 1857 and 1864.

. Provenance: Christie's Paris sale. April 30, 2014. Lot 74.