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by Charles Baudelaire (1821 - 1867)

À une passante
Language: French (Français) 
La rue assourdissante autour de moi hurlait.
Longue, mince, en grand deuil, douleur majestueuse,
Une femme passa, d'une main fastueuse
Soulevant, balançant le feston et l'ourlet ;

Agile et noble, avec sa jambe de statue.
Moi, je buvais, crispé comme un extravagant,
Dans son œil, ciel livide où germe l'ouragan,
La douceur qui fascine et le plaisir qui tue.

Un éclair... puis la nuit ! -- Fugitive beauté
Dont le regard m'a fait soudainement renaître,
Ne te verrai-je plus que dans l'éternité ?

Ailleurs, bien loin d'ici ! trop tard ! jamais peut-être !
Car j'ignore où tu fuis, tu ne sais où je vais,
Ô toi que j'eusse aimée, ô toi qui le savais !

Available sung texts:   ← What is this?

•   R. Piacentini 

R. Piacentini sets stanzas 3-4

View text with all available footnotes

Confirmed with Charles Baudelaire, Les Fleurs du mal, Paris: Poulet-Malassis et de Broise, 1861, in Tableaux parisiens, pages 216-217. Also confirmed with Charles Baudelaire, Œuvres complètes de Charles Baudelaire, vol. I : Les Fleurs du mal, Paris: Michel Lévy frères, 1868, in Tableaux parisiens, page 270. Note: this was number 93 in the 1861 edition of Les Fleurs du mal but number 117 in subsequent editions.

First published October 15, 1860 in L'Artiste.


Text Authorship:

  • by Charles Baudelaire (1821 - 1867), "À une passante", appears in Les Fleurs du mal, in 2. Tableaux parisiens, no. 93, Paris, L'Artiste, first published 1860 [author's text checked 3 times against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Danielle Baas (b. 1958), "A une passante", op. 71 (2000) [ baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Riccardo Piacentini (b. 1958), "À une passante", 1996, stanzas 3-4, from Fugitives. Tre frammenti da Baudelaire, no. 2 [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by Rudi Spring (b. 1962), "À une passante", op. 96 no. 24 (2018) [ baritone and piano ], from Livre de Mélodies Françaises, no. 24 [sung text not yet checked]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • CZE Czech (Čeština) (Jaroslav Haasz) , "Ženě, která šla mimo", Prague, J. Otto, first published 1919
  • ENG English (Cyril Meir Scott) , "To a Passer-by", appears in The Flowers of Evil, London, Elkin Mathews, first published 1909
  • GER German (Deutsch) (Stefan George) , "Einer Vorübergehenden", appears in Die Blumen des Bösen, Berlin, Bondi, first published 1901


Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2008-11-24
Line count: 14
Word count: 113

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