Guillaume Apollinaire

Guillaume Apollinaire
Guillaume Apollinaire
	Photograph of Guillaume Apollinaire in spring 1916 after a shrapnel wound to his temple
Born	Wilhelm Albert Włodzimierz Apolinary Kostrowicki; 26 August 1880; Rome, Italy
Died	9 November 1918 (aged 38); Paris, France
Resting place	Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris
Occupation	Poet; writer; art critic;
Literary movement	Cubism, Surrealism, Orphism
Signature

Guillaume Apollinaire (French: [ɡijom apɔlinɛʁ], born Kostrowicki^[a]; 26 August 1880 – 9 November 1918) was a French poet, playwright, short story writer, novelist, and art critic. He had Polish ancestry.

Kostrowicki family's coat-of-arms

Apollinaire is one of the most important poets of the early 20th century. He defended Cubism and helped start Surrealism. He invented the words "Cubism"^[1] in 1911, "Orphism" in 1912, and "Surrealism" in 1917.^[2] Apollinaire wrote many early Surrealist works. One of these was the play The Breasts of Tiresias (1917). This play became the basis for Francis Poulenc's 1947 opera Les mamelles de Tirésias.

When Guillaume was young, he was influenced by Symbolist poetry. During his life, he was admired by the young poets who helped influence Surrealism. He was very original, and his work was not based on any theory.

Apollinaire was also a journalist and art critic for Le Matin, L'Intransigeant, L'Esprit nouveau, Mercure de France, and Paris Journal. In 1912, Apollinaire cofounded Les Soirées de Paris, an artistic and literary magazine.

Apollinaire was wounded in World War I. During the pandemic of 1918, Apollinaire died of the Spanish flu.^[3]

Works

A Calligramme by Guillaume Apollinaire^[4]
The Muse Inspiring the Poet, portrait of Apollinaire and Marie Laurencin, by Henri Rousseau, 1909
Apollinaire's grave in Père Lachaise Cemetery
Poem by Apollinaire on a wall in Leiden

Poetry

L'enchanteur pourrissant (1909). The Enchanter Rotting
Le Bestiaire ou Cortège d'Orphée (1911)
Alcools (1913)
Vitam impendere amori (1917)
Calligrammes, poèmes de la paix et de la guerre 1913–1916 (1918) (published shortly after Apollinaire's death)
Il y a... (1925) Albert Messein
Julie ou la rose (1927)
Ombre de mon amour (1947). Poems addressed to Louise de Coligny-Châtillon
Poèmes secrets à Madeleine (1949). Pirated edition
Le Guetteur mélancolique (1952). Previously unpublished works
Poèmes à Lou (1955)
Soldes (1985). Previously unpublished works
Et moi aussi je suis peintre (2006). Album of drawings for Calligrammes, from a private collection

Novels

Mirely ou le Petit Trou pas cher (1900). Mirely, or The Cheap Little Hole (unpublished)
Que faire ? (1900). What to Do?
Les Onze Mille Verges ou les Amours d'un hospodar (1907). The Eleven Thousand Rods; The Debauched Hospodar
Les Exploits d'un jeune Don Juan (1911). The Amorous Exploits of a Young Rakehell, trans. Reaves Tessor (1959)
La Rome des Borgia (1914). The Rome of the Borgias
La Fin de Babylone (1914). The Fall of Babylon
Les Trois Don Juan (1915). The Three Don Juans
La Femme assise (1920). The Sitting Woman

Short story collections

L'Hérèsiarque et Cie (1910). The Heresiarch and Co., trans. Rémy Inglis Hall (1965)^[5]
Le Poète assassiné (1916). The Poet Assassinated, trans. Matthew Josephson (1923, title story);^[6] trans. Ron Padgett (1968, unabridged)^[7]
Les Épingles (1928). The Pins

Plays

Les Mamelles de Tirésias (1917). The Breasts of Tiresias
La Bréhatine (1917). Screenplay (collaboration with André Billy)
Couleurs du temps (1918)
Casanova (published 1952)

Articles

Le Théâtre italien, illustrated encyclopedia, 1910
Preface, Catalogue of 8th Salon annuel du Cercle d'art Les Indépendants, Musée moderne de Bruxelles, 10 June – 3 July 1911.
La Vie anecdotique, Chroniques dans Le Mercure de France, 1911–1918
Pages d'histoire, chronique des grands siècles de France, chronicles, 1912
Les Peintres Cubistes, Méditations Esthétiques, 1913
La Peinture moderne, 1913
L'Antitradition futuriste, manifeste synthèse, 1913
Jean Metzinger à la Galerie Weill, Chroniques d'art de Guillaume Apollinaire, L'Intransigeant, Paris Journal, 27 May 1914
Case d'Armons, 1915
L'esprit nouveau et les poètes, 1918
Le Flâneur des Deux Rives, chronicles, 1918

Translations into English

The Poet Assassinated, trans. Matthew Josephson (The Broom Publishing, 1923)
Selected Writings, trans. Roger Shattuck (New Directions, 1948)
Alcools: Poems 1898–1913, trans. Walter Meredith (Doubleday, 1964)
Alcools, trans. Anne Hyde Greet (University of California Press, 1965)
Selected Poems, trans. Oliver Bernard (Penguin, 1965; expanded, bilingual edition, Anvil Press, 1986)
The Heresiarch and Co., trans. Rémy Inglis Hall (1965), published in the UK as The Wandering Jew and Other Stories (1967)^[8]
The Poet Assassinated, trans. Ron Padgett (Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1968)
Calligrams, trans. Anne Hyde Greet (Unicorn Press, 1970)^[9]
Apollinaire on Art: Essays and Reviews, 1902-1918, trans. Susan Suleiman (1972)
Zone, trans. Samuel Beckett (Dolmen Press, 1972)
Alcools: Poems, trans. Donald Revell (Wesleyan University Press, 1995)
The Self-Dismembered Man: Selected Later Poems, trans. Donald Revell (Wesleyan University Press, 2004)
The Little Auto, trans. Beverley Bie Brahic (CB editions, 2012)
"Zone", trans. David Lehman, in Virginia Quarterly Review (2013)^[10]
Zone: Selected Poems, trans. Ron Padgett (New York Review Books, 2015)
Selected Poems, trans. Martin Sorrell (Oxford University Press, 2015)

In popular culture

French composer Francis Poulenc has set Apollinaire's poems to music in his five-part song cycle Banalités (1940), which in turned inspired Pink Martini's song Sympathique (je ne veux pas travailler in 1997.
Dutch composer Marjo Tal set some of Apollinaire’s poetry to music.^[11]
French composer Denise Roger set Apollinaire’s poetry to music.^[12]
Apollinaire is played by Seth Gabel in the 2018 television series Genius, which focuses on the life and work of Pablo Picasso.