From the book
Intimate Journals
Charles Baudelaire · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordMon cœur mis à nu CV contains an explicit antisemitic proposal to organize a conspiracy for the extermination of Jews.
- In Intimate JournalsThe two sentences appear after notes on sacraments and the infamy of printing.
- In this editionThe 2026 translation preserves ‘extermination’ and the historical phrase ‘Jewish race’, without substituting softer vocabulary.
- A place to readpour l’extermination de la race juive.
Meaning
Mon cœur mis à nu CV contains an explicit antisemitic proposal to organize a conspiracy for the extermination of Jews. Its imperative project-form does not turn it into a neutral historical observation, and its shortness does not reduce its violence. The phrase must be named accurately rather than euphemized as mere irreverence or generalized misanthropy.
The next sentence calls Jews librarians and witnesses of Redemption. That theological role is also assigned from a Christian perspective; it is not a description of Judaism in its own terms.
Use in the book
The two sentences appear after notes on sacraments and the infamy of printing. Their adjacency supplies no demonstrated causal argument. It would be unjustified to invent an economic theory, a particular political organization, or an implemented plot behind the fragment. It would be equally unjustified to claim that the surrounding discontinuity makes the extermination proposal harmless.
The image of Jewish custodians of scriptural books has a Christian precedent in Augustine. In City of God XVIII.46, their preservation and dispersion are made witnesses to Christian prophecy. This is a subordinating and anti-Jewish framework, but its preservation argument is distinct from extermination. The parallel clarifies the following line without reconciling the two claims or establishing Baudelaire's immediate source.
The fragment therefore matters to the notebook's larger contradictions. A writer can defend spiritual depth against materialist simplification while producing dehumanizing hatred. The language of universal religion, charity, or divine justice elsewhere does not absolve this sentence. Conversely, the sentence should be read in its exact historical textual form rather than used to fabricate a detailed programme that the surviving note does not contain.
Places to read
- Mon cœur mis à nu CVpour l’extermination de la race juive. — The violent aim is explicit and directed at Jews as a group.
- Mon cœur mis à nu CVLes juifs Bibliothécaires et témoins de la Rédemption. — The next line invokes a separate Christian witness image.
Translation in this edition
The 2026 translation preserves ‘extermination’ and the historical phrase ‘Jewish race’, without substituting softer vocabulary. Translator note 93 distinguishes the extermination call from the witness tradition and marks the immediate source as unestablished. Clear translation is indispensable here: the reader needs neither protective omission nor speculative amplification.
Source note
Primary comparison: Augustine, City of God XVIII.46, City of God XVIII 46. The chapter argues for the preservation of Jews as scriptural witnesses within a Christian supersessionist framework. That preservation claim must not be confused with the extermination proposal in Mon cœur mis à nu CV.