Baudelaire's Le Spleen de Paris

Prize: Winner of the R.H. Gapper Book Prize 2007 'This is a thought-provoking book, which advances ideas in an understated manner, and leaves us to ponder the implications. The Baudelaire who emerges is profoundly ethical, an advocate of self-knowledge, and deeply protective of his more Romantic artistic ideals. Scott shows how he uses textual duplicity to enact and entrap bourgeois hypocrisy, and her main concern is to expose the reading dynamic rather than to impose an ideological agenda. The book is lucidly written throughout and is a valuable contribution to the expanding body of work on Baudelaire's prose.' French Studies 'Maria Scott's insightful and engaging interpretation of Le Spleen de Paris opens up the text to new and original readings, whilst offering an incisive critique of the existing scholarship in the field. In its elegantly written, cogent and subtle analyses, Scott's book offers an explanation of the reader blindness and competing perspectives that the prose poems provoke and re-frames the critical debate in illuminating and alluring ways. Full of fascinating and persuasive readings of individual prose poems, Baudelaire's Le Spleen de Paris also makes an important contribution to our understanding of Baudelairean duplicity and to the highly productive critical unease it generates.' Sonya Stephens, Reader in Modern French Literature and Culture, Royal Holloway, University of London 'With a wealth of sensitive, original and highly detailed analyses, this is a first-rate addition to the growing number of excellent monographs on Baudelaire's prose poems...' Forum for Modern Language Studies 'The author appears in total command of the critical corpus that has grown round Le Spleen de Paris and her erudition is nothing if not impressive... there are many pieces of perceptive and nuanced criticism...' Modern Language Review