Capital of Pain

by Paul Ėluard

Translated into English by R J Dent

Capital of Pain is a book of poems by Paul Éluard, translated into modern English by R J Dent, and published by Black Scat Books.

When Paul Éluard’s Capital of Pain was published in 1926, it caused a sensation. Generally considered to be Éluard’s most powerful poetry collection, one critic wrote: ‘In Capital of Pain, Éluard writes poetry that is pure, spontaneous and intense.’

A true surrealist, Éluard’s poems in Capital of Pain contain details of his controversial personal life. As the collection’s name suggests, Capital of Pain is a document of the poet’s private anguish and personal agony made public and the poetry crackles with immense power.

Today Paul Éluard is considered to be the most gifted of the French surrealist poets and Capital of Pain his surrealist masterpiece.

Book details:

Title: Capital of Pain

Author: Paul Ėluard

Translator: R J Dent

Publisher: Black Scat Books

Publication Date: February 16th, 2023

Language: English

Format: Paperback

Pages: 132

ISBN-13: 979-8986922485

Item Weight: 7 ounces (198.447 grams)

Dimensions: 5.06 inches x 0.33 inches x 7.81 inches (12.85 cm x 0.84 cm x 19.84 cm)

Book details by the publisher: https://blackscatbooks.com/2023/02/16/surreal-deal/

Book details on R J Dent’s website: http://www.rjdent.com/capital-of-pain/

Purchase link (US): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BVT3QXGD/

Purchase link (UK): https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BVT3QXGD/

Purchase link (Aus) https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0BVT3QXGD/

Purchase link (Can): https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0BVT3QXGD/

R J Dent is a translator of several works of European literature including The Songs of Maldoror (Lautreamont); Selected Erotic Poems (Charles Baudelaire); Poems & Fragments (Alcaeus); Speculations (Alfred Jarry); Soluble Fish (Andre Breton); and Some Thoughts on the Novel (De Sade). He is also a novelist, poet, essayist and short story writer.

His website is www.rjdent.com

Hidden Gems

(The Best of The Pearl, a Journal of Voluptuous Reading.)

Anonymous

The infamous Victorian monthly magazine The Pearl was published in London from July 1879 to December 1880 and was subsequently shut down by the authorities for publishing obscene literature.

Each issue was devoted to erotic serials featuring sex in high society, incest and flagellation, interspersed with ribald parodies, rude poems and smutty limericks

This selection (over 300 pages) includes the best of The Pearl and is drawn from all of its original 18 issues. Hidden Gems is a fascinating look at the secret obsessions behind the Puritan’s mask.

Step inside and enjoy this raunchy romp through the Victorian underground.

Title: Hidden Gems

Author: Anonymous

Introduction: William Hamilton

ISBN-10: 0692450165

ISBN-13: 978-0692450161

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Black Scat Books

Pages: 334

Language: English

Item Weight: 15.2 ounces

Dimensions: 5.06 x 0.84 x 7.81 inches Book details (publisher): Hidden Gems

Purchase link (US): Hidden Gems

Purchase link (UK): Hidden Gems

Purchase link (Aus): Hidden Gems

Purchase link (Can): Hidden Gems

Charles Baudelaire – Selected Erotic Poems – A Review by Amanda Hodgson

Selected Erotic Poems

Charles Baudelaire

Translated from the French by RJ Dent

The Godfather of Gloom, Charles Baudelaire, gets the R J Dent treatment in a translation that brings new life and suppleness to his words.

Baudelaire is closed curtains in daytime, candles, overflowing ashtrays and small, intimate parties where small, intimate events occur; as in these closing lines from  “Jewels”:

‘And as the candle-light prepared to die,

and its low flames gently lit the chamber,

each time there sounded a contented sigh,

our warm flesh blushed the colour of amber.’

Ennui-ridden existentialist Baudelaire gives us some dreamy transporting moments before we are mired in the sludge of sin once more. This is starkly drawn in ‘I love the memory’, where an Elysium in which ‘no shame was caused by sensuality’, men and women were naked and ‘heaven lovingly caressed their skin’ is firmly of the past. In trying to imagine such times in the present ‘a cold and gloomy feeling envelopes his soul’. It sounds more than cold and gloom. Cold and gloom is Britain pre-global warming most days. Cold and gloom is not

‘a black, terrifying tableau:

monstrosities crying out for their clothes;

twisted bodies, fat uglies needing masks,

the crooked, wasted, flabby, the grotesque –

who some practical god, serene and calm,

forced into metal clothes when they were born,

and every one as pale as candle wax,

who gnaw at their debauchery and sex

who drag with them their parents’ stupid vice

of bringing hideous progeny to life.’

Conversely, the reader can feel the sun and smell the tamarind in ‘Exotic Perfume”, where Baudelaire is once more transported from the bleak present by a woman’s body. Baudelaire portrays women as representing good and evil on a metaphysical plane. I am filled with ennui over Madonna/Whore tropes but in “Exotic Perfume”, the imagery delights.

In “Hair” the woman of the poem is the sea. The poet dives in:

‘Into this black sea where other seas swell,

I’ll dip my lovingly rapturous head

and then, caressed by rolling waves, I will

find you again, idleness that’s fertile

enough to lull me into a sweet bed.’

There is much to delight in this translation. The rich, evocative imagery lends these poems to being read on silken bedding while languorously consuming peeled grapes. This translation serves as both introduction and companion to the works of Charles Baudelaire.

Charles Baudelaire – Selected Erotic Poems

Translated into English by R J Dent

Published by New Urge Editions

R J Dent’s official website book details and links: Selected Erotic Poems – Charles Baudelaire

New Urge Editions book details and links: Banned in France! – Selected Erotic Poems – Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire and the Marquis de Sade

Charles Baudelaire and the Marquis de Sade.

Charles Baudelaire – Selected Erotic Poems

Translated into English by R J Dent

Book details and purchase links:
http://www.rjdent.com/selected-erotic-poems-charles-baudelaire-translated-from-the-french-by-r-j-dent/

Sade – Retaliation

Translated into English by R J Dent

Book details and purchase links:
http://www.rjdent.com/retaliation-the-marquis-de-sade-translated-from-the-french-by-r-j-dent/

Kim Vodicka, author of Dear Ted: https://kimvodicka.com/ and @theelvismachine

Book details and purchase link:

https://rlysrslit.bigcartel.com/product/dear-ted-preorder-kim-vodicka

The Marquis de Sade, Louis Aragon, Charles Baudelaire…

Three translations and an adaptation by R J Dent

The Marquis de Sade’s Retaliation, book details here

The Marquis de Sade’s The Self-Made Cuckold, book details here

Louis Aragon’s Jean-Fucque (Le Cocque), book details here

Charles Baudelaire’s Selected Erotic Poems, book details here

All available as paperbacks in the Pocket Erotica Series from New Urge Editions

R J Dent’s official website is here

Selected Erotic Poems by Charles Baudelaire

Translated into English by R J Dent

Charles Baudelaire’s decadent erotic poems caused a scandal when they first appeared in 1857. Both author and publisher were prosecuted for unveiling works that were ‘an insult to public decency’, and six poems in the collection were suppressed.

These so-called indecent works (banned in France until 1949) were: Lesbos; Condemned Women: Delphine and Hippolyta; Lethe; To One Who Is Too Happy; Jewels; and The Metamorphosis of the Vampire— and all are included in this Pocket Erotica edition, plus 20 more.

Selected Erotic Poems

Charles Baudelaire

Translated from the French by R J Dent

Pocket Erotica No. 21, New Urge Editions

ISBN 978-1737943037

Format: Paperback chapbook

Pages: 64

Dimensions: 4 x 0.16 x 6 inches

Weight: 3.2 ounces

Purchase link (US): https://www.amazon.com/dp/1737943034

Purchase link (UK): https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1737943034

Purchase link (Aus): https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/1737943034

Translator’s website: www.rjdent.com

Retaliation by the Marquis de Sade

Translated into English by R J Dent

From the back cover:

Did the notorious author of Justine and The 120 Days of Sodom have a sense of humor?

Indeed he did, and this short story shows a side of Sade few have seen. Here is a witty, libertine tale, free of flagellation and sexual perversion. Instead, it reveals a husband’s adultery and a wife’s clever “retaliation.”

This is decidedly a feminist text, and it punctures the double standard still infecting relations between men and women.

Translated from the French by R J Dent.

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Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ New Urge Editions / Pocket Erotica (11 Sept. 2021)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 52 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1737371170
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1737371175
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 10.16 x 0.33 x 15.24 cm

Retaliation by the Marquis de Sade is available here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1737371170/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=retaliation+de+sade&qid=1631478528&sr=8-1

http://www.rjdent.com/