«All the imbeciles of the bourgeoisie who endlessly utter the words “immoral”, “immorality”, “morality in art” and other nonsense make me think of Louise Villedieu, a five-franc whore, who once accompanied me to the Louvre, where I had never been before, her blushed, she covered her face, and pulling at my sleeve at every moment, she asked me in front of the statues and immortal paintings, how they could exhibit such indecencies before the public.» Charles Baudelaire, My Heart Bare (1864)
Banned in France for offending morality and good customs, the poems gathered in this volume had to wait ninety-two years until their public claim. In 2007, a century and a half after the publication of The Flowers of Evil, Pat Andrea, a key figure in contemporary art, ventured into one of the most dazzling recreations ever made of Baudelaire's universe. The bilingual edition included the admirable Spanish version of the poet Jaime Siles.

In 2017, Red Fox Books republished this work on the 150th anniversary of the death of Baudelaire, "the first seer, the king of poets, the true god," as Rimbaud wrote.

The sentence (excerpt)

Considering the poet's error, in the goal he wanted to achieve and in the path he followed, whatever stylistic effort he might have made, whatever censorship preceded or followed his descriptions, he cannot destroy the disastrous effect of the paintings that it presents to the reader, and that the incriminated pieces necessarily lead to the excitement of the senses through a crude and offensive realism for modesty. Bearing in mind that Baudelaire, Poulet-Malassis and De Broise committed a crime of outrage against public morals and good customs, namely: Baudelaire, for publishing; Poulet-Malassis and De Broise, for publishing, selling and putting up for sale, in Paris and Alençon, the work entitled: The Flowers of Evil, which contains passages or obscene and immoral expressions. […] Baudelaire is sentenced to a fine of 300 francs, Poulet-Malassis and De Broise to a fine of 100 francs each. The suppression of the pieces bearing the numbers 20, 30, 39, 80, 81 and 87 of the compilation is ordered. And the defendants are sentenced to bear the costs.”

Gazette des Tribunaux, August 21, 1857