French · Revolt

Les Litanies de Satan

The Litanies of Satan

52 lines · 15 notes

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1
O you, the most learned and the most beautiful of Angels,
ÔOô · interjectionvocative particle
toiyoutoi · pronounhead of the phrase
lethele · determiner, masculine, singulardeterminer in superlative le plus savant
plusmostplus · adverbmodifies savant
savantlearnedsavant · adjective, masculine, singularin apposition to toi
etandet · conjunctionlinks the coordination
lethele · determiner, masculine, singulardeterminer in superlative le plus beau
plusmostplus · adverbmodifies beau
beaubeautifulbeau · adjective, masculine, singularcoordinated with savant
desof thede · prepositionpreposition marking Anges
AngesAngelsange · noun, masculine, pluraldepends on beau/savant
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a God betrayed by fate and stripped of praises,
Grammarprivé de + noun «privé de» = 'deprived of, stripped of'. The past participle «privé» agrees with «Dieu» (masc. sing.) and «de» introduces what is lacking, with no article: «privé de louanges» = 'deprived of praises'.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
GrammarImperative «prendre pitié de» «prends» is the «tu» imperative of «prendre». The fixed idiom «prendre pitié de quelqu'un» = 'to take pity on someone'. This line is the refrain — a litany response that returns after every invocation, the way a congregation answers a priest.
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O Prince of exile, to whom a wrong was done
Wordfaire tort à «faire tort à quelqu'un» = 'to wrong someone, to do someone an injustice'. The «l'» in «l'on» is purely euphonic (it smooths the vowel clash after «à qui»), not a pronoun. Satan is cast as the wronged party, the exile who was treated unfairly.
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and who, vanquished, always raise yourself up stronger,
Grammarse redresser (pronominal) «se redresser» = 'to straighten up, to rise again'. The reflexive «te» marks the action as done to oneself: «tu te redresses» = 'you raise yourself back up'. Note the address shifts to «tu» («te»), even though «qui» grammatically governs the verb — Baudelaire speaks directly to Satan.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who know all, great king of subterranean things,
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familiar healer of human anguishes,
Wordguérisseur «guérisseur» is a folk-healer or faith-healer, not a trained doctor — one who cures by laying-on of hands or charms. «familier» = 'familiar, intimate'. Satan is the homely, everyday healer of human dread, a deliberately tender title for the Devil.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who, even to the lepers, to the accursed pariahs,
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teach through love the taste of Paradise,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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O you who, on Death, your old and mighty mistress,
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begot Hope — a charming madwoman!
GrammarPassé simple: «engendrer» «engendras» is the passé simple (literary past tense) of «engendrer» = 'to beget, to father', second person singular. The construction is «engendrer X de Y» — to beget X upon Y: here Satan begets «l'Espérance» (Hope) upon «la Mort» (Death), his aged mistress.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who give the outlaw that calm and lofty gaze
Wordle proscrit «le proscrit» = 'the proscribed one, the outlaw, the banished man' — someone outlawed and condemned by the state. «faire un regard à quelqu'un» here means to lend or give him that look. The condemned man's serene defiance damns the crowd watching him die.
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that damns a whole people around a scaffold.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who know in what corners of the grudging earth
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the jealous God hid the precious stones,
GrammarPassé simple: «cacher» «cacha» is the passé simple of «cacher» = 'to hide', third person singular ('hid'). The litany keeps reaching back into a mythic past tense: the «Dieu jaloux» once buried the gems, and only Satan knows where.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You whose clear eye knows the deep arsenals
GrammarRelative «dont» (= of whom / whose) «dont» replaces «de qui / duquel» and here marks possession: «toi dont l'oeil» = 'you whose eye'. It links Satan to «l'oeil clair» that follows. The anaphora «Toi qui… / Toi dont…» drives the whole litany of attributes.
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where the people of the metals lies buried asleep,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You whose broad hand hides the precipices
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from the sleepwalker wandering at the edge of the buildings,
Grammarcacher qqch à qqn «cacher quelque chose à quelqu'un» = 'to hide something from someone' — French uses «à» where English uses 'from'. So «cache les précipices au somnambule» = 'hides the precipices from the sleepwalker'. Satan, perversely, protects the dreamer from the fall.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who, by magic, make supple again the old bones
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of the belated drunkard trampled by the horses,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who, to console the frail man who suffers,
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taught us to mix saltpetre and sulphur,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who set your mark, O subtle accomplice,
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on the brow of the pitiless and base Croesus,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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You who put into the eyes and into the heart of girls
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the cult of the wound and the love of rags,
Wordles guenilles «guenilles» = 'rags, tatters' — worn-out, filthy clothing, hence wretchedness itself. «des filles» here carries its harsher sense of fallen or kept women. Satan teaches the poor and the prostitute to worship their own sores and squalor.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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Staff of the exiled, lamp of the inventors,
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confessor of the hanged and of the conspirators,
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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Adoptive father of those whom, in his black wrath,
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God the Father drove out of the earthly paradise,
GrammarPast-participle agreement with «que» In «ceux qu'... a chassés», the participle «chassés» agrees in gender and number (masc. pl., +s) with the preceding direct object «ceux» ('those'), which the relative «que» stands for. The rule: a participle conjugated with «avoir» agrees with a direct object that comes before it. The word order is inverted — «Dieu le Père» (the subject) lands at the very end.
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O Satan, take pity on my long misery!
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Prayer
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Glory and praise to you, Satan, in the heights
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of Heaven, where you reigned, and in the depths
GrammarPassé simple: «régner» «régnas» is the passé simple of «régner» = 'to reign', second person singular ('you reigned'). The closing prayer balances two tenses of dominion: «où tu régnas» (where you once reigned, in Heaven) against «où… tu rêves» (where you now dream, in Hell).
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of Hell, where, vanquished, you dream in silence!
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Grant that my soul, one day, beneath the Tree of Knowledge,
Grammar«faire que» + subjunctive «Fais que» ('bring it about that, grant that') is a command that forces the subjunctive in the clause it governs: «se repose» (third person of «se reposer») is subjunctive, not indicative. The whole sentence is a petition — the «Prière» proper — asking that the soul one day rest beside Satan.
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may rest near you, at the hour when upon your brow
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its boughs, like a new Temple, will spread wide!
GrammarFuture of «s'épandre» «s'épandront» is the simple future of the pronominal verb «s'épandre» = 'to spread out, to extend'. The subject «ses rameaux» (its boughs — those of the Tree of Knowledge) stands in normal preverbal order; it is the fronted comparison «Comme un Temple nouveau» that pushes subject and verb to the end of the line. The poem closes on a vision of the future: the tree's branches will arch over Satan's brow like a new temple.

The particulars

The text: Les Fleurs du mal, Charles Baudelaire. Revolt.
Words: Every word of the text, by letter.
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