Baudelaire and the cunning of the devil

Abstract

The expression “devil's astúcia”, mentioned in the title of this intervention, was taken from the prose poem "O jogador generoso". In it, the poet narrates a long night of games and conversation with the devil, in which the latter states at a certain moment that he only feared the loss of his power when he heard the following words from a “subtle preacher”: “My dear brothers, never forget, when you hear the progress of the lights exalted, that the most beautiful of the devil's cunning is to persuade you that he does not exist! Indeed, for Baudelaire, the devil not only exists, but presides over the logic of human existence: as the poet already wrote in the poem "Ao leitor", which prefaces his Flores do mal, “it is the devil who holds the thread that moves us”. That is, the devil exists and lives in us.