Through its unparalleled exploration of the trials of poetry from the early seventeenth to twentieth centuries, Poetry Proscribed opens a new line of inquiry into the present-day stakes of poetry through in-depth investigation of the mishearing inherent to poetry's relation to philosophy, history, politics, and the law. By considering the literal and figural trials of Théophile de Viau, André Chénier, Charles Baudelaire, André Breton, and Louis Aragon, each of the chapters of this book theorizes the twentieth-century fascination for the trials of poetry as key to the literary politics of French national identity and the unfulfilled promise of the commitment of literature. The impact of this book on the debate over the place of poetry on the cultural and political landscape will be a lasting one.