Word: laudanum
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...biography accurately describes Les Fleurs du Mai as an "anatomy of addiction"-of men and women hooked on drugs, alcohol and every variation of sex. Baudelaire himself drank to the brink of alcoholism and took 150 drops a day of laudanum-twice the dose fatal to a nonaddict. Yet the drug Baudelaire was most addicted to was hope: luxe, calme et volupté-the elegance of Islamic paradise, a Christian's heavenly peace and a pagan bliss of the senses. Baudelaire chanted of this blessed trinity while he suffered the diseases of the age: poverty, rage and soul-withering...
...with an "accident." It is François's wife who was Charles' mistress. Charles sits uneasily at home, toying with his dinner, forcing himself to eat dessert and play a game of Scrabble with his wife and children. He even has to take several drops of laudanum to sleep...