Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867)
France

The Beauty Conceive me as a dream of stone: my breast, where mortals come to grief, is made to prompt all poets' love, mute and noble as matter itself. With snow for flesh, with ice for heart, I sit on high, an unguessed sphinx begrudging acts that alter forms; I never laugh, I never weep. In studious awe the poets brood before my monumental pose aped from the proudest pedestal, and to bind these docile lovers fast I freeze the world in a perfect mirror: he timeless light of my wide eyes.

He lost his father when he was 6 years old and devoted his love to his mother who after two years re-married to Jaques Aupick, a military officier. This marriage was a shock to young Charles, and due to that marriage he felt a lack of love through his whole life. During his studies in college, he became fond of novels defined as "satanic" and started writing verses. His step-father, worried, in 1841 forced him to take a long journey to the Orient that lasted 10 months. There he produced several of the poems that were later published in his most famous work, "Les Fleurs du Mal." From 1842 to 1844 he founded intellectual alliances with Gautier, Balzac, Manet and Delacroix. Moreover he frequented the Club des Haschischins (hascish smokers) and became interested in the theory and practice of the use of alcohol and drugs to instigate imagination. In 1857 was released the first edition of Les Fleurs du Mal and after few days Baudelaire was sequestrated. Both poet and editor were upbraided. The collection was re-published with an extension in 1861, and innovated European poetry, opening the door to Symbolism.

Works
Les Fleurs du mal (1857, enlarged 1861, 1868; several Eng. tr., The Flowers of Evil)
Petits poèmes en prose (1869)
Curiosités esthétiques (1868)
L’Art romantique (1869)

Additional Information
Baudelaire @ Poetes.com http://poetes.com/baud
Charles Baudelaire http://users.lycaeum.org/~sputnik/People/baud.html