Charles Pierre Baudelaire (April 9, 1821 – August 31, 1867) was a French poet, essayist, translator, and art critic, widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in modern literature. He was born in Paris, where his father, a retired civil servant and amateur painter, was sixty years old and his mother only twenty-six. His father died in 1827, and the following year his mother married Colonel Jacques Aupick. Baudelaire never fully accepted his stepfather, whose military discipline and bourgeois values contrasted sharply with the artistic temperament of his late father.
After completing his studies in Lyon and Paris, Baudelaire rejected the conventional lifestyle expected of him. In 1841 his family sent him on a voyage to the East, hoping to reform his behavior and financial habits. Although the journey ended before he reached India, it left a lasting impression on his imagination and later poetry. Upon his return to Paris, he met Jeanne Duval, the woman who inspired many of his most passionate poems.
Baudelaire spent much of his inheritance on an extravagant lifestyle while dedicating himself to literature. He became one of the first French admirers and translators of Edgar Allan Poe, whose work profoundly influenced him. He also worked as a journalist and art critic, developing innovative ideas about modern art and urban life.
In 1857 he published *The Flowers of Evil* (*Les Fleurs du mal*), his masterpiece and one of the most important poetry collections in Western literature. The book shocked contemporary society and led to a trial for offending public morality. Baudelaire, his publisher, and his printer were fined, and six poems were banned from publication in France for nearly a century.
Among his other notable works are *Artificial Paradises* and *Paris Spleen* (*The Melancholy of Paris*). Throughout his writings he explored the tensions between beauty and corruption, pleasure and suffering, idealism and despair. Though misunderstood by many of his contemporaries, he later came to be recognized as a pioneer of Symbolism and a major influence on modern poetry.
In 1864 Baudelaire moved to Brussels, hoping to improve his financial situation, but the venture proved unsuccessful. In 1866 he suffered a severe stroke that left him partially paralyzed and unable to speak properly. He was brought back to Paris, where he died on August 31, 1867, at the age of forty-six.
