Avant-garde poet who wrote in
French, but was of a
pan-European background. Apollinaire was extremely
prolific during his shortened life, especially considering his service in
World War I, and this
WU only tries to list his most important works. He was the
archetypical bohemian.
Born
August 26, 1880, outside of
Rome. Died
November 9, 1918, as a result of
Spanish Grippe, which he got after having being weakened by a
war wound he sustained in March,
1916. His head was wounded by a
shell fragment while he was reading an issue of
Mercure de France.
Apollinaire was tight-lipped about his origins, but his mother was probably
Angelica de Kostowitzky. His father was most likely
Fransesco Flugi d'Aspermont. Guillaume had a brother, also
illegitimate, named
Albert.
As a boy, he lived in
Italy,
Monaco, on the
French Riviera, and in
Paris, and he pretended to be a
Russian prince.
He went to school
Collège Saint-Charles in
Monaco, and various other schools in
Cannes and
Nice.
He moved to Paris in
1902.
In
1903 he founded
Le Festin d'Esope, a
literary review. It lasted a bit more than a year.
L'Enchanteur Pourrissant in
1909 was his first collection of poems, which was illustrated by
Derain.
He published a book of stories,
L'Hérésiarque et Cie, in
1910.
He published a book of poems,
Le Bestiare, in
1911, which featured
woodcuts by
Raoul Dury.
In September, 1911, Apollinaire was
arrested and held in jail for 6 days because a friend of his had stolen a few small statues from the
Louvre. This was during the time that the
Mona Lisa had been stolen, and he was under suspicion for that crime.
Les Peintres Cubistes(
The Cubist Painters) was published in
1913, the result of his talks with
Picasso,
Picabia,
Marcoussis, and others.
In 1913
Alcools was published, a collection of poems which is perhaps his most famous work
He wrote the
futurist manifesto L'Antitradition Futuriste in 1913, also.
In
1914, though an
Italian citizen, he joined the
French army as a volunteer. He served in the
artillery for two years before becoming an
infantry lieutenant.
In
1916, after being wounded and undergoing a
series of operations, he started working for the French
Bureau of Censorship.
He published his other great poetry collection,
Calligrammes, in 1916, as well as the play
Les Mamelles de Tirésias (The Breast of Tiresias) and
Le Poète Assasiné (
The Poet Assassinated).
He married
Jacqueline Kolb, the last in a series of romances, in May
1918.
November 9, he died.
In his life, Apollinaire was associated with
pornography,
crime,
war,
Cubism,
Futurism,
Surrealism,
Orphism,
dada,
theatre of the absurd and
modernism. He was friends with
Alfred Jarry,
Pablo Picasso,
Marie Laurencin (also his lover for a time), and
André Derain.
My favorite poem of his- very
heartwrenching:
L'
Adieu
J'ai cueilli ce crin de bruyère
L'automne est morte souviens-t'en
Nouse ne nous verrons plus sur terre
Odeur du temps brin de bruyère
Et souviens toi que je t'attends
translation by Roger Shattuck
The
Farewell
I picked this
fragile sprig of
heather
Autumn has
died long since
remember
Never again shall we see
one another
Odor of
time sprig of
heather
Remember I await our time together