Venus and the Fool

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Section three of Little Poems and Prose by Charles Beaudelaire.
The LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Venus and
the Fool, how admirable of the day. The vast park
swoons beneath the burning eye of the sun, as youth
beneath the lordship of love. There is no rumor of

(00:23):
the universal ecstasy of all things. The waters themselves are
as though drifting into sleep. Very different from the festivals
of humanity. Here is a silent revel. It seems as
though an ever waning light makes all objects glimmer more
and more, as though the excited flowers burn with a

(00:44):
desire to rival the blue of the sky by the
vividness of their colors, as though the heat making perfumes
visible drives them in vapor towards their star. Yet in
the midst of this universal joy, I have perceived one
afflicted thing at the feet of a colossal venus. One

(01:05):
of those motley fools, those willing clowns whose business it
is to bring laughter upon kings when weariness or remorse
possesses them, lies wrapt in his gaudy and ridiculous garments,
coined with his cap and bells, huddled against the pedestal
and raises towards the Goddess, his eyes filled with tears,

(01:26):
and his eyes say, I am the last and most
alone of all mortals, inferior to the meanest of animals,
in that I am denied either love or friendship. Yet
I am made even I for the understanding and enjoyment
of immortal beauty. O, Goddess, have pity upon my sadness

(01:46):
and my frenzy. The implacable venus gazed into I know
not what distances with her marble eyes. End of Section three.