FleursDuMal.org
"I once read a lot of Baudelaire + my Angel kid has read every translation — apparently, if you don't know french (I do) you have to read all the translations to get a good idea." — Allen Ginsberg, Letter to David Cope, 25 Jan 1977.
Fleursdumal.org is dedicated to the French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821 - 1867) and his poems Les Fleurs du mal (Flowers of Evil). The definitive online edition of this masterpiece of French literature, Fleursdumal.org contains every poem of each edition of Les Fleurs du mal, together with multiple English translations.
About. Fleursdumal.org launched on 1 Feb 2004. The site is a labor of love created and maintained by Supervert. At supervert.com you can find information about Supervert's books, which include Extraterrestrial Sex Fetish, Necrophilia Variations, Perversity Think Tank, Post-Depravity, Apocalypse Burlesque, and Music for Erotomaniacs.
Note on translations. Most of the translations that appear on fleursdumal.org have appeared previously in book form. These are not necessarily the best or the worst translations — though fleursdumal.org is partial to Edna St. Vincent Millay's renderings — but they are ones that the site felt comfortable reproducing in terms of rights. If you are a rights holder and object to your translations being included here, please contact fleursdumal.org to discuss the issue.
Translators. Contact fleursdumal.org if you would like to submit a translation. Please note, however, that the site reserves the unconditional right to reject any submission without explanation.
If you're new to Baudelaire or uninterested in the various editions of the Flowers of Evil, you should browse poems using the 1861 Table of Contents. This is the definitive edition of Les Fleurs du mal and contains most everything except the "condemned" poems which you can find in Les Épaves (scraps).
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Two editions of Fleurs du mal were published in Baudelaire's lifetime — one in 1857 and an expanded edition in 1861. "Scraps" and censored poems were collected in Les Épaves in 1866. After Baudelaire died the following year, a "definitive" edition appeared in 1868.