This is the memoir of a friend writing about a friend. Théophile Gautier, himself a towering figure of French Romanticism, first encountered Charles Baudelaire in the bohemian circles of 1840s Paris. What unfolds is not distant biography but intimate recollection: Gautier remembers the dandy in his tailored coat, the sharp eyes that missed nothing, the poet who would scandalize a generation with Les Fleurs du Mal. The portrait captures Baudelaire at the threshold of notoriety, before the prosecutions and the poverty, when he was merely the brilliant young writer pushing the boundaries of French verse. Gautier writes with the authority of one who attended the same salons, suffered the same scandals, and understood the same obsessive devotion to beauty. This is less a comprehensive life than a glimpse behind the curtain, rendered by someone who was there. For anyone seeking to understand the making of modern poetry, or simply to hear a great writer remember a great friend, this remains an essential document.
