The Arcades Project - Operi

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The importance of theory for artistic creation was not something about which
Bandelaire was clear, initially. In the "Salon de 1845;' discussing the painter
Haussoullier, he asks: "Is M. Haussoullier perhaps one of those who know too
much about their art? That is a truly dangerous scourge:' Ch. B., Oeuvres, vol. 2,
p. 23. "m [J39a,3]
A critique of the idea of progress, such as may become necessary in connection
with a presentation of Baudelaire, must take great care to differentiate itself from
the latter's own critique of progress. This applies still more unconditionally to
Baudelaire's critique of the nineteenth century and to that entailed by his biogra·
phy. It is a mark of the warped and crassly ignorant portrait of Baudelaire drawn
by Peter Klassen that the poet should appear against the background of a century
painted in the colors of Gehelma. The only thing in this century really worthy of
praise, in the author's view, is a certain clerical practice-namely, that moment
"when, in token of the reestablished kingdom of the grace of God, the Holy of
Holies was carned through the streets of Paris in an entourage of shining arma·
ments. This will have been an experience decisive, because fundamental, for his
entire existence:' So begins this presentation of the poet framed in the depraved
categories of the George circle. Peter Klassen, Baudelaire (Weimar