Baudelaire is Sartre's long essay on the nineteenth-century French poet Charles Baudelaire. Rather than simply reading the poems, Sartre studies the poet's life and character, including his difficult relationship with his family, his sense of isolation and his choices. He uses the case to apply his existentialist ideas about freedom and the way a person shapes their own identity. The book is a provocative piece of biography and criticism, and it shows how Sartre approached writers.