BAUDELAIRE AND BARTHES: THE PLEASURE OF THE PROSE POEM by STEVEN G. CRAWFORD (Under the Direction of Timothy Raser) ABSTRACT Both the nineteenth-century poet, Charles Baudelaire and the twentieth-century literary critic Roland Barthes considered the concept of “pleasure” in their writings. Baudelaire’s life was so bleak that pleasure and its counterpart “spleen” became natural objects of his artistic endeavors. The resulting works, especially Les Fleurs du mal, have evoked a mass of critical comment, but only limited amounts concerning his poèmes en prose. A small subset of his prose poems seem intent on subverting the usual dark side of his work in order to prove that indeed one can find the pleasure of the text in this poetry. Baudelaire fashions a working definition for the enigmatic “prose poem” and then uses his own concept of pleasure as a major ingredient in these prose poems. Roland Barthes wrote in 1973 Le Plaisir du texte where he discusses the less evident ways of experiencing the pleasure of literature. Here we have two “littérateurs” separated by two generations, yet both writing with an essential motivation in mind, the pleasure of the text. The discussion begins with some history of the prose poem, a genre difficult to define. Next is a short history of Baudelaire’s shift from rhymed verse towards the prose poem. The pleasure as defined by Baudelaire leads to the same concept as elaborated by Barthes. These theories help in commenting the six poèmes nocturnes as quintessential texts of pleasure. Finally, one particular prose poem is discussed as an unusual title having over the years been variously incorporated into music, theater, rhymed poetry, prose poetry, and painting. INDEX WORDS: Baudelaire, Barthes, poème en prose, prose poem, poèmes nocturnes, Invitation to the Dance, Invitation au voyage, Houssaye, Le Spleen de Paris, Les Petits Poèmes en prose, Les Fleurs du mal, Le Plaisir du texte, The Pleasure of the Text. BAUDELAIRE AND BARTHES: THE PLEASURE OF THE PROSE POEM by STEVEN G. CRAWFORD B.S., Georgia Tech, 1976 B.A., Georgia State, 1992 B.A., Georgia State, 1995 M.A., Georgia State, 2002 A dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY ATHENS, GEORGIA 2008 © 2008 Steven G. Crawford All Rights Reserved BAUDELAIRE AND BARTHES: THE PLEASURE OF THE PROSE POEM by STEVEN G. CRAWFORD Major Professor: Timothy Raser Committee: Catherine Jones Jonathan Krell Jan Pendergrass Electronic Version Approved: Maureen Grasso Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia December 2008 iv DEDICATION For Mom. I’m glad you can run and jump again. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A man came across a common dirt clod and asked: “What art thou?” “I am but a lump of clay, but fortune has placed me next to a rose and I have caught its fragrance. To my whole committee, I think this applies. Merci. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...........................................................................................................................v LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................................... vii CHAPTER 1 BACKGROUND OF THE PROSE POEM ...............................................................................1 2 THE PROSE POEM ACCORDING TO BAUDELAIRE ......................................................18 3 THE PLEASURE OF THE TEXT ACCORDING TO BAUDELAIRE .................................49 4 THE PLEASURE OF THE TEXT ACCORDING TO BARTHES.........................................83 5 PLEASURE & THE POÈMES NOCTURNES ......................................................................113 6 ONE TITLE, FIVE ARTS......................................................................................................152 REFERENCES...........................................................................................................................................170 APPENDIX................................................................................................................................................177 A Lettre programme ...................................................................................................................177 B Poèmes nocturnes ...................................................................................................................178 C Luxe, calme et volupté ...........................................................................................................183 vii LIST OF TABLES Page Table 1: PROSE POEM DEFINITIONS .....................................................................................................15 Table 2: PROSE POEM CLAIMANTS.......................................................................................................19 Table 3: DOUBLETS...................................................................................................................................43 Table 4: PLAISIR v. JOUISSANCE ...........................................................................................................90 Table 5: CHRONOLOGY OF BAUDELAIRE’S PROSE POEMS .........................................................116 1 CHAPTER 1 BACKGROUND OF THE PROSE POEM Studies of prose poems have understandably concentrated on formal elements: the name begs that sort of study. Form, however, was not uppermost in Charles Baudelaire’s (1821-1867) mind when, in 1861, with obvious pride he presented a group of prose poems to his friend and editor, Arsène Houssaye (1815-1896). This is significant because in his dedication of Les Fleurs du mal in 1857 to Théophile Gautier (1811-1872), he insisted on form. What he did point out later instead was the hedonic, or pleasurable aspect of these works. Such a clear-cut criterion is hard to ignore, but equally difficult to define. What, for instance, is the nature of the pleasure a text affords? A century after Baudelaire’s death, the celebrated critic Roland Barthes (1915-1980) wrote a book addressing just that question: Le Plaisir du text (1973). I intend, to use Barthes’s insights to attempt a study of Baudelaire’s prose poems concentrating on pleasure, whether that of the poet or that of the reader, whether pleasure described or pleasure produced. Baudelaire – Barthes; the prose poem – the pleasure of the text. Pleasure and reading poetry traditionally go together. This association springs from two reasons – one ordinary, the other philosophical. First, poetry is by its nature dense with suggestion; it intimates more than it spells out. Compared to a prose narrative, poetry leaves the reader with the responsibility to glean meaning and effect from the words. Its open-endedness sets aside a great space for interpretation. Second, the prose in the prose poem liberates the text from the rigor of rhyme and strict order. The pleasure of the prose poem is thus twofold; one, it takes advantage of inherent poetic effect and two, it benefits from narrative explanation without prolonging the text. Working with words, literature and especially poetry is an uplifting activity, an activity that has a large dose of pleasure as its byproduct. Among various literary genres – poetry, novels, plays, essays, short stories – one finds the evolution of the prose poem not as straightforward as with the more common genres. 2 Defining the term prose poem, has not been simple. The warning flags of definitional complication go up immediately with the oxymoronic name. As with expressions such as “forward- lateral” or “semi-boneless” – something does not fit. “Poems” and “prose” are by definition opposing genres. How can they be fused? As it turns out, forward-lateral describes a not infrequent ball-game manoeuvre, because all laterals do not go sideways. As it turns out also, prose poem is a legitimate if not widespread literary genre. If the history of defining the prose poem has not always been smooth-sailing and without dispute, its relationship to pleasure is nonetheless undeniable. Being first an art-form / literary work, and also enjoying poetic and prosaic values, the prose poem is intimately tied to the concept of pleasure. The writings of Baudelaire and Barthes can help us more clearly to see the pleasure inherent in the prose poem. Baudelaire often mentions the theme of pleasure in his works as a way to offset the misery of his life. As a young man, he searched largely for physical pleasures and for the rest of his relatively short time on earth (46 years) he paid a heavy price for his indiscretions. Nagging ailments drained his energy, sickened him and plunged him into weeklong despondencies. But even then, he constantly refers to pleasure in his writing, sometimes in the physical sense, but more often in the artistic sense. The composition of poetry with its attractive themes and lyrics is antithetical to the most common conception of Baudelaire, the famous “Rôdeur de Paris” (Parisian Prowler) who wrote many poems dealing with life’s somber side. Baudelaire became infamous with the 1857 publication of his collected verse, Les Fleurs du mal where the titles of many of the poems convey preoccupations with penury and death: “La Muse vénale,” “Le Vampire,” or “Sépulture” are some examples. The reason Baudelaire seemed obsessed with the theme of evil is not hard to discern; there is a clear connection between his personal life and the contents of his poetry. His letters reveal a man, a poet, struggling with