The Arcades Project - Operi

masses on its public. Particularly vulnerable to these developments, as can be
seen now unmistakably in our century, was the 1Y'c. It is the unique distinction
of Les FleuIJ du rnal that Baudelaire responded to precisely these altered condi·
tions with a book of poems. It is the best example of heroic conduct to be found
in his life. [J60,6]
The heroic bearing of Baudelaire is akin to that of Nietzsche. Though Baudelaire
likes to appeal to Catholicism, his historical experience is nonetheless that which
Nietzsche fixed in the phrase "God is dead;' In Nietzsche's case, this experience
is projected cosmologically in the thesis that nothing new occurs any more. In
Nietzsche, the accent lies on eternal recurrence, which the human being has to
face with heroic COlllposure. For Baudelaire, it is nlore a matter of "the new;'
which must be wrested heroically from what is always again the same. [J60,7]
The historical experiences which Baudelaire was one of the first to undergo (it is
no accident that he belongs to the generation of Marx, whose principal work
appeared in the year of his death) have become, in our day, only more wide·
spread and persistent. The traits displayed by capital in June 1848 have, since
then, been engraved still more sharply in the ruling classes. And the particular
difficulties involved in mastering the poetry of Baudelaire are the obverse of d,e
ease with which one can give oneself up to it. In a word, there is nothing yet
obsolete about dlis poetry. This fact has determined the character of most of the
books concerned widl Baudelaire: they are feuiJIetons on an expanded scale.
[J60a,1]
Particularly toward the end of his life, and in view of d,e linllted success of his
work, Baudelaire more and more threw himself into the bargain. He flung hinl·
self after his work, and thus, to the end, confirmed in his own person what he had
said about the unavoidable necessity of prostitution for the poet. [J60a,2]
One encounters an abundance of stereotypes in Baudelaire, as in the Baroque
poets. [J60a,3]
For the decline of the aura, One thing within the realm of mass production is of
overriding inlportance: the massive reproduction of the inlage. [J60a,4]
lnlpotence is the key figure of Baudelaire's solitude.327 An abyss divides hinl from
his fellow men. It is this abyss of which his poetry speaks. [J60a,5]
We may assume that the crowd as it appears in Poe, with its abrupt and intermit·
tent movements, is described quite realistically. In itself, the description has a
higher truth. These are less the movements of people going about their business
than the movements of the machines they operate. With uncanny foresight, Poe
seems to have modeled the gestures and reactions of the crowd on the rhythm of
these machines. The flaneur, at any rate, has no part in such behavior. Instead, he