The Arcades Project - Operi

drawings, in distilling the bitter or heady flavor of the wine of Life.?? Baudelaire,
L'A, . t romantique (Paris), p. 114." [J6a,1]
The figure of the "modem" and that of "allegory" must he brought into relation
with each other: "Woe unto him who seeks in antiquity anything other than pure
art, logic, and general method! By plunging too deeply into the past, . . . he
renounces the ... privileges provided by circumstances; for almost all our originality
comes from the stamp that time imprints upon our feelings :'
Baudelaire, L'Art romantique (paris), p. 72 ("Le Peintre de la vie modeme")." But
the privilege of which Baudelaire speaks also comes into force, in a mediated way,
vis-it-vis antiquity: the stamp of time that imprints itself on antiquity presses out
of it the allegorical configuration. [J6a,2]
Concerning Spleen et ideal," these reflections from the Guys essay: "Modernity is
the transitory, the fugitive, the contingent; it is one half of art, the other half being
the eternal and immutable . . . . If any particular modernity is to be worthy of
becoming antiquity, one must extract from it the mysterious beauty that human
life involuntarily gives it. It is to this task that Monsieur G. particularly addresses
himself." Baudelaire, L iirt romantique (Paris), p. 70. In another place (p. 74), he
speaks of this legendary translation of external life. ",18 [J6a,3]
Motifs of the poems in the theoretical prose. "Le Coucher du solei! romantique"
: '"Dandyism is a sunset; like the declining daystar, it is glorious.
without heat and full of melancholy. But alas, the rising tide of democracy . ..
is daily overwhelming these last representatives of human pride" (L iir-t romantique,
p. 95).-"r.Le SoleH" : At a time when others are asleep, Monsieur
G. is bending over his tahle, darting onto a sheet of paper the same glance that a
moment ago he was directing toward external things , skirmishing with his pencil,
his pen, his hrush, splashing his glass of water up to the ceiling, wiping his pen on
his shirt, in a ferment of violent activity, as though afraid that the images might
escape him, cantankerous though alone, elbowing himself on" (L'Art romantique,
p. 67),'19 [J6a,4]
Nouveaute: "The child sees everything in a state of newness; he is always drunk.
N odling more resembles what we call inspiration than the delight with which a
child absorbs form and color . ... It is by this deep and joyful curiosity that we
may explain the fixed and animally ecstatic gaze of a child confronted widl
something new:' Baudelaire, L'Art romantique (Paris), p. 62 ("Le Peintre de la vie
modeme"). Perhaps this explains the dark saying in "l}Oeuvre et la vie d'Eugene
Delacroix": "For it is true to say that, generally speaking, the child, in relation to
the man, is much closer to original sin" (L'Art romantique, p. 41)."' [J7,1]
The sun: '"the boisterous sun heating a tattoo upon his windowpane" (L 'A rt romantique,
p. 65); 'the landscapes of the great city . .. huffeted by the sun" (L 'Art
, . omantique, pp. 65-66).,;1 [J7,2]