Charles Baudelaire

The Albatross (L’Albatros) by Charles Baudelaire

A nicely non-literal interpretation that feels true to the spirit of Baudelaire. This is a Catalan film of a great French poem with an English translation in the soundtrack — specifically, the English of Geoffrey Wagner, Selected Poems of Charles Baudelaire (NY: Grove Press, 1974). That and several other translations may be read at fleursdumal.org. Here’s the original French:

L’Albatros

Souvent, pour s’amuser, les hommes d’équipage
Prennent des albatros, vastes oiseaux des mers,
Qui suivent, indolents compagnons de voyage,
Le navire glissant sur les gouffres amers.

À peine les ont-ils déposés sur les planches,
Que ces rois de l’azur, maladroits et honteux,
Laissent piteusement leurs grandes ailes blanches
Comme des avirons traîner à côté d’eux.

Ce voyageur ailé, comme il est gauche et veule!
Lui, naguère si beau, qu’il est comique et laid!
L’un agace son bec avec un brûle-gueule,
L’autre mime, en boitant, l’infirme qui volait!

Le Poète est semblable au prince des nuées
Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l’archer;
Exilé sur le sol au milieu des huées,
Ses ailes de géant l’empêchent de marcher.

The Carcass (Une Charogne) by Charles Baudelaire

A mesmerizing film and reading in French, with the English translation by Geoffrey Wagner provided in subtitles. I am guessing that the filmmaker, Koustoz, is Greek.

The End of the Day (La Fin de la Journée) by Charles Baudelaire

An experimental short to which the poem was added at the end — which to me makes for a more satisfying blend than most videopoems where words and images are tightly matched.

This is an experimental short movie made in a week (from the concept to the final release). This movie doesn’t want any interpretation. The poem was chosen after the filming. Finally was composed the music. The basic idea is to show some scenes before go to bed leaving an unhappy impression.

Spleen by Charles Baudelaire

Baudelaire’s famous poem from Flowers of Evil turned into a chanson by Léo Ferré, from a recital given in 1969. The Fench text and multiple English translations may be found here; I’ve appended the translation by Edna St. Vincent Millay, which may or may not be the best (I don’t know French), but is certainly the most song-like.

When the low, heavy sky weighs like the giant lid
Of a great pot upon the spirit crushed by care,
And from the whole horizon encircling us is shed
A day blacker than night, and thicker with despair;

When Earth becomes a dungeon, where the timid bat
Called Confidence, against the damp and slippery walls
Goes beating his blind wings, goes feebly bumping at
The rotted, moldy ceiling, and the plaster falls;

When, dark and dropping straight, the long lines of the rain
Like prison-bars outside the window cage us in;
And silently, about the caught and helpless brain,
We feel the spider walk, and test the web, and spin;

Then all the bells at once ring out in furious clang,
Bombarding heaven with howling, horrible to hear,
Like lost and wandering souls, that whine in shrill harangue
Their obstinate complaints to an unlistening ear.

— And a long line of hearses, with neither dirge nor drums,
Begins to cross my soul. Weeping, with steps that lag,
Hope walks in chains; and Anguish, after long wars, becomes
Tyrant at last, and plants on me his inky flag.