Baudelaire's "Argot Plastique"

Exploring the poets fascination with the affective power of caricature, Baudelaires Argot Plastique charts the movement in Baudelaires poetry toward a language of visual distortion. McLees demonstrates that caricature, graphically and culturally a vehicle of sharp wit and social commentary, became in Baudelaires works a poetic expression of the human condition itself. Using its capacity for deflating commentary to subvert the poetic conventions of his age, transferring its range of subjects into a poetry that celebrated the underclass, Baudelaire ultimately focused the lens of poetic caricature on the relation of subject, artist, and viewer. Richly illustrated with lithographs, etchings, and drawings by Goya, Daumier, Grandville, Gavarni, and other caricaturists, Baudelaires Argot Plastique reveals the importance of caricature as a model for Baudelaires poetry.