BE DRUNK ***************************** Charles Baudelaire

17.            Charles Baudelaire                                                                                            Be Drunk

Write an essay on the following

1.       The poem as a celebration of life

2.       The poem as an indictment of modern life.

Charles Baudelaire is a great French poet whose magnum opus is “Flowers of Evil” an anthology of his poetry, which dealt with the two taboo topics like sex and lesbianism. As a child he had a strong fixation towards his mother. His father’s death gave him the opportunity to be close to his mother. But when his mother married again, he lost his motherly love and he was in atraumatic condition. But his stepfather’s death brought him back to his mother and he declares with pride: “I belong to you absolutely, an that I belong only to you”. Baudelaire won acclaim in the literary field on translating the poetry of Edgar Allan Poe, the great American poet and novelist.

“Be Drunk” is a simple poem written by Charles Baudelaire is a celebration of life. The poet asks his readers to get drunk from anything they like – wine, poetry or virtue and makes sure that they are happy. The poet says that you have to be drunk which means get intoxicated with anything such as wine, poetry, music, art and literature or doing good things for the people around you. You have to be continually drunk so that you don’t feel the terrible burden of time.

In his poem “Be Drunk”, Charles Baudelaire gives us a new meaning of “drunk”. Usually drink means drink liquor and you will be intoxicated. But the poet gives a new meaning to “drunk” which means get intoxicated with anything in life. You may get intoxicated when you are indulged in too much music or poetry, literature, art or doing good things for the people and thereby do service to mankind. In short you should enjoy life to its maximum, so that you for get your slavery of life, its hard work and other terrible pains and burdens of time. Time is portrayed as the enemy of man. Time is a villain which makes you grow old and sick and finally you are killed.  The poet uses two metaphors in the poem. First is life which is intoxicated to escape from the terrible burdens of time. The second metaphor is Time which is shown as the enemy of man. Most people suffer sorrow and pain and lead life like a slave. They are the “‘martyred slaves of time”.     Kjt/- 20-03-2020