(Faux Titre No. 355) Apollinaire, Guillaume - Bohn, Willard - Apollinaire, Guillaume - Apollinaire On The Edge - Modern Art, Popular Culture, and The Avant-garde-Rodopi (2010)

Apollinaire on the Edge
Modern Art, Popular Culture,

and the Avant-Garde
FAUX TITRE
355
Etudes de langue et littérature françaises

publiées sous la direction de
Keith Busby, †M.J. Freeman,

Sjef Houppermans et Paul Pelckmans
Apollinaire on the Edge
Modern Art, Popular Culture,
and the Avant-Garde
Willard Bohn
AMSTERDAM - NEW YORK, NY 2010

Cover illustration: Guillaume Apollinaire in Paris,1914.
Cover design:: Pier Post.
The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of

‘ISO 9706: 1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents -
Requirements for permanence’.
Le papier sur lequel le présent ouvrage est imprimé remplit les prescriptions
de ‘ISO 9706: 1994, Information et documentation - Papier pour documents -
Prescriptions pour la permanence’.
ISBN: 978-90-420-3108-1
E-Book ISBN: 978-90-420-3109-8
© Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2010
Printed in The Netherlands
Table of contents
List of Illustrations 7
Acknowledgments 9
Introduction 11
1. Contemplating The Bestiary 15
2. In Search of the Whatnots 45
3. Apollinaire and Children’s Rhymes 75
4. The Mammaries of Tiresias 105
Conclusion 127
Bibliography 129
Index 141
List of illustrations
Figure 1.1 Raoul Dufy, The Serpent 22
Figure 1.2 Raoul Dufy, The Cat 27
Figure 1.3 Raoul Dufy, The Lion 39
Figure 1.4 Raoul Dufy, The Carp 41
Figure 3.1 Benozzo Gozzoli, The Feast of Herod and

the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist 94
Acknowledgments
The following study is dedicated to the memory of Michel

Décaudin, mentor, colleague, and scholar extraordinaire. Several sec-
tions were presented previously as public lectures at Oxford Univer-
sity. I am grateful to Balliol College for inviting me to serve as Oliver
Smithies Lecturer. The National Gallery of Art in Washington D. C.
kindly granted permission to reproduce Benozzo Gozzoli’s painting
The Feast of Herod and the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist
(1461-1462), Samuel H. Kress Collection, Image copyright 2007
Board of Trustees. Portions of Chapters 1 and 3 appeared in the
following publications and are reprinted with their authorization:
“Contemplating Apollinaire’s Bestiary” in Modern Language Review,
Vol. XCIX, No. 1 (January 2004), pp. 47-53, permission granted by
the Modern Humanities Research Association; and “Apollinaire,
Salomé, and the Dance of Death” in French Studies, Vol. LVII, No. 4
(October 2003), pp. 491-500.
Introduction
In contrast to the following pages, which are the result of lengthy

investigations, the title of this book came to me only recently. Some
years ago, several students told me about a poem by Guillaume
Apollinaire they had encountered in English translation. According to
one person, it featured a fairy princess who beckoned seductively to a
man saying “Come to the edge.” When he cautiously drew near, she
gave him a gentle push, and he began to fly! Eager to read the French
original, the students asked me to help them find it, which proved to
be impossible. Since the poem was not included in Apollinaire’s
Oeuvres poétiques, I concluded that it had been written by someone
else—but who? And in which language? And on what occasion?
Several years elapsed before I discovered the answers to these ques-
tions. The poem was composed by the British poet Christopher Logue,
I eventually learned, for a festival commemorating the fiftieth anniver-
sary of Apollinaire’s death. Instead of a fairy princess, the first
speaker turned out to be Apollinaire himself.
Come to the Edge
Come to the edge.

We might fall.
Come to the edge.
It’s too high!
COME TO THE EDGE!
And they came,
and he pushed,
and they flew ...1
Conceived originally as a historical tribute, the poem contains a

powerful inspirational message as well. For this reason, it has been
adopted by public speakers everywhere and has become surprisingly
popular. Logue’s composition has even entered the realm of folklore,
where numerous variants exist side by side. In one version, the
speaker—who is identified as Life—admonishes his listeners not to be
afraid to take chances. In another version, God invites mankind to
approach his celestial throne. Ironically, most people have come to
1
Christopher Logue, New Numbers (New York: Knopf, 1970), p. 81.
12 Apollinaire on the Edge
believe the text was composed by Apollinaire. Even the illusionist

David Copperfield, who has emblazoned the poem on his stage
curtain, attributes it to the French poet.
While it is tempting to compare Apollinaire to Copperfield
himself, he does not resemble a magician so much as a tightrope
walker. Like an aerialist on the high wire, he derived constant en-
joyment from living dangerously. Or rather, to borrow a metaphor
from Christopher Logue, he enjoyed living on the edge. This metaphor
lends itself to two different interpretations, both of which describe
Apollinaire perfectly. Since he consistently worked on the cutting
edge, I imagine him balancing on a razor-thin vertical plane. Like a
tightrope walker performing without a net, he constantly took incredi-
ble risks. By contrast, Logue envisions the poet at the edge of a hori-
zontal plane, from which he flings himself into space. Like the first
image, the second depicts Apollinaire as an innovator and an explorer.
As the poem implies, he inspired generations of poets who came after
him. He taught them to dare, and he taught them to fly.
The horizontal edge is also an apt image because Apollinaire
worked on material that was marginal much of the time. Or rather, he
experimented with material that appeared to be marginal but which
has since proved to be central to modern aesthetics. Since he was
working at the beginning of the tradition, the significance of many of
his contributions was not recognized until later. The most obvious
example is his visual poems, which were subjected to widespread
ridicule when they first appeared. Since then, they have influenced
hundreds of poets all over the world, who continue to explore their
legacy today.2 The present volume attempts to rehabilitate four
additional genres, which have received relatively little critical
attention. In retrospect, it is clear why Apollinaire became the leader
of the Parisian avant-garde. His experiments with all four paved the
way for major aesthetic developments, several of which he clearly
foresaw.
2
See for example, Johanna Drucker, The Visible Word: Experimental Typography
and Modern Art, 1909-1923 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994), and two
books by myself: The Aesthetics of Visual Poetry, 1914-1928 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1986; Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1993) and Modern
Visual Poetry (Newark, Delaware: University of Delaware Press, 2000).
Introduction 13
The marginal genre that achieved the greatest success was

doubtless the artist’s book, which has attracted numerous artists and
writers ever since. The first chapter considers one of the earliest exam-
ples, which appeared in 1911. Like L’Enchanteur pourrissant (The
Putrescent Enchanter), published two years before, it contains a text
by Apollinaire and illustrations by an important artist—in this case,
Raoul Dufy. If it simply strikes the casual observer as a charming little
volume, the degree of collaboration between the poet and the artist is
virtually unprecedented. Part of this chapter examines the book
through the eyes of the reader, with special attention to the verbal
images. The remainder looks at the volume through the eyes of the
viewer. Utilizing insights developed by Roland Barthes, it analyzes
the illustrations and the various messages they convey.
The following chapter examines a group of poems that were
initially entitled Banalités. Published in 1914, these audacious works
strike the reader at first glance as completely unimaginative. Or rather,
in keeping with their unusual title, they seem commonplace,
hackneyed, trite, and/or trivial. Upon closer examination, one dis-
covers this impression is deceiving. Like beauty, banality turns out to
lie in the eye of the beholder. The nature of the compositions’ banal-
ity, its different functions, and the various forms it assumes are sur-
prisingly interesting. Many of the poems also appropriate elements of
everyday reality. Some depict a slice of life, some engage in visual
pursuits, and some focus on common objects. Paralleling similar de-
velopments in the arts, the genre appealed to a number of poets who
came after Apollinaire, especially those associated with Dada and Sur-
realism.
The next chapter considers Apollinaire’s debt to popular culture
in more detail, focusing on an area that has previously been neglected.
In contrast to the preceding chapter, which illustrates the impact of
contemporary reality on his poetry, it is concerned with a traditional
branch of folklore. Concentrating on children’s rhymes, it documents
their pervasive presence in Apollinaire’s poetry and studies the
different roles he assigned to them. Among other things, the chapter
sheds new light on several poems, including “La Dame” and “La
Blanche Neige,” and presents a new interpretation of “Salomé.” In
addition, it discusses several articles in which the poet displays a keen
interest in children’s rhymes and an acquaintance with folklore
scholarship. It argues as well that his fondness for this genre reflects
his predilection for unmediated experience.
The final chapter examines Les Mamelles de Tirésias (The
Mammaries of Tiresias), which was destined to play an important role
in the evolution of modern French theater. First performed in 1917,
this resolutely anti-realistic work shocked and delighted the audience
by turns. Insisting that it was more faithful to reality than traditional
plays, Apollinaire added the subtitle “drame surréaliste.” While in-
vestigating what he meant by that term, which was later appropriated
by André Breton and his colleagues, the chapter discusses the role of
surprise and relates it to Apollinaire’s fascination with novelty and
modernity. After considering several possible sources, it provides a
detailed analysis of the play and proposes a new interpretation. In
particular, it argues that Les Mamelles de Tirésias is not didactic and
that, despite their obvious immediacy, the themes of feminism and
repopulation serve a higher purpose.
Chapter 1
Contemplating The Bestiary
In 1911, Apollinaire published a collection of poems entitled Le

Bestiaire ou Cortège d’Orphée which, as Anne Hyde Greet and others
have shown, was modeled on earlier collections of animal fables and
myths.1 Faithful to the principles governing this ancient genre, each
text was accompanied by a woodcut by Raoul Dufy. Consisting of
thirty poems followed by a series of explanatory footnotes, the book
was a stunning accomplishment. Greet calls it “peut-être la plus belle
édition publiée en France au XXe siècle” (“perhaps the most beautiful
edition published in France during the 20th century”) (p. 151). The
slim volume is not only a remarkable verbal achievement but also a
visual tour de force. Translated and reprinted repeatedly over the
years, it has delighted generations of readers.2 A surprising number of
artists, including Graham Sutherland, have succumbed to the temp-
tation to illustrate the volume themselves. Several composers have
even set some of the poems to music.3
What distinguishes Le Bestiaire from most illustrated books, in-
cluding previous bestiaries, is not its attractiveness so much as the
1
Anne Hyde Greet, Apollinaire et le livre de peintre (Paris: Minard, 1977), pp. 57-
151. Subsequent references to this study will be cited in the text. See also Claude
Debon, “Relire et revoir Le Bestiaire ou cortège d’Orphée d’Apollinaire,” Que Vlo-
Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser. No. 1
(January-March 1998), pp. 1-32. Apollinaire had published eighteen of the poems in
La Phalange on June 15, 1908: “La Tortue,” “Le Cheval,” “La Chèvre du Thibet,”
“Le Chat,” “Le Lion,” “Le Lièvre,” “Le Lapin,” “Le Dromadaire,” “La Chenille,”
La Mouche,” “La Puce,” “Le Paon,” “Le Hibou,” “Ibis,” “Le Boeuf,” and three texts
that would later be attributed to Orpheus.
2
See the “Petite Bibliographie du Bestiaire” published in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin
International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 1st ser., No. 28 (April 1981), pp.
16-18.
3
A list of artists and composers who have been attracted to Le Bestiaire appears in
ibid. Debon discusses some of the former in “Relire et revoir Le Bestiaire ou cortège
d’Orphée d’Apollinaire” and provides a list of illustrators on pp. 28-29.
way in which it evolved. Whereas authors traditionally exert little

control over their illustrations, which are chosen by the publisher,
Apollinaire collaborated closely with Dufy as the woodcuts progres-
sed. Together they experimented with a number of different designs
until they both were satisfied. From the beginning, the volume was
conceived as a livre d’artiste (“artist’s book”) whose poems and
pictures would continually interact with each other. In every instance,
the text and its corresponding woodcut function as a single unit—a
fact that the poet and the painter exploit to great advantage. Unlike
traditional illustrations, which simply accompany the words on the
page, Dufy’s pictures possess a critical function. Rejecting a purely
passive role, they complement the verbal text and interpret it in a
variety of ways. As such, they represent not only a brand new
approach to the illustrated book but also a radically new view of the
artist’s mission.
Although Le Bestiaire continues to grow in popularity, it has
received surprisingly little critical attention. Apollinaire is partly to
blame for this neglect himself, since he adopted the neo-Symbolist
mode with its cult of implicit meaning. While the poems’ syntax is
relatively straightforward, they are filled with personal allusions and
hermetic references. This difficulty is partially offset by Dufy’s
illustrations which, despite their intense primitivism, are immediately
intelligible. The volume itself is divided into four sections, each of
which is presided over by Orpheus (the archetypal poet), who is
celebrated on four different occasions. According to legend,
Apollinaire notes, his music was so powerful that “les animaux
sauvages eux-mêmes venaient écouter son cantique” (“the wild
animals themselves came to listen to his song”). The remaining
woodcuts depict twenty-six animals, four of which are associated with
myths of one kind or another. In addition to the Horse, the Serpent,
and the Ox, these include the legendary Sirens—who are absent from
traditional bestiaries. The first section, which is twice as long as the
others, is reserved for land-dwelling animals. The second section is
devoted to insects, the third to creatures that live in the water, and the
fourth to animals that fly.
Contemplating The Bestiary 17
The Verbal Images

Each of Apollinaire’s poems consists of a single stanza com-
prising four or five lines. Although a few alexandrines intrude from
time to time, the vast majority of the texts employ octosyllabic verse.
Some poems utilize rhymed couplets, others alternating rhymes, and
still others a combination of the two. “La Méduse” (“The Jellyfish”)
and “Le Hibou” (“The Owl”) contain rhymes that look slightly
different but sound exactly the same. Although the poet uses definite
and indefinite articles indiscriminately to describe the animals,
alternating between singular and plural constructions, these references
are consistently generic. It makes no difference whether he says
“comme le lièvre” (“like the hare”) or “comme un lièvre” (“like a
hare”). Even when Apollinaire employs demonstrative adjectives or
addresses the animal directly, he manages to maintain a broader focus.
“Cet oiseau” (“This bird”) does not really refer to a specific peacock
but to peacocks in general. And the Serpent, whom he calls “tu,”
represents all serpents rather than a particular individual.
While Apollinaire’s poetry is consistently witty and amusing, it is
also surprisingly evasive. “En dépit d’un titre alléchant,” Claude
Debon observes, “les quatrains et quintils du Bestiaire n’abordent
pratiquement jamais l’animal de front” (“Despite their alluring titles,
the quatrains and quintains in Le Bestiaire almost never confront the
animal directly”).4 In contrast to traditional bestiaries, which adopt a
presentational mode, Apollinaire alludes to the creature in passing.
Debon cites the example of the Tibetan Goat, among others:
Les poils de cette chèvre et même

Ceux d’or pour qui prit tant de peine
Jason, ne valent rien au prix
Des cheveux dont je suis épris.
(The hair of this goat, and even

Those golden strands sought by
Jason, are worthless compared
To the hair that I adore.)
4
Ibid., p. 19.
In a study published in 1966, Marc Poupon wondered what

prompted Apollinaire to choose a goat from such an exotic locale.5
Why pick Tibet, he queried, when goats exist all over France? The
answer is that the Tibetan variety possesses wool that is unusually fine
and soft. Marketed commercially as “cashmere,” it is expensive and
highly sought after. While the Goat makes a brief appearance at the
beginning of the poem, its presence is basically misleading. Instead of
the protagonist, it turns out to be a sacrificial victim. Leaving the
hapless beast dangling at the end of a prepositional phrase, Apollinaire
focuses on its valuable wool which, to make things worse, he hastens
to disparage. The actual subject does not appear until the final line,
which celebrates Marie Laurencin’s hair. A number of animals under-
go a similar fate in other poems, including the Cat, which is engulfed
by domestic scenery, and the Ibis, which is displaced by a bilingual
pun. Others are relegated to similes, like the Elephant whose gleaming
tusks resemble the poet’s words, or serve as convenient metaphors.
“Belles journées, souris du temps,” the poet laments at one point,
“vous rongez peu à peu ma vie” (“Lovely days, temporal mice, / You
are slowly nibbling my life away”). As Debon points out, only six
poems treat the animal as an actual subject. Several texts fail to
identify the beast at all. Like Mallarmé, Apollinaire strives to “pein-
dre, non la chose, mais l’effet qu’elle produit” (“depict, not the thing,
but the effect that it produces”).6 What interests him is not the animals
so much as what they can tell us about ourselves.
Since the volume is supposed to be a bestiary, Apollinaire’s
situation is rather ironic. Although he attaches little importance to the
animals, he must magnify their role somehow in order to be
convincing. This function is reserved for Dufy’s woodcuts which, like
their generic titles, maintain the fiction that the book is concerned with
natural history. With one exception (“Les Sirènes”), each of the
illustrations depicts a single animal. Since the Sirens always appear
together in Classical myth, Dufy (and Apollinaire) decided to portray
two of them. Similarly, each title consists of a singular noun preceded
5
Marc Poupon, “Quelques énigmes du Bestiaire,” La Revue des Lettres Modernes,
nos. 146-149 (1966), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 5, p. 87.
6
Stéphane Mallarmé, letter to Henri Cazalis written in October or November 1864,
Correspondance, ed. Henri Mondor and Jean-Pierre Richard (Paris: Gallimard,
1959), Vol. I, p. 137.
by a singular article. The only exceptions are “Les Sirènes,” discussed

above, and “Ibis,” which violate the general rule for different reasons.
Since ibis is the second person future of “to go” in Latin, as the poet
reminds us in the first line, the second title represents a bilingual pun.
The gratuitous pairing of the Egyptian bird with the Latin verb leads
Apollinaire in turn to envisage a voyage to the underworld.
Oui, j’irai dans l’ombre terreuse

O mort certaine, ainsi soit-il!
Latin mortel, parole affreuse,
Ibis, oiseau des bords du Nil.
(Yes, I will go into the dark earth

O certain death, so be it!
Fatal Latin, horrible word,
Ibis, bird from the Nile’s shores).
On the one hand, as Greet observes, the composition announces

Apollinaire’s impending death (p. 140). Reminding him of his inesca-
pable mortality, the ibis serves essentially as a memento mori. On the
other hand, since the ibis symbolized the immortal soul in ancient
Egypt, the poem looks forward to Apollinaire’s resurrection. Viewed
in this perspective, it anticipates the final text, entitled “Le Boeuf”
(“The Ox”), which reserves a place for the poet in heaven.
Suspended between the poems and the illustrations, the titles in
Le Bestiaire occupy a precarious position. Compelled to do double
duty, they not only introduce the text and the picture simultaneously
but provide a transition between them. On a number of occasions, the
relationship between the various components proves to be problem-
atic. Sometimes, the title contradicts the poem, sometimes it contra-
dicts the illustration, and sometimes it contradicts them both. Whereas
the title of “L’Ecrevisse” evokes a single Crayfish, for example, the
text speaks of multiple crustaceans. And while a tortoise figures in the
poem entitled “La Tortue,” the woodcut depicts a lyre (belonging to
Orpheus) constructed from the creature’s shell. Unlike the rest of the
illustrations, which portray living animals, the Tortoise is dead!
Similar conflicts occur in “Le Boeuf,” where all three components
appear to contradict each other simultaneously. The Ox specified in
the title appears neither in the woodcut, which seems to portray a
winged bull, nor in the poem, which identifies the creature as an angel.
Ce chérubin dit la louange

Du paradis, où, près des anges,
Nous revivrons, mes chers amis,
Quand le bon Dieu l’aura permis.
(This cherub sings the praises

Of paradise, where, near the angels,
We will be reborn, my friends,
When God in his wisdom decides.)
Since the volume is modeled on earlier bestiaries, many of which

explore the animals’ religious significance, Apollinaire imitates this
practice from time to time in Le Bestiaire. In the case of “Le Boeuf,”
he appended a note explaining that cherubs are actually winged oxen.7
Although a grim spectre haunts the final section of Le Bestiaire, as
noted previously, the volume manages to conclude on an optimistic
note. Through God’s grace, “Le Boeuf” assures us, mankind will
eventually triumph over death.
In 1910, the couturier Paul Poiret commissioned Dufy to create
textile designs from carved wood blocks. In contrast to those designs,
which were printed in bright colors, the illustrations in Le Bestiaire
are in black and white. Despite this restriction, which proves to be no
handicap, they are clearly Fauvist in inspiration. Like similar works by
Matisse, Braque, and Derain, they employ simplified forms sur-
rounded by elaborate patterns. Like the latter works, they present a
unified surface that is essentially two-dimensional. As one would
expect, most of the animal portraits are generic—like Apollinaire’s
poems. Five woodcuts depict specific individuals, who can be
identified either from their visual attributes or from the context in
which they appear. Since the Tortoise forms part of an ancient Greek
lyre, for example, it clearly belongs to Orpheus. The fact that the
Horse possesses wings allows us to recognize it as Pegasus. And since
the Serpent is flanked by Adam and Eve, it must be the original
Tempter. Similarly, the way in which the Dove is depicted reveals that
it represents the Holy Ghost. We will discover that “Le Lion” portrays
a specific individual as well.
7
For additional information about this tradition, see Pol-P. Gossiaux, “Sur les
chérubins du Bestiaire”" Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 249-253 (1970), special
issue Guillaume Apollinaire 9, pp. 169-70.
In contrast to Apollinaire, whose poems are deliberately evasive,

Dufy approaches each of the animals directly, developing and
expanding the verbal reference within a decorative framework. Nearly
half the portraits reproduce verbal images that are largely unremark-
able. Refusing to engage in rhetorical or semantic exercises, the
original references merely evoke the creature in question. Most of the
poems’ titles are redundant, simply repeating the animal’s name, but
several prove to be indispensable. Although neither the Serpent nor
the Tibetan Goat is named in the text, the former can be identified
from various clues. That the latter comes from Tibet, however, is only
indicated by the title. If the Goat is only mentioned in passing, the
portrait of the Serpent that emerges is more complex.
Tu t’acharnes sur la beauté.

Et quelles femmes ont été
Victimes de ta cruauté!
Eve, Eurydice, Cléopâtre;
J’en connais encor trois ou quatre.
(You eagerly pursue beauty.

And how many women have fallen
Victim to your cruelty!
Eve, Eurydice, Cleopatra;
I know three or four myself.)
The poem begins with a startling assertion: that serpents are

attracted to beautiful women. Unfortunately, instead of worshipping
their idols from afar, they have a distressing tendency to attack them.
Apollinaire cites three examples taken from the Bible, Classical
mythology, and ancient history respectively. Unlike Eurydice, who
succumbed to an accidental snakebite (and who was rescued by Or-
pheus), Cleopatra died from a self-administered wound. And although
Eve was duped rather than bitten by Satan’s emissary, her sin con-
demned the entire human race to death. Apollinaire confides that he
knows three or four women himself who have been bitten by serpents.
This statement (which is highly unlikely) encourages us to review the
poem and to discover the phallic symbolism lurking just beneath its
surface. Sooner or later, one perceives that the poet is referring to his
amorous conquests. Instead of confirming the previous comments, the
statement turns out to be a ribald interjection. Uttered with Apol-
linaire’s tongue planted firmly in his cheek, it is meant to be amusing.
Focusing on expressions such as “cruauté” and “Tu t’acharnes,” Greet

claims that the poem exposes “l’aspect sadique des amours du poète”
(“the sadistic aspect of the poet’s loves”) (p. 91). However, the
poem’s ironic dimension undercuts any attempt to apply these terms
literally. For the women who have succumbed to Apollinaire’s
“serpent” have all been willing victims. Whatever cries they may have
uttered were associated with pleasure rather than pain.
Figure 1.1 Raoul Dufy, The Serpent

Miraculously, Dufy’s woodcut manages to reproduce both the

verbal image and the implicit verbal metaphor. Depicted in an upright
position, the phallic Serpent looms above two naked human beings,
who gaze serenely at the viewer. Its huge proportions symbolize the
enormous influence that sexuality exerts on human behavior—a
common theme in Apollinaire’s work. Despite W. J. Strachan’s reser-
vations, the woodcut obviously depicts Adam and Eve.8 Although
Strachan believes the figure on the right represents Cleopatra, the
short hair and the prominent abdominal muscles indicate that it is
male. In contrast to Eve, whose long hair partially hides her graceful
curves, Adam is strong and muscular. At this point several questions
arise. Why do Adam and Eve seem so calm standing beside the agent
of their eternal damnation? And why does Eve cover her mouth with
her hands? If this gesture signals her despair, as Greet suggests, then
why isn’t Adam upset as well? The answer seems to be that Dufy
depicts Eden just before the Fall, before Adam and Eve realize they
have sinned (and that the Serpent has betrayed them). This explains
why they are not wearing fig leaves, for example, and why the Serpent
is still able to walk upright. It also explains why Eve places her hands
over her mouth—not because she is ashamed, one finally realizes, but
because she is eating the fatal apple.
Although the Serpent proves to be surprisingly complex, the rest
of the animals in this group are unremarkable at the linguistic level.
The Tibetan Goat, the Cat, the Rabbit, the Dromedary, the Fly, the
Dolphin, the Jellyfish, the Carp, the Sirens, and the Ox all eschew
verbal gymnastics. By contrast, the remaining illustrations portray
animals that are associated with rhetorical tropes of one persuasion or
another. As noted previously, the Ibis is constructed around a bilingual
pun. And since the Tortoise is represented by its shell, it qualifies as a
verbal metonym. In addition, the Hare, the Elephant, the Locust, and
the Crayfish all participate in similes. In contrast to its three com-
panions, the first poem contains a negative comparison. Apollinaire
advises artists and writers not to imitate the Hare, which is “lascif et
peureux” (“lascivious and afraid”), but to be extremely creative. The
next two works are concerned with Apollinaire’s poetic voice. Like
the Elephant with its valuable tusks, he declares, he possesses “un bien
8
W. J. Strachan, The Artist and the Book in France (London: Owen, 1969), pp. 48-
49.
precieux” (“a precious substance”) in his mouth. And like the Locust,
which nourished John the Baptist in the desert, his poetry will
hopefully appeal to superior individuals. The last text portrays the poet
backing away, like the Crayfish, from a delicate situation. Since Greet
reports that “l’écrevisse s’éloigne traditionnellement de l’objet des ses
désirs” “the crayfish traditionally retreats from the object of its
desires”) (p. 118), one suspects that Apollinaire’s ambivalence
concerns his love life.
In a similar manner, four of the woodcuts depict verbal meta-
phors: the Mouse, the Flea, the Octopus, and the Owl. As we saw ear-
lier, the Mouse represents the passage of time, nibbling away
relentlessly at the poet’s life. Dufy’s illustration portrays a cute little
animal, no bigger than the strawberry beside it. By contrast, the Flea is
magnified a hundredfold or more until it resembles a terrible monster.
One of the few unpleasant beasts in Le Bestiaire, it is less threatening
than the Serpent but more irritating than the Fly. Not surprisingly,
since fleas have tormented mankind for ages, Apollinaire casts the
insect in a sadistic role.
Puces, amis, amantes même,

Qu’ils sont cruels ceux qui nous aiment!
Tout notre sang coule pour eux.
Les bien-aimés sont malheureux.
(Fleas, friends, lovers even,

How cruel are those who love us!
Our blood flows ceaselessly for them.
Well-loved people are unfortunate.)
Another poet would have selected an evil character to represent

the Flea (Count Dracula comes to mind). However, Apollinaire
chooses to compare the bloodsucking insect to our friends and lovers.
Ironically, he seems to have concluded, those who are closest to us are
in a position to do the greatest harm. The problem with friends, Apol-
linaire insinuates in the third line, is that they overwhelm you with
excessive demands. The problem with lovers, as he knew from his
own experience, is that they abandon you. Proceeding logically from
the initial premise, the conclusion is inescapable. Since friends and
lovers are cruel, the people they love are miserable (another meaning
of “malheureux”). Although Apollinaire complained about being
unloved in “La Chanson du Mal-Aimé” (“The Song of the Unrequited
Lover”), he complains about being loved in the present poem--which

could just as well be called “La Chanson du Bien-Aimé.” Friends and
lovers are portrayed not only as sadistic parasites but as heartless
cannibals. The only solution seems to be to avoid people altogether.
For these and other reasons, “La Puce” is a disturbing poem. The por-
trait of friendship and love that emerges is not only jaundiced but
hopelessly pessimistic. The same remarks apply to “Le Poulpe,”
which is equally disturbing.
Jetant son encre vers les cieux,

Suçant le sang de ce qu’il aime
Et le trouvant délicieux,
Ce monstre inhumain, c’est moi-même.
(Spurting its ink toward the heavens,

Sucking the blood of what it loves
And finding it delicious,
This inhuman monster is myself.)
That Apollinaire chose to compare himself to the Octopus is not

terribly surprising, since they possess one obvious trait in common.
Like the poet writing at his desk, the animal emits occasional spurts of
ink. Like the Octopus, moreover, whose ink drifts slowly upward in
the water, Apollinaire offers his poetry to the gods above, from whom
he received his divine talent.9 However, the second line introduces
another image that clashes with the initial portrait. The Octopus is
associated not only with writing, one discovers, but also with
cannibalism. Wrapping its arms around its hapless victims, it sucks
every last drop of blood from their veins—prompting Apollinaire to
call it a “monstre inhumain.” Although the poem closely resembles
“La Puce,” it differs from it in one important respect: the metaphoric
equation has been reversed. This time it is Apollinaire who is the
inhuman monster, who subjects his friends and lovers to the same
abuse that he received previously. In addition, the second and third
lines apparently contain a private joke. At another level, they seem to
indicate that the poet used to suck on his pen while he was writing.
9
Debon calls attention to a pun in the first line: “Jetant son ancre vers les cieux”
(“Relire et revoir Le Bestiaire ou Cortège d’Orphée,” p. 7). Antoine Fongaro demon-
strates that this image is traditionally associated with hope in “Deux Notes sur le
Bestiaire,” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apol-
linaire, Ser. 4, No. 2 (April-June 1998), pp. 42-43.
Since ink is the lifeblood of poetry, Apollinaire jokes that he is

“suçant le sang de ce qu’il aime.”10
Once again, the portrait of intimate relationships that emerges is
disconcerting. And since we know the poet treasured such
relationships in real life, it is also puzzling. Interestingly, the conflict
between lived experience and imaginary experience extends into Le
Bestiaire itself. In contrast to “La Puce” and “Le Poulpe,” several
other poems present an optimistic view of love and friendship. In “Le
Chat” (“The Cat”), for example, Apollinaire celebrates the tranquil
joys of domesticity.
Je souhaite dans ma maison:

Une femme ayant sa raison,
Un chat passant parmi les livres,
Des amis en toute saison
Sans lesquels je ne peux pas vivre.
(I wish to have in my house:

A woman who is reasonable,
A cat passing among the books,
Some friends in every season
Without which I cannot live).
10
Fongaro suggests a slightly different interpretation: that Apollinaire is evoking his
ability to assimilate various texts he has read (Ibid., p. 43).
Figure 1.2 Raoul Dufy, The Cat

As Greet remarks, the Cat in Dufy’s illustration seems to have

walked into a modern still-life (p. 95). Surrounded by a lamp, a vase
of flowers, and an open book, it is sitting on a circular table covered
with a flowery table cloth. Comfortably ensconced among these famil-
iar objects, the animal gazes serenely at the viewer. Although it is dif-
ficult to prove, the scene appears to take place in the poet’s apartment.
Lying across the book is a pipe with an extremely long stem, like that
affected by Apollinaire during this period.11 While Dufy could have
chosen another object to hold the book open, the fact that he chose this
one is significant. It not only hints at the poet’s presence but also
allows us to identify the animal in the woodcut. According to all
indications, the latter portrays Apollinaire’s own cat—whose name
was “Pipe.”
In contrast to the illustration, the situation depicted in the poem
was entirely imaginary. In reality, Apollinaire had considerable diffi-
culty achieving domestic bliss, which partially explains his ambi-
valence. Although he had a cat and plenty of friends, it took years to
find a woman with whom he could build a permanent relationship.
That he lumps love and friendship together in “La Puce” and “Le
Poulpe” is accordingly rather surprising. While his relationships with
men tended to be rewarding, those with women (at least with Annie
Playden and Marie Laurencin) were less successful. Apollinaire
finally acknowledges this situation, albeit implicitly, in “Le Hibou.”
Mon pauvre coeur est un hibou

Qu’on cloue, qu’on décloue, qu’on recloue.
De sang, d’ardeur, il est à bout.
Tous ceux qui m’aiment, je les loue.
(My poor heart is an owl

Nailed, un-nailed, and nailed again.
It is drained of blood and ardor.
I praise all those who love me.)
During 1901-1902, when he was employed as a French tutor in

the Rhineland, Apollinaire was struck by the peasants’ practice of
nailing owls to their doors—presumably to ward off the evil eye. In
11
A photograph of Apollinaire smoking a similar pipe appears in Peter Read, Picasso
et Apollinaire: les métamorphoses de la mémoire 1905-1973 (Paris: Place, 1995), p.
62.
the beginning, he treated the image as a picturesque detail, one of

many that he noted during his stay.12 Not until later, when he was
searching for animals to include in Le Bestiaire, did he realize how
closely the crucified owl’s predicament resembled his own. Although
the source of Apollinaire’s anguish is never specified, the fact that it
affects his heart points to an amorous etiology. Tired of being tor-
mented by the object of his affection, he portrays himself as a martyr
to love. Like the owl, whose plight recalls that of Christ on the cross,
he is a victim of gratuitous cruelty. That this experience occurs over
and over makes it even more excruciating. No sooner does his heart
recover from one wound than it receives another. Since the wording is
ambiguous, it is impossible to tell whether Apollinaire is complaining
about one woman or several women. An earlier draft is much more
explicit. “Mon pauvre coeur est un hibou,” he wrote to Marie
Laurencin at the beginning of their relationship, “Que j’ai fixé à votre
porte” (“My poor heart is an owl / That I have nailed to your door”).13
Although he is unlucky in love, Apollinaire concludes, he is fortunate
to have a number of good friends. Their affection is a constant source
of joy and a great consolation.
Completing the list of animals associated with rhetorical tropes in
Le Bestiaire, the remaining five woodcuts depict verbal symbols.
Since the subject of “Le Cheval” is never identified by name, in theory
it represents an implicit symbol. Despite this momentary impediment,
the reader quickly perceives that the animal is Pegasus. Any lingering
doubt is removed by Dufy’s illustration, which depicts a winged
horse—the symbol of poetic inspiration—impatiently pawing the
ground. Like his winged steed, the poet’s imagination is often said to
“take flight.” A similar principle structures the relation between the
Dove in “La Colombe” and the Holy Ghost, which spreads its
protective wings over the world. In 1908, when Apollinaire wrote “Le
Hibou,” he and Marie Laurencin had only recently met. Although he
had fallen in love with her, she was apparently unwilling to commit
herself. By 1910, when Apollinaire composed “La Colombe,” the two
of them had been together for three years. “Comme vous j’aime une
Marie,” the poet confided to the Holy Ghost, “Qu’avec elle je me
12
See Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, ed. Marcel Adéma and Michel
Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1965), p. 530.
13
Ibid., p. 1038.
marie” (“Like you I love someone called Marie / And I am going to

marry her”).
Like the Horse and the Dove, the three remaining animals
symbolize abstract principles. Despite this superficial resemblance,
they operate in quite a different manner. The first two creatures serve
as vehicles for principles that they transmit to other individuals. The
Horse and the Dove do not symbolize Apollinaire and the Virgin Mary
but are related to them metonymically. By contrast, the Lion, the
Caterpillar, and the Peacock not only incarnate the principles
themselves but also symbolize specific persons. Since they resemble
the individuals in question, they are related to them metaphorically.
Like the Lion, which embodies nobility, kings are the most powerful
members of their society. Like the Caterpillar, which tirelessly pre-
pares to become a butterfly, successful poets demonstrate persever-
ance. And like the Peacock, which incessantly struts and preens, the
dandy exemplifies vanity.
En faisant la roue, cet oiseau,

Dont le pennage traîne à terre,
Apparaît encore plus beau,
Mais se découvre le derrière.
(Spreading its tail, this bird,

Whose plumage trails on the ground,
Appears even more beautiful,
But is forced to expose its behind).
Not surprisingly, “Le Paon” is the most popular poem in the

collection. Its sly humor and lapidary style, which recall La Fontaine,
have made it a favorite of the literate public. Although “Le Serpent”
and “Le Lapin” contain amusing observations, these are relatively
subtle. Because they refer to taboo subjects, they are necessarily
veiled. “Le Paon” is the only poem in Le Bestiaire that is truly funny.
The only satirical portrait in the collection as well, it is doubly unique.
Faithful to the genre’s expectations, Apollinaire reserves the
humorous punch line for the conclusion. Since the dandy himself
never makes an appearance, the Peacock represents an implicit
symbol. However, there can be little doubt as to the bird’s secret
identity. Although the poem’s moral is likewise implicit, it is
unmistakable. In Greet’s words, “la vanité entraîne le ridicule”
(“vanity exposes one to ridicule”) (p. 137).
The Visual Images

Thus far we have been looking at Le Bestiaire through the eyes of
a hypothetical reader who deciphers the poem before examining the
illustration. However, what catches one’s eye initially is not the text
but the illustration accompanying it. In other words, the process of
decipherment is frequently the reverse. This section examines the
volume through the eyes of the hypothetical viewer, of the reader who
reverses the traditional hierarchy and approaches the poems visually.
In fact, as Roland Barthes notes in a seminal essay entitled “Le
Message photographique,” this reversal corresponds to modern
practice in general. “[Aujourd’hui], et c’est là un renversement
historique important,” he remarks, “l’image n’illustre plus la parole;
c’est la parole qui, structurellement, est parasite de l’image”
(“[Today], and this is an important historical reversal, the image no
longer illustrates the words; rather the words, structurally speaking,
are parasitic on the image.”)14 Although Barthes is speaking about
newspaper photographs, this describes the situation in Le Bestiaire as
well.
While photography appears to be completely objective, Barthes
observes, it conveys a variety of coded messages that possess an
aesthetic and/or ideological function. Except for photographs of
traumatic events, which are entirely denotative, photographs are
manipulated by the individuals who take them, develop them, and
print them. “La connotation,” he explains, “c’est-à-dire l’imposition
d’un sens second au message photographique proprement dit,
s’élabore aux différents niveaux de production de la photographie
(choix, traitement tecnique, cadrage, mise en page)” (“Connotation,
the imposition of a second meaning on the photographic message
proper, is produced at different levels of photographic production
{choice, technical treatment, framing, layout}”).15 Since the photo-
graph purports to present a slice of life, these procedures constitute an
insidious metalanguage. Barthes distinguishes several photographic
devices that help to understand the artistic possibilities available to
14
Roland Barthes, “Le Message photographique,” Communications, No. 1 (1961),
p. 134.
15
Ibid., pp. 130-31.
Dufy, the strategies he chose to employ, and the manner in which the
woodcuts comment on the verbal text.
One such device is trucage—trick effects that are intended to
deceive the viewer. Barthes cites a widely circulated photograph of
Senator Millard Tydings talking to a notorious Communist in 1951.
Although the photograph was actually a fake, it caused the senator to
lose the next election. Conceivably a realistic painting of the two men
standing together could have achieved the same effect. Since Dufy’s
woodcuts do not pretend to depict reality, they do not employ this
procedure, which is better suited to photography.
However, the artist makes abundant use of a second device which
Barthes, drawing on a study by Edgar Morin, labels “photogenia.” By
adjusting technical variables such as lighting, exposure, and printing,
photographers can manipulate the physical image (and thus its
connoted message). Art possesses a similar set of variables that govern
the elaboration of a painting or a drawing (pictogenia). The image
may be embellished by modifying various elements such as texture,
contrast, line, and color. Like all good artists, Dufy knew how to
exploit the technical possibilities of his medium. Unlike some of his
colleagues, who liked to emphasize the grain of the wood, he preferred
to work on a smooth surface. Although his illustrations possess
considerable texture, this was added by Dufy himself as a finishing
touch.
Since woodcuts are traditionally printed in black ink on white
paper, they derive much, if not all, of their effect from contrast.
Although black and white are fairly evenly distributed in Le Bestiaire,
Dufy adjusts their proportion occasionally in order to achieve certain
effects. The best example is the Elephant which, except for its tusks
and toenails, is solid black.
Comme un éléphant son ivoire,

J’ai en bouche un bien précieux.
Pourpre mort!... J’achète ma gloire
Au prix des mots mélodieux.
(Like an elephant with ivory tusks,

My mouth contains a precious asset.
Crimson death!... I purchase my glory
By trading in melodious words.)
Since ivory is a valuable commodity, the initial simile generates a

charming conceit utilizing the language of the marketplace.
Unfortunately, the critics disagree about the meaning of “pourpre
mort.”16 While Dufy could have outlined the Elephant or included
more detail, he chose to depict its silhouette. Occupying two thirds of
the picture, the latter emphasizes the creature’s size as well as its
weight. Ironically, Dufy treats the smallest animal in the volume in
much the same manner. Although its shiny body reflects numerous
highlights, the Flea enjoys the same monumental status as the
Elephant. The same observation applies to the Serpent and the
Dolphin, whose bodies are crisscrossed by white lines. The large
expanse of black emphasizes the animals’ bulk. Interestingly, although
most of the scenes in Le Bestiaire have white backgrounds, Dufy
occasionally reverses the contrast to create negative illustrations.
While the Owl and the Ibis are the most obvious examples, the Fly,
the Crayfish, the Carp, and the Peacock are all superimposed on black
backgrounds. Like the portrait of the Crayfish, which resembles a blue
plate special, the first two illustrations are surprisingly elegant.
Otherwise, this procedure seems to make little difference.
In contrast to the heavy, dark shapes that dominate the previous
examples, other illustrations contain outlined forms and a profusion of
light. If black connotes solidity, white is generally associated with
fragility. The outlined animals are often more delicate than their solid
companions. This describes the slender Locust, for example, whom
we see basking in the sun. It describes the Octopus and the Jellyfish
as well, which are literally swimming in light. Unlike the Dolphin, the
Crayfish, and the Carp, which are removed from their element, they
are portrayed at the bottom of the sea. Waving its tentacles in every
direction, the Jellyfish dazzles the viewer with its shimmering
iridescence.
Méduses, malheureuses têtes

Aux chevelures violettes
Vous vous plaisez dans les tempêtes,
16
See, for example, Pol-P. Gossiaux, “Sur l’éléphant du Bestiaire,” Revue des Lettres
Modernes, Nos. 217-222 (1969), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 8, pp. 211-12
and Etienne-Alain Hubert, “Petit Cortège pour le Bestiaire,” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin
International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, Ser. 4, No. 2 (April-June 1998),
pp. 36-37.
Et je m’y plais comme vous faites.
Jellyfish, unhappy heads

Adorned with violet hair
You enjoy the raging tempests,
And like you I enjoy them too.)
Since méduse also evokes the Gorgon Medusa, who was

decapitated by Perseus in the Greek myth, Apollinaire compares the
jellyfish to a flotilla of floating heads with long, dangling hair. Dufy’s
drawing is unusually supple for a woodcut which, because the artist
uses a chisel instead of a pen, is typically much cruder. Indeed, this is
the source of much of the genre’s charm. Elsewhere in Le Bestiaire,
for example in “La Chèvre du Thibet” and “Le Serpent,” Dufy utilizes
a heavier line that is harder to control. Whereas fine lines are asso-
ciated with delicateness, thick lines connote sturdy qualities such as
strength, vigor, and good health.
Surprisingly, although he touches on it in several places, Barthes
neglects to discuss another connotative device: composition. Where
the various components are placed and how they are related to each
other is as important in art as it is in photography. Although Dufy’s
illustrations tend to be two-dimensional, the animals themselves
possess a certain amount of volume (except for the Elephant).
Similarly, half the pictures contain shallow backgrounds that are
theoretically distinct from the foreground. “Le Lion” and “Le Lapin”
come the closest to employing traditional perspective. In “Le Lièvre,”
by contrast, Dufy juxtaposes two separate views to create a composite
portrait. A closeup of the Hare in the distance is superimposed on the
hunting scene before us, as if the viewer were looking through a
telescope. Like the fleet-footed Hare, each of the animals in Le
Bestiaire is placed in the foreground in order to signal its importance.
Most of them appear to be larger than life for the same reason. While
the tiny mouse is dwarfed by the pile of fruits and vegetables
surrounding it, a number of other beasts occupy the whole picture.
Barthes identifies a related device that furnishes additional
information about the animals: their stance. As he points out, a picture
derives much of its meaning from a repertoire of stereotyped attitudes.
Gestures and poses are cultural artifacts that constitute a kind of
grammar. Those that appear in Le Bestiaire convey two types of
information: factual or symbolic. Since the Carp is jumping out of the
water, for example, we know it is a lively animal. The fact that the
Hare is portrayed from the rear with its forelegs and hindlegs far apart
signals that it is running. Since the Cat is sitting on the table with its
tail curled around its feet, one suspects it feels comfortable there. That
Pegasus appears with one foreleg raised and his wings spread tells us
he is impatient to take flight. Similarly, since the Dove extends its
wings in a cruciform pattern, we know it symbolizes the Holy Ghost.
Balanced on its hind legs with its forepaws outstretched, the Lion’s
heraldic pose reminds us that it is a royal emblem. Occasionally a pose
conveys both symbolic and factual information. If the phallic
connotations of the Serpent’s pose are unmistakable, as we have seen,
the fact that it is standing upright indicates that the scene take place
before the Fall.
Another connotative procedure is that of aestheticism. Some-
times, Barthes observes, photographs try to transform themselves into
works of art. No longer content simply to transmit factual information,
they cultivate certain stylistic effects. Since Dufy’s woodcuts already
are works of art, this distinction needs to be modified. In general, the
illustrations combine a decorative style inherited from the Nabis with
a more primitive, Fauvist style. However, some of them depart from
this basic model, at least partly, and adopt other styles. The waves in
“Le Dauphin,” for example—especially the bow wave preceding the
Dolphin—seem to have been influenced by Japanese block prints. The
same remark applies to the smoke issuing from the steamship’s funnel,
which resembles coils of hair. By contrast, “La Colombe” is heavily
indebted to a different model: religious iconography.
Colombe, l’amour et l’esprit

Qui engendrâtes Jésus-Christ,
Comme vous j’aime une Marie.
Qu’avec elle je me marie.
(Dove, the love and the spirit

That engendered Jesus Christ,
Like you I love a Mary.
And with her wish to marry.)
Although the translation manages to perpetuate the wordplay in

the last two lines, the reference to Marie Laurencin is unfortunately
lost. Interestingly, the woodcut’s style conveys as much information
as the Dove itself. Complementing the triangular background, which
evokes the Trinity, the burst of light symbolizes divine radiance and
power. Although “Le Paon” utilizes the same triangular composition
as “La Colombe,” with which it is paired, it exhibits traces of yet
another style. As Greet notes, its graceful curves and flowing lines
betray the influence of Art Nouveau (p. 138).
In addition, Barthes declares, pictorial objects play a significant
role, since they generate certain associations in the viewer’s mind. “Ce
sont donc les éléments d’un véritable lexique,” he asserts, “stables au
point que l’on peut facilement les constituer en syntaxe” (“They are
thus elements of a veritable lexicon, stable enough to be easily
constituted into syntax”).17 This describes the objects in Dufy’s
woodcuts, which not only provide the animal with an appropriate
habitat but often tell an interesting story. That the Dromedary is
surrounded by date palms, for example, suggests it inhabits an Arabic
land. Since two pyramids are depicted in the distance, one deduces
that the country is Egypt. The Buddhist temple, the arched bridge, and
the towering mountains in “La Chèvre du Thibet” exercize a similar
function. One scarcely needs to consult the title to identify the country
in question. In “Le Serpent” the objects are replaced by human beings
(the only ones in the volume, besides Orpheus), who play an identical
role. The fact that the Serpent is flanked by Adam and Eve establishes
a crucial interpretive context.
Some of the collaborations between Dufy and Apollinaire turn out
to be even more successful. In several instances, the woodcut
completes the text so profoundly, so intimately, that it is difficult to
tell where one begins and the other leaves off. The final synthesis
stems not from the image of the animal so much as from the objects
surrounding it. Complementing the text and the image simultaneously,
they link each to the other while developing their latent meaning. One
of the poems that exemplifies this remarkable symbiosis is “Le
Cheval.”
Mes durs rêves formels sauront te chevaucher,

Mon destin au char d’or sera ton beau cocher
Qui pour rênes tiendra tendus à frénésie,
Mes vers, les parangons de toute poésie.
(My polished, formal dreams will straddle you,
17
Barthes, “Le Message photographique,” p. 132.
My handsome destiny will drive your golden chariot

And for taut reins will tightly grip,
My verses, paragons of poetry.)
While “Ibis” and “Le Boeuf” anticipate the poet’s death and re-
surrection, they are firmly anchored in the present. “Le Cheval” is the
only poem in Le Bestiaire that is situated entirely in the future. It not
only celebrates Apollinaire’s poetic inspiration but looks forward to
his eventual triumph. As Greet remarks, Pegasus “est un emblème de
la gloire aussi bien que de la poésie” (“is an emblem of glory as well
as poetry”) (p. 87). Whether Apollinaire conceives of his verse as a
model of excellence or as a visionary instrument, he is determined to
dominate modern poetry. Dufy’s woodcut depicts a high-spirited
animal that will make a fitting steed for the ambitious poet. From all
indications, the scene takes place at the foot of Mt. Helicon, the home
of the nine Muses. Issuing from the Hippocrene spring, created when
Pegasus stamped on the rock, a stream cascades down the mountain
and continues to the Gulf of Corinth.
Although Apollinaire boasts that he will tame Pegasus, like Belle-
rophon in the well-known myth, the moment has not yet come. That
the horse is wearing neither a bridle nor a saddle indicates he is
completely wild. This conclusion is reinforced by the mysterious
trefoil patterns, masquerading as vegetation, that dot the slopes behind
Pegasus. A Cabalistic food according to one of Greet’s students, their
role has long puzzled critics (p. 88). Additional research reveals that
these strange designs possess a doubly symbolic function. In the first
place, the clover leaf symbolizes the Trinity (which explains why
three-lobed arches were so popular in medieval architecture). “When
it is located upon a mountain,” one authority adds, “it comes to signify
knowledge of the divine essence gained by hard endeavor, through
sacrifice or study.”18 Thus the trefoils in “Le Cheval” echo the theme
of poetic inspiration embodied by Pegasus. In the second place, clover
is also a plant as well as a symbol. Since it possesses divine properties,
it makes an ideal fodder for the winged horse. Although there are
many different varieties, one suspects the specimens depicted by Dufy
are examples of crimson clover (trifolium pratense). Known in French
18
J. E. Cirlot, A Dictionary of Symbols, tr. Jack Sage, 2nd ed. (London: Routledge &
Kegan Paul, 1971), pp. 50-51.
as le farouch, they confirm our initial impression that Pegasus is wild

and untamed (farouche).
“Le Lion” is the site of another marvelous collaboration between
Apollinaire and Dufy. In contrast to many of the other texts, which
recite the virtues of the animal in question, the poem laments the fate
that has befallen this noble beast. Although the objects in the
background seem to be purely decorative, we will discover they have
important implications.
O lion, malheureuse image

Des rois chus lamentablement,
Tu ne nais maintenant qu’en cage
A Hambourg, chez les Allemands.
(O lion, the miserable image

Of lamentably fallen kings,
You are only born in a cage now
In Hamburg, among the Germans.)
As Greet declares, “le Lion est, dès le début, un être allégorique”

(“the Lion is an allegorical figure from the very beginning”) (p. 96).
As King of the Beasts, he symbolizes not only historical kings who
have disappeared over the years, but also Jesus Christ, a spiritual king,
who was martyred by those he was trying to save. Although the Lion’s
symbolism is relatively clear, the buildings and boats in the illustration
are not immediately identifiable. While the scene evidently portrays a
port, one wonders where it is supposed to be. The text seems to imply
that it is located in Hamburg. The last two lines refer to Carl
Hagenbeck, a famous wild animal trainer, who built the first modern
zoo in that city between 1902 and 1907. However, this interpretation
is contradicted by the proud Lion in Dufy’s woodcut, who appears to
be completely free.
Figure 1.3 Raoul Dufy, The Lion

Upon reflection, one realizes that the illustration contains the key
to the enigma. Since the Lion assumes a rampant pose, as if it were
emblazoned on a coat of arms, it constitutes a heraldic emblem. In
fact, it symbolizes both an individual and a city. For if the Lion
represents Christ and royalty in general, it is also the symbol of Saint
Mark. And when the citizens of the former Venetian empire adopted
the evangelist as their patron saint, they adopted his symbol as well. In
retrospect, one perceives that the illustration’s background represents
a Venitian scene. With a little effort, we can make out the piazza San
Marco on the left bordered by the Campanile, the Byzantine basilica
(two of whose domes are visible), and the Doge’s palace. On the right,
Dufy depicts the church of San Giorgio Maggiore, designed by
Palladio, and three sailing ships representing the former empire’s
maritime power. Like the Lion, that “malheureuse image / Des rois
chus lamentablement,” Venice is the symbol of a glorious past. In this
role, it is contrasted with modern Hamburg, where the King of the
Beasts is simply an object of curiosity.
A similar situation exists in “La Carpe,” whose ancient protag-
onist is also associated with a former era. As in the previous two
works, the scenery proves to be an indispensable part of the poem.
Dans vos viviers, dans vos étangs,

Carpes, que vous vivez longtemps!
Est-ce que la mort vous oublie,
Poissons de la mélancolie.
(In your ponds, in your pools,

Carp, how long you live!
Has death forgotten you,
Fish of melancholy.)
Figure 1.4 Raoul Dufy, The Carp

The first question that confronts the viewer is the identity of the
palace in the background. One wonders where the scene is situated
and why the artist has chosen this particular setting. For Gérard
Bertrand, the illustration evokes “la grande pièce d’eau de Versailles
ou de Chantilly” (“the large ornamental lake at Versailles or
Chantilly”).19 On the other hand, Greet suggests it depicts a Roman
atrium (p. 122). Exhaustive research reveals that the scene takes place
in the gardens at Versailles, near the Orangerie. Although the final
illustration is somewhat ambiguous, Greet reproduces an earlier
version that is much more specific (p. 121). Despite the picture’s
extreme foreshortening, which seriously distorts the perspective, the
view is unmistakable. Looking toward the north, toward the royal
palace, we see the equestrian statue of Louis XIV by Bernini, the
ornamental pond known as the Pièce d’Eau des Suisses, and finally
the Escaliers des Cent-Marches whose twin staircases embrace the
Orangerie. The facade adorned with friezes and arcades in the
background belongs to the Escaliers des Cent-Marches. The palace
itself is too large to be included in the picture. Like the hapless Lion,
who is associated with the Venetian empire, the Carp evokes France’s
glorious past. The sole remaining witness of Louis XIV’s triumphs, it
recalls the splendor of the French court as it contemplates the present
age. Once again modern civilization suffers by comparison—whence,
at least in part, the melancholy that pervades the last line. In addition
to the Classical era, the Carp longs for its former friends. Left with
nothing but its memories, which are still vivid, it is isolated both in
time and in space. Like the Lion, the Carp symbolizes a glorious ideal
that has become obsolete. Like the Lion, it has witnessed the decline
of royalty and the rise of modern democratic society. The melancholy
fate of both animals is emphasized by the objects around them, which
facilitate a rich dialogue between the illustration and the text.
The final connotative device that Barthes identifies is syntax. As
he points out, it makes a considerable difference whether a photograph
is printed separately or as part of a series. When several photographs
are viewed together—for example in an illustrated magazine—they
acquire a broader meaning that encompasses all of them. The whole
19
Gérard Bertrand, L’Illustration de la poésie à l’époque du cubisme 1901-1914:
Derain, Dufy, Picasso (Paris: Klincksieck, 1971), p. 54.
turns out to be larger than the sum of its parts. How the photographs
are ordered, moreover, determines the message they will ultimately
convey. The same thing is true of works of art, as Apollinaire clearly
realized, for the illustrations in Le Bestiaire are carefully orchestrated.
Many of the portraits are arranged in pairs, for example. The Cat is
juxtaposed with the Lion, the Octopus with the Jellyfish, the Dove
with the Peacock, and so forth. Similarly, a number of poems, such as
“La Puce” and “Le Poulpe,” are grouped together thematically. In
addition, one notes a gradual progression from the Classical world,
presided over by the Orphic poet, to the modern world, where he is
transformed into a messianic figure. Since the poet is engaged in a
divine mission, Apollinaire declares in the notes, he is destined to
become immortal. “Ceux qui s’exercent à la poésie,” he concludes, “et
n’aiment rien autre que la perfection qui est Dieu lui-même” (“Those
who practice poetry and who only love the perfection that is God
himself”) will surely be reborn in heaven.
Chapter 2
Apollinaire and the Whatnots
Born and raised in Rome, where he spent the first eight years of
his life, Apollinaire harbored a permanent affection for Italy. Aided by
his ability to speak the language, he also developed extensive relations
with a number of Italian artists and writers over the years.1 His
involvement with Italy reached its highest point in 1914, when the
Italian Futurists visited Paris in the spring. During their stay, they
clustered around Apollinaire and his journal Les Soirées de Paris,
whose office even housed several of them for a while. During this
period Apollinaire discussed artistic matters with his guests on a daily
basis. In addition, he published texts by Ardengo Soffici and Giovanni
Papini in Les Soirées de Paris and collaborated on their journal
Lacerba. Following repeated requests for some poetry, Soffici later
recounted, Apollinaire allowed him to look through his papers and
choose whatever he liked.2 The twenty-two short texts that he
discovered appeared in four issues of Lacerba published between
April 1914 and February 1915.3 Although the first batch was entitled
“Banalités,” Apollinaire asked Soffici to call the remainder “Quel-
conqueries” (“Whatnots”) because he found the title more amusing.4
After he returned to Florence, Soffici received another poem entitled
“Arrivée du paquebot” (“The Arrival of the Steamship”), which for
some reason was never published. Since it concluded with the naked
1
Although the bibliography has become quite lengthy, the basic text is still P. A.
Jannini’s La fortuna di Apollinaire in Italia, 2nd ed. (Milan: Istituto Editoriale Cis-
alpino, 1965).
2
Letter from Ardengo Soffici to Alfred Vallette, Mercure de France, May 15, 1920.
Repr. in Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, ed. Marcel Adéma and Michel
Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1965), pp. 1147-48.
3
See Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, pp. 370, 516, 562, 590-92, 594, 656-73.
“Arrivé du paquebot” is reprinted on p. 735.
4
Letter from Guillaume Apollinaire to Ardengo Soffici dated April 30, 1914. Repr.
in Apollinaire, Oeuvres complètes, ed. Michel Décaudin (Paris: Balland-Lecat, 1965-
66), Vol. IV, p. 762.
poet sucking a prostitute’s breasts, he may have feared the issue would
be confiscated.5
Wishing to defend the dead poet’s reputation in 1920, Soffici
insisted that Apollinaire attached no importance to these pieces, which
he had simply written to amuse himself. Privately, one suspects that
Soffici did not know what to make of the “Quelconqueries,” which as
late as 1960 he described as “curiose bizzarrie inedite” (“curious
unpublished oddities”).6 To be sure, many critics would doubtless
agree with him today. Others would probably agree with Antoine
Fongaro that the texts are completely worthless.7 By contrast, the
“Quelconqueries” elicited vociferous support from the Dadaists and
the Surrealists, who admired their persistent iconoclasm. Citing the
Whatnots and the conversation poems in the Second Surrealist
Manifesto, André Breton declared that Apollinaire deserved to be
ranked with Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and the Comte de Lautréamont. In
contrast to all the other writers, he explained, “ils ont voulu vraiment
dire quelque chose” (“they really tried to say something”).8
By 1914, the Belle Epoque was drawing to a close and with it the
Symbolist mode that had dominated French letters for so many years.
Although it was a time of intense intellectual ferment, readers were
not prepared for the “Quelconqueries,” whose audacity caught them
by surprise. As a result, the texts were greeted largely with silence.
Since then, the world has witnessed numerous literary and artistic
movements, which have become increasingly radical over the years.
Readers and viewers have been affected by this aesthetic revolution as
much as artists and writers. We have become more accustomed to
works that challenge the intellect in new and unforeseen ways. The
time has come to rehabilitate the “Quelconqueries,” therefore, many of
which were written with publication in mind. One of the things that
make them so remarkable is their incredible diversity, which is
unprecedented in a single collection by a single author. Four texts
5
The original version was even bawdier. See Michel Décaudin, “Autour de Stavelot:
deux cahiers et un agenda,” Que vlo-ve?: Bulletin International des Etudes sur
Apollinaire, 3rd ser., No. 21 (January-March 1996), p. 19.
6
Ardengo Soffici, “Apollinaire poeta e amico,” Omaggio ad Apollinaire, ed.
Giovanni Sangiorgi and Jacopo Recupero (Rome: Ente Premi Roma, 1960), p. 26.
7
Antoine Fongaro, “Un Poème retrouvé d’Apollinaire,” Studi Francesi, Vol. I, No. 2
(May-August 1957), p. 252.
8
André Breton, Second Manifeste du surréalisme in Oeuvres complètes, ed.
Marguerite Bonnet et al. (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1988), Vol. I, p. 815.
Apollinaire and the Whatnots 47
were borrowed from an opérette-bouffe Apollinaire had written

earlier, several appear to be jokes, one consists of a series of
anagrams, and another is a rough draft of a page from his novel Le
Poète assassiné (1916). Some of the compositions rhyme, some are in
free verse, and others are in prose. Some of them are recent, others
were written ten or fifteen years before. Indeed, half the texts were
taken (many verbatim) from a notebook known as the “cahier de
Stavelot,” which the poet used from 1897 to 1901.9
Michel Décaudin describes the “Quelconqueries” as “fonds de
tiroir qu’Apollinaire s’est manifestement amusé à rassembler” (“odds
and ends that Apollinaire obviously enjoyed assembling”).10 While the
poet may have viewed the “Quelconqueries” as trifles initially, his
opinion underwent a dramatic reversal when Soffici rediscovered the
texts and proposed to publish them. This project prompted Apollinaire
to re-examine the manuscripts and to make a number of changes. The
fact that the revisions are fairly minimal suggests they were made at
the last minute. In addition, the project forced Apollinaire to consider
the works as a group for the first time. Seeking a critical framework in
which to place them, he chose the title “Banalités” and then
“Quelconqueries.” If Apollinaire’s decision to publish the texts had
far-reaching implications, their appearance in Lacerba decisively
altered their fate. It not only changed the way in which they were
perceived but established them as bonafide (if experimental) literary
works. Viewed from this angle, their role as aesthetic objects recalls
that of Marcel Duchamp’s readymades. Like Duchamp, Apollinaire
managed to transform a series of banal objects into works of art
simply by treating them as works of art. Like the latter artist, he
singled each one out for attention, gave it a title, and exhibited it in an
artistic (literary) setting.
If poetry strives to “[liberate] the word from the constraints which
discursive order imposes on it,” as Jonathan Culler notes, the “Quel-
conqueries” seek to liberate the word from the constraints associated
9
For a detailed description, see Décaudin, “Autour de Stavelot: deux cahiers et un
agenda,” pp. 4-25. The notebook includes manuscript versions of “Arrivée du
paquebot,” “Té,” “Le Repas,” “La Chaste Lise,” “Un Dernier Chapître,” “0,50,” “Le
Tabac à priser,” “Le Matin,” “Acousmate,”, “Etoile,”, “A Linda,” and “Fagnes de
Wallonie."
10
Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, p. 1146.
with traditional poetry.11 While poetry is a subversive genre by defini-

tion, the “Quelconqueries” are doubly subversive, since they reject
any attempt to codify their anti-discursive procedures. The only
principle that links them together is their refusal to be bound by a
common principle. Besides the great diversity of these texts, one is
impressed by their tremendous freedom, which is unparalleled in the
literature of the period. Not only do the “Quelconqueries” subvert
literary principles, Georges Longrée observes, but they expose the
inherent limitations of literature itself.
[Elles mettent] en cause les valeurs d’unité, d’homogénéité,
d’hiérarchie, de classes d’objets littéraires et non littéraires pour
qu’apparaissent avec un relief beaucoup plus marqué … les
interdits qui sont ceux du champ littéraire.
([They] question values such as unity, homogeneity, and

hierarchy, as well as literary and non-literary classification, in
order to call attention to … taboos associated with the literary
enterprise.)12
In view of their defiant posture and libertarian values, the “Quel-

conqueries” are best understood—best appreciated—when they are
examined in the context of the Dada movement. Although Dada was
not officially baptized until 1916, its anarchic spirit was prevalent a
good deal earlier.13 Numerous examples abound in Paris, including
two works that Apollinaire composed in 1914: Le Poète assassiné and
a performance piece entitled A quelle heure un train partira-t-il pour
Paris? (What Time Does a Train Leave for Paris?). Apollinaire
appears to have given the “Quelconqueries” to Soffici in much the
same vein. Indeed, the Dadaists themselves believed they exemplified
the Dada spirit. Soon after André Breton, Louis Aragon, and Philippe
Soupault founded Paris Dada in 1919, they reprinted thirteen “Quel-
conqueries” in the October and November issues of Littérature. When
Breton published his Anthologie de l’humour noir twenty years later,
11
Jonathan Culler, Structuralist Poetics: Structuralism, Linguistics, and the Study of
Literature (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975), p. 183.
12
Georges H. F. Longrée, “Apollinaire parallèle: le cas des ‘Quelconqueries’ et de
‘La Fin de Babylone,’” Les Cahiers des Paralittératures, Vol. I (l989), pp. 108-09.
13
See in particular Michel Sanouillet, Dada à Paris (Paris: Pauvert, 1965) and Elmer
Peterson and Stephen C. Foster, Paris Dada: The Barbarians at the Gates (New
York: Hall, 2001).
he included two of these texts plus two equally outrageous passages

from Le Poète assassiné.
A Slice of Life
Apart from two or three traditional poems, the bulk of the “Quel-
conqueries” are experimental and break with convention in a number
of important ways. Apollinaire was attempting an exploratory oper-
ation in an effort to expand (and revitalize) the concept of poetry. One
of his more significant innovations was to choose a trivial subject and
to describe it in a flat, matter-of-fact style--whence the initial title
“Banalités.” As Marguerite Bonnet states, “il a cru à l’existence d’une
matière poétique dans la vie” (“he discovered poetic subject matter in
life itself”).14 In other words, he believed that ordinary existence
possessed a beauty of its own. Apollinaire not only extended the realm
of poetry into the everyday world, moreover, but made it available to
the man in the street. For the fact that something is “ordinary” simply
means it is important to the average person. At the same time, Apol-
linaire redefined his own function in keeping with the radical new
poetry that he envisioned. In particular, he rejected the lofty role
traditionally accorded the poet. Instead of drawing his inspiration from
the Muses or from his own genius, Longrée observes, he reveled in
“son rôle de bricoleur, de fournisseur de restes, d’accomodeur de
rebuts” (“his role as handyman, as purveyor of scraps, as adapter of
left-overs”).15 In contrast to the conversation poems, which record
what Apollinaire hears, the “slice of life” poems record what he sees.
He is present not so much as a participant but as a neutral observer.
While some of them contain humorous touches, the texts in this
category tend to be descriptive, objective, and factual. “By maximiz-
ing discursive simplicity and directness,” Susan Harrow explains,
“Apollinaire challenges the arbitrary separation of poetic lyricism and
lived language, and the absolute separation of language and its
14
Marguerite Bonnet, “Aux sources du surréalisme: place d’Apollinaire,” Revue des
Lettres Modernes, Nos. 104-107 (1964), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 3, p. 70.
15
Longrée, “Apollinaire parallèle: le cas des ‘Quelconqueries’ et de ‘La Fin de Baby-
lone,’” p.110.
material object.”16 Resembling a still-life painting more than a con-

ventional poem, “Le Repas” (“The Meal”) is an excellent example.
Apollinaire describes a complete meal from beginning to end, the
surroundings in which it takes place, and the people who are present at
the table. In its simplicity (one is tempted to say purity) of line and in
the formal organization of its elements, the poem is indistinguishable
from, say, Cézanne’s Card-Players:
Il n’y a que la mère et les deux fils

Tout est ensoleillé
La table est ronde
Derrière la chaise où s’assied la mère
Il y a la fenêtre
D’où on voit la mer
Briller sous le soleil ...
(There are only the mother and her two sons

Everything is sunny
The table is round
Behind the chair where the mother is sitting
There is the window
From which one glimpses the sea
Glistening beneath the sun …)
While “Le Repas” does not sound like a poem, it manages to look
like one—as do the majority of the “Quelconqueries.” Despite the
lack of a formal rhyme scheme, it possesses other properties that have
come to be associated with the genre. Since each line begins with a
capital letter, the reader recognizes that it is a poem immediately. This
impression is confirmed by the white borders and by the way in which
the lines are arranged on the page. Although the text is written in free
verse, its rhythm is surprisingly regular. The poem opens with three
decasyllables, for example, one of which is dislocated to form the
second and third lines. The use of definite articles where one would
expect indefinite articles—as in “Il y a la fenêtre”—reinforces the
presentational mode adopted by Apollinaire. Again one is tempted to
compare the text to a painting. The mention of capes studded with
olive trees in the following line situates the poem on the Côte d’Azur,
16
Susan Harrow, The Material, the Real, and the Fractured Self: Subjectivity and
Representation from Rimbaud to Réda (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004),
p. 73.
as do the lemon trees in line 23. Amazingly, in view of its ultra-

modern style, “Le Repas” seems to have been composed in 1897 or
1898—while Apollinaire was living on the Côte d’Azur himself.17
Conceived as a family portrait, it depicts the poet, his mother, and his
brother enjoying a typical midday meal.
A more recent portrait of the poet emerges from a text entitled
“Table,” which is cast in the form of a prose poem. Composed in
1914, it reflects Apollinaire’s experiments with literary cubism during
the period preceding the First World War. Like “Zone” or “Les
Fenêtres,” it juxtaposes the poet’s visual perceptions with various
thoughts and memories that flash through his mind. At the same time,
it differs from the two earlier poems in one crucial respect. Whereas
Apollinaire suppresses the logical connections that structure “Zone”
and “Les Fenêtres” in order to create a verbal collage, he continues to
respect them in “Table.” Despite one or two abrupt transitions, the
narrative flows smoothly with no interruptions. The orderly
progression not only adds to the work’s banality but contributes to its
anecdotal style. As Mary Ann Caws notes, “Table” is a meditation
upon the conditions of writing.18 It is a poem about the difficulty of
writing a poem. What makes this autobiographical sketch so fascinat-
ing is that it provides an intimate glimpse of Apollinaire’s habits and
working conditions. It is precisely the banality of the portrait that
interests us. The poem begins with the poet seated at his work table
waiting for inspiration to strike on a perfectly ordinary day:
Ma table est rectangulaire, ses angles sont arrondis. Je fume
la pipe bien que le tabac me dégoûte mais son amertume et sa
brûlure me plaisent.
J’aurais voulu travailler ce matin mais je n’ai fait que fouiller
de vieux brouillons à moi.
(My table is rectangular, its corners are round. I am smoking

a pipe, although the tobacco disgusts me, but its bitterness and
its burning please me.
I planned to work this morning, but all I have done is to
rummage through some old rough drafts.)
17
Décaudin, “Autour de Stavelot: deux cahiers et un agenda,” p. 24.
18
Mary Ann Caws, A Metapoetics of the Passage (Hanover, New Hampshire:
University Press of New England, 1981), p. 85.
Since the table is featured in the title, one would expect it to play a
prominent role in the poem.19 Following its initial appearance, however,
it vanishes without a trace. The first line merely serves as a point of
departure. “‘Table’ met à la fois l’accent sur l’indétermination des
événéments quotidiens,” Longrée declares, “et sur les actes du scripteur
engagé dans la production de son texte” (“‘Table’ emphasizes both the
randomness of daily events and the actions of the writer engaged in the
production of his text”).20 Or rather, it reveals how the two themes are
intertwined, how ordinary objects trigger thoughts and memories that
interfere with Apollinaire’s plans. For the poem is not really about
working but about wanting to work and not being able to. Following this
frustrated admission, the poet discourses on blotting paper, introduces a
fleeting metaphor, and describes several objects lying on the table.
Les machins où l’on adapte du papier buvard sont des trucs

idiots, il vaut mieux sécher ce qu’on écrit avec du papier buvard
non monté, c’est ce qu’il y a de mieux. Il est rose comme un
visage fardé, peu à peu il noircit au centre rectangulairement.
Maintenant je ne fais rien, j’écris ce que je vois, mon mouchoir
est près de moi froissé. Il y a aussi une boîte d’allumettes
suédoises à l’envers, elle est vieux rose avec un cercle rouge où
il y a un A un M et un C avec une torche allumée.
(The gadgets that hold blotting paper are idiotic gimmicks, it is

better to dry what one is writing with unmounted blotting paper,
that’s what is best. It is pink, like rouge on a woman’s cheeks, it
gradually becomes black in the center rectangularly. I am not
doing anything now, I am noting what I see, my crumpled
handkerchief is nearby. There is also a box of Swedish matches
lying upside-down, it is dusty pink with a red circle containing
an A an M and a C with a lighted torch.)
As this excerpt demonstrates, Apollinaire was experimenting with

the stream of consciousness technique a good eight years before James
Joyce published Ulysses. Without attempting to regulate the mental
flow, he records each sight or thought that impinges on his awareness.
Although “Table” observes certain grammatical conventions, it viol-
ates a number of others in order to preserve its narrative fluidity.
19
A photograph of the table in question is reproduced in Pierre Cailler, Guillaume
Apollinaire: documents iconographiques (Geneva: Cailler, 1965), plate 16.
20
Longrée, “Apollinaire parallèle: le cas des ‘Quelconqueries’ et de ‘La Fin de Baby-
lone,’” p. 110.
Periods are frequently replaced by commas, for example, and commas

are eliminated when nouns occur in a series. Among other things, the
passage reminds us what a nuisance it was to write with a steel-tipped
pen—or even a fountain pen. While they represented a significant
advance over earlier implements, they required the constant use of a
blotter. The final reference is especially interesting in the light of sub-
sequent remarks by Apollinaire. The Swedish matchbox reappeared
unexpectedly the following year in a letter he wrote to Georgette
Catelain. During a lengthy discussion of modern aesthetics, in which
he defended the artistic value of ordinary objects, Apollinaire
remarked :
C’est justement l’art que je voudrais bannir des arts ou sinon
l’art surtout l’artiste et celui qui fait tout en artiste, qui attache
plus de prix à un diamant qu’à une boîte d’allumettes, à une rose
qu’à un hareng saur …[Il y a] trop de goût et trop de dévotion
aux conventions de beauté.
(It is precisely art that I would like to banish from the arts or
if not art, specially the artist and those who imitate artists, who
attach more worth to a diamond than to a box of matches, to a
rose than to a smoked herring … There is too much taste and
too much devotion to conventional beauty.)21
Most everyday objects, Paola Antonelli observes, “speak of the time-

less role of craftsmanship… Some of these things are true masterpie-
ces of the art of design and deserve our unconditional admiration.”22
As worthy of our admiration as a diamond ring, the matchbox in
“Table” reminds Apollinaire of several advertisements he encountered
during a recent train trip. These remind him in turn of the electric
poles running along side the tracks. Not only was their mysterious
humming delightful, he confides, but their terse inscriptions were
strangely moving. This statement is accompanied by the following
example:
21
Letter from Guillaume Apollinaire to Georgette Catelain dated November 7, 1915.
Repr. in “Des lettres inédites du mal-aimé à une amie,” Le Figaro Littéraire, No. 1174
(November 4-10, 1968), p. 9.
22
Paola Antonelli, Humble Masterpieces: Everyday Marvels of Design (New York:
Regan, 2005), p. 1.
A
T T
E
N T
ION
DANGER DE MORT
Arranged so as to imitate a warning sign near high-tension wires,

the four words are set off from the text and isolated on the page. The
earliest example of expressive typography in Apollinaire’s work, they
precede his first visual poem (“Lettre-Océan”) by at least two months.
The poet seems to have borrowed the original idea from the Italian
Futurists, who had been experimenting with similar devices since the
beginning of 1914. Appearing in Lacerba, their poetry utilized a wide
variety of typographical effects to depict signs and other objects. The
presence of a similar device in “Table” suggests that the poem was
composed for publication in the same journal. Like the discovery of
electricity, signs like this were another product of the modern age. As
Apollinaire intimates, they must have seemed rather startling at first.
The very symbol of progress was accompanied by the possibility of
imminent death.
Reminding himself to discard several pipes that had acquired a
foul taste, Apollinaire concludes on a trivial domestic note: he decides
to trim his cuticles. “Et si je saigne,” he adds, “je me sucerai le doigt
jusqu’à ce que l’obscurité étant complète je me lèverai pour allumer
une lampe” (“And if I start to bleed I will suck my finger until it is
completely dark outside and I must get up to light a lamp”). In
contrast to the poet, who grows more and more bored as the poem
progresses, the reader is intrigued by this glimpse of Apollinaire’s
private life. The banal subject matter and the relaxed style generate a
closeness, a warmth, that is impossible to achieve in more formal
works. Prose turns out to be the perfect medium for this kind of
poetry. Ironically, Apollinaire’s efforts have been successful after all,
since they produced the text we have just finished reading.
Smoking plays a significant role in another, much briefer work
entitled “Hôtel.” Consisting of only five lines, it combines banality
with whimsicality to create a charming portrait of Apollinaire, who
once again finds himself at loose ends. Although the lines vary in
length from eight to twelve syllables, the poem is not written in free
verse. The fact that the first four lines rhyme prevents it from being
completely emancipated. In addition, each of these lines contains a

striking metaphor.
Ma chambre a la forme d’une cage

Le soleil passe son bras par la fenêtre
Mais moi qui veux fumer pour faire des mirages
J’allume au feu du jour ma cigarette
Je ne veux pas travailler je veux fumer.
(My room has the shape of a cage

The sun passes its arm through the window
But I who want to create smoky mirages
I light my cigarette with the sunbeam’s fire
I don’t want to work I want to smoke.)
At first glance, the poem seems to be a condensed version of

“Table.” Although the setting is a hotel room rather than Apollinaire’s
apartment, although he is smoking a cigarette instead of a pipe, we
find him scribbling away desultorily as before. Despite these and
other similarities, the compositions differ in one crucial respect.
Whereas Apollinaire complains about being unable to work in
“Table,” he admits he doesn’t want to work in “Hôtel.” Instead of
writing, he would rather smoke cigarettes all day. The final line
counterbalances the whimsical metaphors of the preceding lines with
its unexpected directness. It not only deflates the preceding rhetoric
but provides a feeling of closure. In addition, since it performs the
thought that it expresses, it turns out to be auto-illustrative. It carries
out the author’s wishes by bringing the poem to a close. One is left
with the nagging suspicion that the conflict between working and
smoking is more apparent than real. Since Apollinaire describes art as
a mirage elsewhere in his works, perhaps he simply wants to smoke
and dream of future projects.
Trivial Pursuits
Mention should also be made of “Le Tabac à priser” (“Snuff”),
another whimsical poem in which tobacco plays a prominent role.
Like “Le Repas,” it is set in Provence and was composed while Apol-
linaire was living on the Côte d’Azur. Comprising four unrhymed
stanzas, the text includes bits and pieces of earlier poems arranged to
form a kind of mosaic. As Décaudin observes, this construction antici-
pates that of many of Apollinaire’s mature poems, which skillfully
exploit “la technique discontinue de découpage et de collage” (“the
discontinuous technique of cutting and pasting”).23 Not only is each
stanza a different length, but the lines themselves vary in length from
one stanza to the next. Although the poem is rhymed initially, Apol-
linaire abandons this idea after the third line. The first stanza sketches
an idyllic portrait of the Provençal countryside.
Tabaquin tabaquin ma tabatière est vide

Mets-y pour deux sous de tabac mais du fin
Il fait si beau qu’en leurs bastides
Les messieurs de la ville s’en sont venus dîner
Les olives sont mûres et partout l’on entend
Les chants des oliveuses sous les oliviers
(Tobacconist, tobacconist my snuff-box is empty

Give me two cents worth of your best snuff
The weather is so nice that gentlemen from the city
Have come to dine in their country houses
The olives are ripe and everywhere one hears
Olive-pickers singing beneath the olive trees).
As these lines demonstrate, the poem is essentially a monologue.

Written in the first person like “Table” and “Hôtel,” it describes the
scene through the speaker’s eyes and includes several autobiog-
raphical remarks. Instead of Apollinaire, however, the narrator turns
out to be an inhabitant of a rural village. “Mais je suis si vieux,” he
23
Décaudin, “Autour de Stavelot: deux cahiers et un agenda,” p. 9. Reprinted on
pp.9-10, the original version contained two more stanzas, one of which was concerned
with the Dreyfus affair. James Lawler believes the latter remarks are uttered by
Apollinaire, while Décaudin attributes them to a gendarme mentioned in the poem.
However, they actually seem to be pronounced by an old man who appears in the
following stanza.
confides in the second stanza, “que je me demande / Si je verrai le

temps des lucioles” (“But I am so old I wonder / If I will live to see
the fireflies again”). Since the olive harvest takes place in the late fall
and fireflies appear in early summer, he has approximately seven
months to live. Perhaps that explains why he insists on treating
himself to the best snuff, which he receives in the third stanza. Having
paid for his purchase, the old man leaves singing the words to a
popular song:
J’ai du bon tabac

Dans ma tabatière
J’ai du bon tabac
Tu n’en auras pas.
(I’ve got some fine snuff

In my snuff-box
I’ve got some fine snuff
You can’t have any)24
As befits an event recounted by a country dweller, the poem’s vo-

cabulary is uncomplicated and down to earth. The trivial commercial
exchange at the bureau de tabac is counterbalanced by the final
stanza, which praises one of the simple joys of life. The fact that snuff
is the subject of a popular song indicates its widespread appeal. Like
the works of Jean Giono, which also celebrate the pleasure of tobacco,
Apollinaire’s poem is built upon a surprisingly broad base.
One of the most unusual compositions consists of a series of ana-
grams that have been arranged in tabular form. Entitled “A Linda”
(“To Linda”), it was inspired by Linda Molina da Silva, the sister of
one of Apollinaire’s friends, whom he courted unsuccessfully during
1900 and 1901. Since it departs so radically from the traditional
model, the poem has attracted a certain amount of attention. Following
Stefan Themerson, for example, Timothy Mathews insists on its visual
specificity and complains that subsequent editors have failed to
respect the original typography.25 Arguing that “A Linda” illustrates
24
Interestingly, Raymond Roussel used the same song to generate the tale of “Le
Poète et la moresque” in Impressions d’Afrique, which Apollinaire saw with Francis
Picabia and Marcel Duchamp in 1911 or 1912.
25
Timothy Mathews, Reading Apollinaire: Theories of Poetic Language (Man-
chester: Manchester University Press, 1987), p. 162.
the material foundation of language, Georges Longrée draws a parallel

between this work and Apollinaire’s calligrams.26
A Adnil
Danil
Nadil
Nalid Alnid
Dilan Aldin
Lanid Ildan
Linda Landi
Ilnda Naldi
Nilda Dalni
Indla
Indal
Lnida
Lndia
Lndai
Lidna
Lidan
Although “A Linda” does not seem very promising initially, it

turns out to have a charm all of its own. Even its harshest detractors
would agree that it is attractive to look at. Since the poem has little if
any verbal content, it seduces us through its appearance. Apollinaire’s
attention to visual compositon anticipates his creation (or recreation)
of visual poetry in 1914. Like Mallarmé in Un Coup de dés n’abolira
jamais le hasard (A Throw of the Dice Will Never Abolish Chance), he
is conscious of the arrangement of blacks and whites on the page.27
The twenty-two permutations are distributed in three columns of
unequal length, parallel to each other but dislocated vertically so they
begin and end on different levels. Each of the words begins with a
capital letter. The central column (which is also the highest) is
crowned with a capital “A” of gigantic proportions, much thicker and
blacker than the other letters. Through its size and intensity it
counterbalances the series of anagrams and gives the composition a
26
Georges H. F. Longrée, L’Expérience idéo-calligrammatique d’Apollinaire, rev. ed.
(Paris: Touzot, 1985), p. 117.
27
See ibid. for additional similarities between Apollinaire and Mallarmé.
focal point. Mathews speaks of “a geometric ‘aesthetification’ of the

letter in the manner of the Futurists’ anti-discursive calligraphy.”28
Indeed, since the same letter occurs elsewhere in Lacerba, Apollinaire
seems to have actually borrowed it from his Italian friends.
While “A Linda” rejects traditional poetics, a few traces of the
original model remain. Like conventional poetry, for example, the
poem proceeds from left to right and from top to bottom—albeit one
column at a time. In contrast to its minimal content, moreover, the title
(which spills over onto the first line) provides a certain amount of
information. While Apollinaire could have chosen an abstract title, or
simply dispensed with one altogether, the dedication “A Linda”
establishes the poem’s purpose, subject, and destination. Not only is it
concerned with Linda, whose beauty it ostensibly celebrates, but it is
intended for her as well. Inevitably, one wonders if she ever received
Apollinaire’s unusual tribute. To be sure, the composition bears little
resemblance to a conventional love poem. Except for the title, it
appears to be totally non-referential, totally abstract. What little in-
formation it conveys must be inferred from its physical characteristics.
We have two choices: we can watch the five letters combine and re-
combine, or we can listen to the various sounds they produce (or
both).
Although the visual play in “A Linda” is relatively subdued, it is
continuous. The reader’s eye is drawn at first to the large capital “A,”
then to the first word in the left-hand column: “Linda.” Scanning each
of the columns in turn, one perceives that the word continually
changes shape. With one exception (a string of words beginning with
“L”), the initial capital is repeated no more than twice in a row. And
as the letters shift back and forth, the typographical skyline changes
accordingly. In contrast to the first word, for instance, which utilizes
two vertical strokes, the second contains three strokes. Whereas the
former appear at opposite ends of the word, two of the latter occur at
the beginning.
Although the poem’s visual effects follow no perceptible pattern,
the play of the five phonemes is carefully orchestrated. The soft, liquid
sounds of “Linda” combine and recombine in a subtle, ever-changing
pattern like an erotic incantation: “Linda / Ilnda / Nilda / Indla / In-
dal,” etc. They resemble a magic spell taken from one of those grimoi-
28
Mathews, Reading Apollinaire: Theories of Poetic Language, p. 162.
res (“books of charms”) that so interested Apollinaire, a spell designed

to make Linda fall in love with him. Of the 3125 phonetic
combinations at the poet’s disposal, only twenty-two proved to be
suitable. They had to be possible to pronounce, they had to possess
two syllables (in order to preserve the initial rhythm), and they needed
to be euphonious. Indeed, a number of syllables are repeated through-
out the poem, rendering it even more harmonious.29 Although quite a
few words end in da, nil, or di, the composition does not follow a co-
herent rhyme scheme. Apollinaire utilizes assonance instead because it
provides more flexibility. Paralleling the first column, which begins
with “Linda,” the second begins with the reverse spelling: “Adnil.”
With one or two exceptions, the former column is assonanced in “a”
and the latter in “i”30
“Poems are significant,” Jonathan Culler avers, “if they can be
read as reflections on or explorations of the problems of poetry it-
self.”31 In contrast to Keat’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” which illustrates
one approach, “A Linda” does not represent a meditative exercise.
Since it utilizes an alien vocabulary, any kind of explicit discussion is
out of the question. Rather, the poem calls attention to poetry’s mate-
rial properties. Like “A Linda,” it seems to say, every poetic com-
position is both a visual poem and a sound poem. We only need to
stop, look, and listen. Although the Futurists had also begun to
publicize this fact, they were attracted to machine-age onomatopoeia
and flashy typography. Unlike the author of “A Linda,” they were not
attracted to abstract poetry. Apollinaire’s true heirs were the Dadaists,
who attempted to re-invent poetry a few years later. Beginning with
Hugo Ball’s “O Gadji Beri Bimba,” the Zurich group experimented
with phonetic poetry, while Man Ray and others composed purely
visual poems. Raoul Hausmann eventually combined the two strains
to create optophonetic poetry.
To be sure, poetry is not the only arena in which sound and typo-
graphy play a fundamental role. For if poetry makes use of language,
language inevitably encompasses poetry. They share the same material
29
Apollinaire often creates the next term in the series by reversing two or three letters
at the beginning of a word or at the end. In one instance (“Nalid”/”Dilan”), he
reverses the entire word.
30
This explains why three of the words begin with Lnd, which is virtually
unpronounceable: Apollinaire wanted to preserve the assonance at all costs.
31
Culler, Structuralist Poetics, p. 177.
attributes, the same preoccupation with phonetic and visual opera-

tions. In the last analysis, therefore, “A Linda” constitutes a critique of
language itself. Or rather, as John J. White remarks, it focuses on the
“resources of language.”32 Besides the latter’s physical characteristics,
Apollinaire celebrates the role of linguistic mechanisms in generating
and preserving meaning. If language is a storehouse of words, to
paraphrase Ferdinand de Saussure, words in turn are composed of
letters.33 By effortlessly generating one word after another, the poem
demonstrates the alphabet’s awesome power. Not only language,
Longrée reminds us, but countless volumes of literature have been
created by rearranging its twenty-six letters.34 That the words in “A
Linda” are meaningless, he adds, demonstrates the arbitrary nature of
the linguistic sign. As Saussure demonstrated long ago, letters are free
to combine any way they like. Words have nothing in common with
the objects they designate.35
One of the most intriguing “Quelconqueries” is entitled “0,50”:
As-tu pris la pièce de dix sous

Je l’ai prise
(Did you take the 50 centime coin

I took it)
Unlike most of the works we have examined so far, “0,50” was

never conceived as a poem. Since Apollinaire was interested in lin-
guistic anomalies, he included it in a list of redundant constructions in
the cahier de Stavelot. As soon as the text appeared in print, however,
it acquired an independent life of its own. Despite its humble origins,
it became a daring, experimental piece of poetry. The key to this
curious composition lies in its utter triviality, which testifies to the
poem’s authenticity. As with other “Quelconqueries,” its subject is
ultimately its own banality. Like pipe tobacco or snuff, the 50 centime
coin was an extremely common object. It had become so common that
nobody even noticed it any more. By depicting the coin from a new
32
John J. White, Literary Futurism: Aspects of the First Avant-Garde (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1990) p. 263. See p. 183 as well.
33
Ferdinand de Saussure, Course in General Linguistics, ed. Charles Bally, et al., tr.
Wade Baskin (1916, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 15.
34
Longrée, L’Expérience idéo-calligrammatique d’Apollinaire, p. 117.
35
Saussure, Course in General Linguistics, pp. 67-70.
angle, Apollinaire managed to give it a brand new life—much as pop

artists would do with soup cans and soap boxes many years later.
However, the closest parallel is with Dada instead of neo-Dada—with
Marcel Duchamp instead of Andy Warhol. For the 50 centime coin is
not a symbol of popular culture but rather an objet trouvé (“ready-
made”). By singling it out, giving it a title, and exhibiting it in a
privileged space, Apollinaire transformed the coin into a work of art.
Zooming in on an object calls attention not just to its existence but
also to its structure and design. “Once we learn to recognize patterns
of beauty in pragmatic and economic ideas,” Paola Antonelli remarks,
“we will realize that our kitchen drawers, our purses, our car trunks,
and our bathroom cabinets are vibrant museums full of master-
pieces.”36
“0,50” does not attempt to describe the coin so much as to define
it. Apollinaire does not dwell on its physical properties because every-
one already knew what a 50 centime coin looked like. Instead, he
defines it in terms of human relationships, which is to say in terms of
its primary function. For a brief second we glimpse the coin passing
from one person to another. Judging from the fact that the first speaker
employs the familiar tu form, these two individuals appear to be well
acquainted. Since neither is ever identified, we are free to imagine a
number of scenarios. The scene could be situated in a sidewalk cafe,
for instance, where two friends have been relaxing over a glass of
wine. The second person could be collecting his or her change before
leaving. Although one would love to know what is taking place, this
information is basically irrelevant. We are left with the following
definition: a coin is something one individual gives to another in
exchange for a service.
In addition to being a readymade, “0,50” is also a conversation
poem—the shortest one that Apollinaire ever composed (or recorded).
Like “Lundi rue Christine” and similar works, it consists of a slice of
everyday reality captured in everyday speech. In its enigmatic brevity,
cast in a question and response format, the work resembles a snatch of
dialogue by Eugène Ionesco. For some reason, it seems strangely
familiar. Where, one wonders, could Apollinaire have encountered
this banal exchange? While he noted the source of several redundant
expressions, “0,50” is not among them. Although it would be difficult
36
Antonelli, Humble Masterpieces, p. 1.
to prove, one suspects the text was taken from a French grammar, for
it illustrates an important grammatical principle: a past participle
must agree with a preceding direct object. Since “pris” follows a femi-
nine pronoun in the second line, it becomes “prise.”
Freed from its original mooring, “0,50” became a floating signifer
drifting aimlessly with the cultural current. For this reason, the most
promising interpretations are anchored in contemporary reality. While
one can imagine a number of realistic scenarios, such as paying the
bill at a sidewalk cafe, additional interpretations exist at the meta-
phoric level.37 In particular, the image of money changing hands can
be viewed as a metaphor for linguistic exchange. More precisely,
since it refers to purely denotative language, it describes the exchange
of factual information. That “0,50” assumes the form of a dialogue
makes this interpretation all the more attractive. The metaphor itself
goes back at least to Mallarmé who, contrasting poetic discourse with
direct discourse, described the latter as follows:
Narrer, enseigner, même décrire, cela va et encore qu’à chacun

suffirait peut-être pour échanger la pensée humaine, de prendre
ou de mettre dans la main d’autrui en silence une pièce de
monnaie.
(To narrate, to teach, even to describe, it suffices as would also

perhaps for anyone wishing to exchange human thought, to take
or to put in another’s hand silently a coin.)38
The Comic Muse
Many of the “Quelconqueries” are noteworthy for their offbeat

humor, which is often as important as their banality. André Breton
rightly perceived that Apollinaire’s use of humor was connected with
37
For example, Scott Bates observes that pièce de dix sous was slang for “anus” in the
19th century, which suggests a different scenario than the one that follows. See his
Dictionnaire des mots libres d’Apollinaire (Sewanee, Tennessee: privately printed,
1991), p. 221.
38
Stéphane Mallarmé, “Crise de vers” in Oeuvres complètes, ed. Henri Mondor and
G. Jean-Aubry (Paris: Gallmard/Pléiade, 1956), p. 368.
his desire to liberate every literary genre.39 Stressing the historical im-
portance of works like “Le Phoque” and “Chapeau-Tombeau,” he de-
clared: “Apollinaire s’est entendu mieux que tout autre à faire passer
dans l’expression … quelques-unes des attitudes les plus caracté-
ristiques de l’humour d’aujourd’hui” (“Apollinaire managed to
express … some of the most characteristic attitudes of today’s humor
better than anyone else”). Breton’s remarks are especially applicable
to Dada and Surrealism, whose adherents possessed a vivid sense of
what he called “humour noir”—humor with a wicked twist to it. As he
declared, this describes the humor in the “Quelconqueries,” which is
direct, powerful, and often perverse.
Not surprisingly, Apollinaire’s comic imagination assumes a
number of different guises. Like the previous poem, “1890” consists
of a brief dialogue. Thanks to the title, we know exactly when the con-
versation supposedly takes place. Although one speaker is anony-
mous, the other is identified as Alfred Capus, a journalist, novelist,
and playwright who specialized in bourgeois comedies. In contrast to
another text by Apollinaire, which portrays him as a lecherous
scoundrel, “1890” depicts Capus as a cynical misogynist.40 Apropos of
absolutely nothing, the first speaker remarks that every woman
between 45 and 50 remembers falling in love with Victor Capoul—an
operatic tenor who sang at the Opéra-Comique from 1861 to 1870.41
To which Capus sarcastically replies: “Et de bien d’autres” (“And
with lots of other men too”). Women are fickle creatures, he implies,
who fall in love at the drop of a hat. A confirmed sceptic, Capus was
famous for uttering acerbic boutades like the one attributed to him by
Apollinaire.42 Indeed, one begins to suspect that “1890” records an
actual rejoinder. Transformed into a “Quelconquerie” by Ardengo
39
André Breton, Anthologie de l’humour noir (Paris: Livre de Poche, 1966), p. 311.
40
Guillaume Apollinaire, “Lettre de Paris,” Le Passant, November 25, 1911. Repr. in
Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, ed. Pierre Caizergues and Michel
Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1991), Vol. II, p. 382.
41
Capoul was especially famous for singing the role of Romeo in Gounod’s Roméo et
Juliette. According to the Robert encyclopedia, “il a donné son nom à une coiffure
qui comporte une raie au milieu de la tête, les côtés du front dégagés et le milieu
recouvert de deux petites boucles” (“he lent his name to a hair style consisting of a
part down the middle, twin forelocks, and two little curls in the middle of the
forehead”).
42
Léon Treich reproduces numerous examples in L’Esprit d’Alfred Capus, 2nd ed.
(Paris: Gallimard, 1926), pp. 23-72.
Soffici, it may simply have been an amusing anecdote that Apollinaire

was saving for the right occasion. Dating from 1898, “Etoile” (“Star”)
was originally considerably longer and much more ambitious.43
Consisting of rhymed alexandrines, the first five verses are all that
remains of the initial version. The other lines were presumably added
in 1914 and follow a different model. While Apollinaire originally
complained that women were faithless, echoing Alfred Capus in
“1890,” this theme was eliminated from the final poem. Indeed,
judging by all the children the protagonist has fathered, it is the male
who is naturally promiscuous not the female.
Je songe à Gaspard ce n’est certainement pas

Son vrai nom il voyage il a quitté la ville
Bleue Lanchi où tant d’enfants l’appelaient papa
Au fond du golfe calme en face des sept îles
Gaspard marche et regrette et le riz et le thé
La voie lactée
La nuit car naturellement il ne marche
Que la nuit attire souvent ses regards
Mais Gaspard
Sait bien qu’il ne faut pas la suivre
(I am thinking of Gaspard that is certainly not

His real name he is traveling he has left the city
Blue Lanchi where so many children call him father
On the gulf’s calm shore opposite the seven islands
As he walks Gaspard fondly remembers the rice and tea
The Milky Way
At night for naturally he only walks
At night often attracts his glance
But Gaspard
Knows better than to follow it).
Despite its anecdotal style and realistic pretensions, “Etoile” is

basically an Absurdist drama. Although the first person narrative
(which quickly switches to the third person) proceeds in a factual
manner, the story that it relates is hopelessly vague. Masquerading as
a straight-forward account, the poem poses far more questions than it
answers. Although the reference to rice and tea situates the story in
43
The original version is reprinted in Décaudin, “Autour de Stavelot: deux cahiers et
un agenda,” pp. 10-11.
Asia, we have no idea where Blue Lanchi is located. The town could
be in Turkey or Japan or anywhere in between. The original text speci-
fied that it was located in China. Nor do we have any idea where
Gaspard is headed (or why)—he simply sets off on a mysterious
journey. In the original version, he was going to visit Hindu sages in
India. A number of other questions come to mind. What is Gaspard’s
real name? Why does he conceal his identity? Where does he come
from? What was he doing in Blue Lanchi? Why does he only travel at
night? And finally, why is it such a bad idea to follow the Milky Way?
Since Gaspard (or Gaspar) was the name of one of the Three
Wisemen, perhaps he is following a sacred star to Bethlehem. Or,
since he seems to be an adventurer, perhaps he is merely following his
own star—like Marco Polo before him.
“Té” presents a different set of problems, one of which confronts
readers before the poem begins: how are we to interpret the title?
Since neither the letter T nor its homonym thé (“tea”) appears to make
any sense, the explanation must lie elsewhere. Reviewing the various
possibilities, one discovers that té is an exclamation of surprise in the
south of France (a deformation of tiens), which might be translated as
“Hey!” in English. Since the poem consists of six unrelated thoughts,
ranging from the witty to the absurd, this would seem to be the best
choice. Like several other “Quelconqueries” (or parts of them), “Té”
seems to have been especially composed for Lacerba. More precisely,
since the individual texts were composed years before, they seem to
have been collected for Lacerba. One wonders whether Apollinaire
decided which ones to include or whether he left that task to Soffici.
In either case, the six texts were clearly chosen at random. Like the
fourth and fifth excerpts, which were borrowed from the cahier de
Stavelot, the others were jotted down on different occasions over the
years.
The first text takes the form of an aphorism: “En matière de
religion la première cause de doute est souvent l’ennui surtout chez les
jeunes gens” (“the first cause of religious doubt is often boredom
especially where young people are concerned”). This observation
recalls several statements by the Duc de La Rochefoucauld, who
claimed that human behavior was frequently influenced by ennui.
Hovering in the background, the sardonic author of the Maximes is
quickly displaced by another 17th century philosopher, who initiated
the cult of reason. Parodying a celebrated passage in the Discours de
la méthode, the second text introduces an amusing paradox: “Il pensa

qu’il ne pensait pas” (“He thought that he wasn’t thinking”). Whereas
Descartes derived his entire method (and deduced the existence of
God) from his ability to think, Apollinaire demonstrates that this
premise contains a fatal flaw. By deconstructing the opposition
between thought and non-thought, consciousness and unconscious-
ness, he reveals the inherent contradiction that plagues the Cartesian
method and Descartes’ view of the universe.
Unconsciously parodying Marcel Proust in the third text, Apol-
linaire cites an example of involuntary memory that resembles the
latter’s experience in A la recherche du temps perdu. Like Proust
nibbling his petite madeleine, he bites into a lemon and is amazed to
discover that the taste transports him back to his childhood, when his
mother used to administer castor oil mixed with lemon and coffee.
Taken from an early draft of Le Poète assassiné, the fourth text
describes the protagonist’s sexual awakening. Rejecting any pretense
of love, Nyctor (his original name) abandons himself wholeheartedly
to the pleasures of the flesh.44 The fifth text consists of a vivid simile
that Apollinaire had saved for future use: “Fumer comme un condam-
né à mort” (“Smoking like a man condemned to death”). Although the
prisoner is presumably smoking furiously, in reality, someone about to
be executed would savor every puff. The poem concludes with a joke
that resists translation into English: “Le cyclope aveugle à qui on a
crevé son oeil dit Je suis borgne” (“The Cyclops whose eye has been
put out says I am blind in one eye”). The irony being that he only has
one eye and thus is no longer borgne but aveugle (“totally blind”).
And yet, since borgne means “one-eyed” as well as “blind in one
eye,” the term continues to apply to him. Describing the Cyclops
before and after the event that cost him his vision, it presents the
reader with a logical conundrum much like the one evoked in the
second text. As always, Apollinaire is attentive to the play of language
and fascinated by its endless possibilities.
Other “Quelconqueries” derive humorous effects from comments
that are silly, childish, and/or nonsensical. This describes the last three
lines of "Le Phoque") ("The Seal”), for example, which appear to
make no sense whatsoever.
44
For more information about Nyctor, see the introduction and notes to Le Poète
assassiné in Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose completes, Vol. I.
J’ai les yeux d’un vrai veau marin

Et de Madame Ygrec l’allure
On me voit dans tous nos meetings
Je fais de la littérature
Je suis phoque de mon état
Et comme il faut qu’on se marie
Un beau jour j’épouserai Lota
Du matin au soir l’Otarie
Papa Maman
Pipe et tabac crachoir caf’conc’
Laï Tou
(My eyes are those of a baby seal

And my walk that of Madame Y
I can be seen at every meeting
I practice literature
I am a seal by profession
And since everybody must marry
One fine day I will marry Lotta
From morning ‘til night lottery
Papa Mama
Pipe and tobacco spittoon music hall
Laï Tou)
Like “Fiord,” “Le Petit Balai,” and “Voyage à Paris,” this poem
was taken from a comic operetta entitled Le Marchand d’anchois (The
Anchovy Merchant), which Apollinaire composed in 1906.45 Ori-
ginally meant to be sung (to the tune of “Le Pendu”), “Le Phoque” is
written in octosyllabic verse with alternating rhymes. Even a cursory
glance reveals why André Breton included it in his Anthologie de
l’humour noir. A wicked satire in the tradition of “Monsieur
Prudhomme,” it is thoroughly amusing. Like Verlaine, who satirized
pompous bourgeois fathers, Apollinaire directs his barbs at pompous
literary figures. As in the earlier poem, the dramatic monologue
allows the speaker to reveal his own inadequacies. Unaware of his
serious limitations, the latter behaves like a fatuous ass—or rather,
like a big fat seal. Instead of bleu marin (“deep blue”), as Gerald
Kamber points out, the reader is surprised to encounter the term “veau
45
See Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose completes, Vol. I, pp. 984-1007. The manuscript
of “Le Phoque” is discussed on p. 1459 and reproduced in Album Apollinaire, ed.
Pierre-Marcel Adéma and Michel Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1971), p. 183.
marin.”46 Although the latter expression is synonymous with phoque,

it resonates with additional associations. A veau is not only a calf, for
example, but also someone who is a “lout.” And veau marin inevitably
reminds one of vaurien—a person who is “good for nothing.”
If the first line attacks the protagonist’s intelligence, the second
line casts aspersions on his masculinity. Not only is he a dummy, the
poem proclaims, but he is effeminate as well. Fluttering his eyelashes
and flouncing around like a drag queen, he is a conspicuous figure at
literary gatherings. Not surprisingly, he also turns out to be a preten-
tious twit. The first indication appears in the third line, where he
employs the English word “meeting” instead of its French equivalent.
However, this affectation is insignificant compared to the facetious
statement in the next line. The proper reply to a query about one’s
occupation is not “I do literature,” as Kamber puts it, but rather “I am
a writer” or “I write poetry.” The actual response manages to be boast-
ful and irreverent at the same time. Although the fact that the speaker
writes “literature” suggests he is an important author, the manner in
which this statement is phrased implies that literature is simply an
amusement. It is uttered in the same spirit as “Je fais du sport” (“I go
in for sports”) or “Je fais de l’auto” (“I am fond of motoring”).
The following line is equally revealing and equally devastating:
“Je suis phoque de mon état.” It is impossible to grasp the underlying
allusion, however, unless one knows that phoque is a slang term for
"blockhead."47 Confirming the reader’s earlier impression, the protag-
onist confesses that he is a “professional idiot.” The manuscript
reveals that Apollinaire was originally thinking of Jean Lorrain, a
minor Symbolist poet who had become a “prisonnier de son esthé-
tisme décadent.”48 Illustrating Apollinaire’s love of word play, the
next three lines culminate in a triple pun: “l’Otarie” (“sea-lion”),
“Lota rie” (“Lotta laughs”), and “loterie” (“lottery”). Like the re-
mainder of the poem, they evoke the speaker’s imaginary future. Once
he and Lota are married, he confides, their house will be filled with
46
Gerald Kamber, Max Jacob and the Poetics of Cubism (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1971), p. 149.
47
Césaire Villatte provides the following German equivalents: Dummkopf, einfältige
Gans, and Blökerin. See his Parisismen, ed. Rudolf Meyer-Riefstahl and Marcel
Flandrin, rev. ed. (Berlin-Schöneberg: Langenscheidt,1912), p. 286.
48
Michel Décaudin, La Crise des valeurs symbolistes: ving ans de poésie française,
1895-1914 (1960) (Geneva: Slatkine, 1981), p.168.
laughter. Although he will no longer be single, he plans to preserve his

bachelor lifestyle. While his wife attends to domestic details, he will
continue to smoke, gamble, and frequent music halls. Since the
national lottery was not created until 1933, “loterie” probably refers to
another kind of gambling--perhaps a popular version of roulette
known as loterie foraine.
Although “Le Phoque” seems fairly coherent up to this point, its
conclusion is problematic. Following the triple pun, the poem disin-
tegrates into a jumble of isolated nouns and nonsense syllables whose
purpose is far from clear. Apollinaire interjects two exclamations in
particular that make little or no sense: “Papa Maman” and “Laï Tou.”
While Kamber astutely deduces that the second expression is a di-
storted version of “Là est Tout” (“There You Have It”), he mistakenly
interprets it as yodeling. However, the question remains: why is the
phrase distorted? This query prompts us to reexamine the first
expression, which has much in common with the second. In retrospect,
the two phrases are clearly examples of baby talk. Their significance
only becomes apparent when we ask ourselves who is speaking.
Uttered by the protagonist, whose narcissism and selfishness are well
documented, they would satirize his childish behavior. Uttered by the
imaginary children he will have with Lota, they would belong to his
vivid fantasy. Although both interpretations are tempting, a third
possibility exists which seems to be the correct explanation.
In 1885, an obscure poet named Ernest d’Hervilly published a
collection of sonnets devoted to Parisian animals, including a fascina-
ting text entitled “Le Phoque.”49 As he was strolling along a boule-
vard, d’Hervilly related, he encountered a sideshow featuring a trained
seal. The illustration shows a tout wearing a crumpled hat, a
nondescript coat, and checkered pants gesturing with his cane to the
animal on the other side of a fence. Remembering how much he
enjoyed similar performances as a child, d’Hervilly purchased a ticket
(for 15 centimes) and eagerly stepped inside.
J’entrai. —Las, mes amis, ce n’était plus le même.

C’était bien son grand oeil à la tendrese extrême,
49
Ernest d’Hervilly, Les Bêtes à Paris (Paris: Launete, 1885). Each of the thirty-six
poems is accompanied by a marvelous illustration by G. Fraipont. Besides the seal,
the performing animals include an organ grinder’s monkey and—incredibly—a
marmot dancing to the music of a hurdy gurdy.
Et sa moustache longue en héros de roman,

Mais il ne disait plus ni papa ni maman.
(I entered. —Alas, my friends, it wasn’t the same.

I recognized his large eyes full of tenderness,
And his long mustache like a romantic hero’s,
But he never said papa or mama.)
Astonishingly, French seals seem to have been taught to pro-

nounce certain words as part of their performance. What looks like
baby talk in “Le Phoque” turns out to be baby talk uttered by a marine
mammal! Since Apollinaire’s readers were familiar with this con-
vention, they would have grasped the reference immediately. “Papa
Maman” and “Laï Tou” simply continue the seal metaphor that
dominates the rest of the poem. Like the first expression, the second
also seems to have been part of the seal’s vocabulary. Indeed, it may
even have signaled the end of the performance. Taking a cue from a
more recent model, one might translate the last line as “That’s all
Folks.”
Erotic and even scatological remarks also play a significant role
in the “Quelconqueries.” As noted previously, “L’Arrivée du paque-
bot” and “Té” include several references to erotic encounters. Similar-
ly, a poem entitled “69 6666 ...6 9...,” in which the poet discusses the
secret affinities of 6 and 9, alludes to a notorious sexual position. For
that matter, “Le Phoque” conceals an obscene pun that seems to have
eluded Scott Bates’ vigilant eye. To an English speaker, as Apollinaire
well knew, the title sounds like a slang term for sexual intercourse.
However, the prize in this category goes to a hilarious composition
entitled “Chapeau-Tombeau” (“Hat-Tomb”). Included in André Bre-
ton’s Anthologie de l’humour noir, the poem satirizes a recent fashion
trend that threatened to decimate yet another avian species. As soon as
the vogue for ostrich feathers began to wane, followed by a similar
passion for egret plumes, stuffed birds began to appear on women’s
hats. “Chapeau-Tombeau” attacks both the designers who were re-
sponsible for these new creations and the women who wore them. The
first two stanzas satirize the new style, while the third dismisses it
altogether.
On a niché
Dans son tombeau
L’oiseau perché
Sur ton chapeau
Il a vécu
En Amérique
Ce petit cul
Or
Nithologique
Or
J’en ai assez
Je vais pisser
(Marooned
On your bonnet
His tomb
There upon it
He came from
Martinique
One dumb
Ex-parakeet
That’s
Enough for me
I’ll take a pee)
The rude gesture that accompanies the final stanza effectively

expresses Apollinaire’s disgust. Taking the reader by surprise, the
poem concludes with a burst of derisive laughter. “L’esthétique de la
surprise chère à l’auteur,” Décaudin remarks, “s’épanouit ici dans le
rire” (“the aesthetics of surprise so dear to the author culminates in
laughter here”).50 Indeed, this describes many of the “Quelconque-
ries,” whose humorous effects derive from unexpected juxtapositions,
incongruous associations, and frequent word play. As early as 1914,
Apollinaire declared that surprise played a central role in modern
literature and art. “La surprise est le plus grand ressort nouveau,” he
proclaimed three years later; “C’est par la surprise, par la place
importante qu’il fait à la surprise que l’esprit nouveau se distingue de
tous les mouvements artistiques et littéraires qui l’ont précédé”
(“Surprise is the greatest new motive force of all. It is the use of sur-
prise, the important role that it reserves for surprise, that distinguishes
the new spirit from all the literary and artistic movements that have
50
Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, p.1146.
preceded it”) (the italics are Apollinaire’s).51 Conceived as a global

principle, surprise assumes many different forms in the “Quelconque-
ries” and elsewhere, including unexpected shock, deliberate provo-
cation, and confrontation with the absurd.
By stressing the aesthetic function of surprise, Apollinaire paved
the way for Dada and Surrealism, which adapted the principle to their
own needs. Whereas the Dadaists perfected the art of scandal, the
Surrealists focused their attention on the “marvelous.” By insisting on
the aesthetic importance of banality, Apollinaire sought not just to
demystify the work of art but also to redefine the nature of art itself.
The “Quelconqueries” are profoundly subversive because they reject a
whole series of traditional assumptions. Possessing remarkable
diversity and tremendous freedom, they represent not a defiant genre
so much as a defiant gesture. As we have seen, Apollinaire refused to
differentiate between artistic and non-artistic materials. Objects do not
possess aesthetic significance in themselves, he maintained, but are
endowed with that quality by the poet. Everything and anything is
grist for his mill, from the loftiest sentiment to the humblest object.
“On peut partir d’un fait quotidien,” Apollinaire declared in 1917; “un
mouchoir qui tombe peut être pour le poète le levier avec lequel il
soulèvera tout un univers” (“An insignificant event can provide a
point of departure: a handkerchief dropped accidently may be the
lever with which the poet can move an entire universe”).52 Apollinaire
was thinking not only of Shakespeare, who accomplished this feat in
Othello, but also of the Greek inventor Archimedes. While the former
constructed a tragedy around the loss of Desdemona’s handkerchief,
the latter boasted: “give me a lever and a place to stand and I will
move the world.”
51
Apollinaire, “L’Esprit nouveau et les poètes,” Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol. II,
p. 949.
52
Ibid., p. 951. Margaret Davies discusses this principle in “Un Mouchoir qui tombe,”
En hommage à Michel Décaudin, ed. Pierre Brunel et al. (Paris: Minard, 1986), pp.
193-201. When Vigny’s translation of Othello was performed in 1829, the audience
responded with cries of outrage at the unbearably common word “handkerchief.” See
Alfred de Vigny, “Lettre à Lord *** sur la soirée du 24 octobre 1829 et sur un
système dramatique” in Oeuvres complètes, ed. F. Baldensperger (Paris: Gallimard/
Pléiade, 1964), p. 291.
Chapter 3
Apollinaire and Children’s Rhymes
Comment faire pour être heureux

Comme un petit enfant candide
— “La Chanson du Mal-Aimé”
Studying the relations between Apollinaire, Francis Picabia, and

Marcel Duchamp, Katia Samaltanos concludes that the poet served as
a major catalyst for primitivism in modern art.1 Stressing his radical
artistic vision and his important function as leader of the French avant-
garde, she identifies three areas in which Apollinaire’s influence was
decisive. Not only did he help to publicize African and Oceanic art,
but he also wrote about children’s drawings and the art of the insane.
What Samaltanos calls “primitivism” is perhaps better described as
unmediated experience—experience that has not been distorted by
viewing it through civilized lenses. Instead of describing, interpreting,
and classifying it, the primitivists strove to communicate the
experience itself. Reducing their participation to a bare minimum, they
sought to create an art brut.
Representing a truer path to reality—or at least a more direct
route—unmediated experience was also prized by numerous writers.
Besides its ability to put them in touch with the authentic world, they
valued its cathartic power, which allowed them to break with the past
and to expand their creative horizons. Like the artists, therefore, they
contributed to the evolution of modern aesthetic consciousness.
Motivated by the same desires as the primitivist painters, Apollinaire
experimented with unmediated experience in a number of different
works. The most prominent example is “Lundi rue Christine” (“Mon-
day Christine Street”), which consists of random phrases overheard in
1
Katia Samaltanos, Apollinaire: Catalyst for Primitivism, Picabia, and Duchamp
(Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1984), pp. 9-60. Jean-Claude Blachère comes to
much the same conclusion in Le Modèle nègre: aspects littéraires du mythe primiti-
viste au XXe siècle chez Apollinaire, Cendrars, Tzara (Dakar, Abidjan, Lomé: Nou-
velles Editions Africaines, 1981), p. 70.
a cafe. Like the other conversation poems, it serves essentially as a

transcript. Similarly, many of the “Quelconqueries” incorporate bits of
earlier manuscripts or, like “1890,” reproduce actual quotations.
Others describe ordinary objects or experiences without attempting to
embellish them. In addition, as Antoine Fongaro has demonstrated, a
number of Apollinaire’s poems contain snatches of popular songs.2
Since they are informed by a collage aesthetic, this is not terribly sur-
prising. Reflecting “une poétique des ciseaux et de la colle” (“a
poetics of scissors and paste”), in Michel Décaudin’s words, Apol-
linaire’s works contain many different kinds of citations.3
Childish Games
Fongaro’s discovery has shed important light on a number of
poems, especially those written during the First World War, which in-
corporate snatches of barracks ballads. He also noted in passing that
“Fusée” (“Flare”) contains a verse taken from a children’s rhyme:
“Une souris verte file parmi la mousse” (“A green mouse flees among
the moss”).4 The rhyme in question, or at least one version, goes as
follows:
Une souris verte
Qui courre dans l’herbe.
On l’attrape par la queue,
On la montre à ces messieurs.
Ces messieurs me disent:
“Trempez-la dans l’huile,
Trempez-la dans l’eau;
Il sortira un escargot.”
(A green mouse
Scurries through the grass.
I caught it by the tail,
I showed it to those gentlemen.
2
See Antoine Fongaro, “‘Les Sept Epées’ et Le Plaisir des dieux,” Revue des Lettres
Modernes, Nos. 327-330 (1972), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 11, pp. 111-19
and “Sources gaillardes (suite),” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 677-681 (1983),
special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 16, pp. 171-74.
3
. Michel Décaudin, “Alcools” de Guillaume Apollinaire (Paris: Gallimard, 1993), p.
53. For an excellent description of Apollinaire’s poetic technique, see pp. 43-54.
4
Fongaro, “Sources gaillardes (suite), p. 174, n. 1.
Apollinaire and Children’s Rhymes 77
Those gentlemen told me:

“Dip it in oil,
Dip it in water;
It will turn into a snail.”)5
A collage portrait of life at the front, “Fusée” includes glimpses of

various animals, including Apollinaire’s horse, a stretcher-bearer’s
dog, a tawny owl and the aforementioned rodent. That the latter is a
magic mouse is confirmed not only by its unusual color but by the
children’s rhyme cited above. An emissary from another time and
place, it contributes to the unreal atmosphere that progressively
envelops the poem. While the influence of military songs on Apolli-
naire’s war poetry is perfectly understandable, the discovery of a line
from a children’s rhyme is surprising. Nor, as it turns out, is this an
isolated instance. Inspired by the martial music and chansons gaillar-
des he encountered at boot camp, Apollinaire looked for other musical
models to emulate as well. One of the first children’s songs to attract
his attention was the following:
As-tu connu Pipo, Pipo
Du temps qu’il était militaire?
As-tu connu Pipo, Pipo
Du temps qu’il était sous les drapeaux?
(Did you know Pipo, Pipo

In the days when he was a soldier?
Did you know Pipo, Pipo
When he was in the army?)6
Since the song already embodied a military theme, it only needed

to be modified slightly. Changing a few words to reflect his own situa-
tion, Apollinaire added the following refrain to “Les Saisons”:
As-tu connu Guy au galop
Du temps qu’il était militaire?
As-tu connu Guy au galop
Du temps qu’il était artiflot
A la guerre?
(Did you know Galloping Guy
5
Pierre Roy, Cent Comptines (Paris: Jonquières, 1926), n.p.
6
Jean Baucomont et al., eds. Les Comptines de langue française (Paris: Seghers,
1961), p. 175.
In the days when he was a soldier?

Did you know Galloping Guy
When he was an artilleryman
In the war?)
As Fongaro points out, the initial letters of each line form a

playful acrostic reading “A DADA” (“ON A HORSIE”).7 Composed
shortly after Apollinaire arrived at the front, the refrain reflects the
jaunty demeanor he adopted initially—before he experienced the full
horror of the war. Sent to Louise de Coligny-Chatillon in May 1915,
the poem sought to reassure her (and perhaps Apollinaire himself) that
he was in no real danger. Following his disastrous affair with Lou,
Apollinaire impulsively proposed to Madeleine Pagès, whom he had
met during a train trip, and was accepted. In December, he received a
military leave that allowed him to visit his fiancée in Algeria, where
she lived with her family. During the two weeks he spent in Oran,
Apollinaire eagerly soaked up many exotic sights and sounds. One
thing he enjoyed repeatedly, he confides in La Femme Assise (The
Seated Woman), was watching a group of schoolgirls jumping rope.8
What fascinated him in particular was the discovery that their rhymes
were inspired by recent events. Not only was the traditional genre still
alive, but it was continuing to evolve as well. Thrilled to observe
folklore in the making, he jotted down two of the songs the girls were
singing:
A. B. C. D.
Les Français ont gagné,
Les All’mands ont perdu,
Le Kaiser sera pendu.
Ah! Mon Dieu! quell’ triste année!

Tout le mond’ mobilisé.
Ya des morts et des blessés,
Il y a mêm’ des prisonniers.
Viv’ la classe de vingt ans!
C’est des homm’s, plus des enfants,
S’ils s’en vont aux Dardanelles,
7
Antoine Fongaro, “Un Acrostiche peu visible,” Que Vlo-Ve? Bulletin International
des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser., No. 6 (April-June 1999), pp. 84-85.
8
The experience was recounted in the first version of La Femme Assise, published in
1920. See Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose, ed. Michel Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/
Pléiade, 1977), Vol. I, p. 1363-64.
Qu’ils n’oublient pas leurs petits demoiselles.
(A. B. C. D.
The French have won,
The Germans have lost,
The Kaiser will be hanged.
Oh! My God! What a horrible year!

Everyone has been drafted.
There are dead as well as wounded,
There are even some prisoners.
Hooray for the military graduates!
They are men, no longer children.
If they are sent to the Dardanelles,
Don’t let them forget the girls at home.)
So far we have focused our attention on texts composed during

the First World War. However, earlier evidence of Apollinaire’s inter-
est in children’s rhymes exists as well. In an article entitled “Le Folk-
lore des jeux d’enfant” (“The Folklore of Children’s Games”),
published in Paris-Journal on June 26, 1914, he reported:
Pierre Roy est en train de graver sur bois des compositions
importantes destinées à illustrer ces petites poésies merveil-
leuses, et parfois fort anciennes, que les enfants récitent dans
leurs jeux et tout particulièrement pour se répartir en camps
différents:
Pique et piqué comme gramme
Bourre et bourré ratatamme
Miss tram drame.
(Pierre Roy is carving some important woodcuts destined to

illustrate those marvelous little poems {which are sometimes
extremely ancient}that children recite during their games, and
especially to divide themselves into different groups:
Pique et piqué comme grame
Bourre et bourré ratatamme
Miss tram drame.)9
9
Guillaume Apollinaire, “Le Folklore des jeux d’enfant,” Paris-Journal, June 26,
1914. Repr. in Oeuvres en prose complètes, ed. Pierre Caizergues and Michel
Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1991), Vol. II, p. 793. The projected volume was
interrupted by World War I but finally appeared in 1926 with 45 illustrations. See
note 5.
Apollinaire was thinking of a wide variety of songs and oral for-

mulas usually associated with folklore, whose freshness and spontane-
ity he greatly valued. Assembled under the general heading of comp-
tines, these include jump-rope rhymes, counting-out rhymes, riddles,
and other childhood games. Since these shape much of our early ex-
perience, their memory persists throughout adulthood. By incorpo-
rating words and images into his works from children’s rhymes,
Apollinaire opened up yet another field of experience for poetic
exploration and appealed to modern sensibility in its endless quest for
variety and diversity. His enthusiasm for comptines was far from a
recent phenomenon, moreover, and can be traced back at least to the
turn of the century. Dating from 1902, “La Maison des morts” (“The
House of the Dead”) was inspired by a visit to a cemetery in Munich.
Struck by the sight of forty-nine corpses displayed in a window like
department store mannequins, Apollinaire imagined a scenario in
which they briefly returned to life. As the adults celebrated their
reunion with friends and family, the children serenaded them.
Des enfants
De ce monde ou bien de l’autre
Chantaient de ces rondes
Aux paroles absurdes et lyriques
Qui sans doute sont les restes
Des plus anciens monuments poétiques
De l’humanité.
(Children
From this world or the other
Were singing those rounds
With absurd lyric verses
That are doubtless the relics
Of humanity’s
Oldest poetic monuments.)
Like the article cited previously, “La Maison des morts” reveals
that Apollinaire was acquainted with folklore scholarship. For al-
though scholars dispute the exact age of children’s rhymes, they agree
that most of them are ancient.10 According to several authorities, some
10
According to Iona and Peter Opie, 85 per cent of children’s rhymes are probably at
least than 200 years old, and a quarter date from before 1600. See the Oxford
Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977), pp.
6-7.
of the classic rhymes are thousands of years old. In addition to the

poems discussed earlier, a number of other works by Apollinaire
display traces of children’s rhymes as well, including “Le Pont Mira-
beau,” whose second stanza evokes an imaginary bridge:
Les mains dans les mains restons face à face

Tandis que sous
Le pont de nos bras passe
Des éternels regards l’onde si lasse
(Let us face each other hand in hand

While beneath
The bridge of our arms flows
The water weary of our endless glances).
As Thérèse Roméo notes, this idea was borrowed from the following
comptine, which has several variations:
Enfilons les aiguilles de bois
Dans le jupon de ma grand-mère.
Enfilons les aiguilles de bois
Dans le jupon du Chinois.
Refrain:
Passe, passe, passera
La dernière, la dernière restera.
(Let’s thread the wooden needles

In my grandmother’s petticoat.
Let’s thread the wooden needles
In the Chinese man’s petticoat.
Refrain:
Pass, pass, pass again
The last, the last one must remain.)11
A considerable number of comptines are gender specific, that

is, traditionally reserved for one sex or the other. Like jump-rope-
rhymes, “Enfilons les aiguilles de bois” is associated with a gameusu-
ally played by girls. As they all chant the words, the littlest onespass
under a bridge formed by the arms of two older girls. As in the
11
Thérèse Roméo, “Apollinaire paysagiste,” paper presented at the Colloque
Apollinaire in Nice, June 1980, apparently unpublished. Cf. Baucomont et al., eds.
Les Comptines de la langue française, pp. 311-12.
American game of musical chairs, each girl is eliminated in turn until

only one remains.
“La Blanche Neige”

Another poem that appears to have been influenced by children’s
rhymes is “La Blanche Neige” (“The White Snow”), which presents a
charming fantasy:
Les anges dans le ciel
L’un est vêtu en officier
L’un est vêtu en cuisinier
Et les autres chantent
Bel officier couleur du ciel

Le doux printemps longtemps après Noël
Te médaillera d’un beau soleil
D’un beau soleil
Le cuisinier plume les oies

Ah! tombe neige
Tombe et que n’ai-je
Ma bien-aimée entre mes bras
(Angels angels in the sky

One is dressed like an officer
One is dressed like a cook
And the others are singing
Handsome sky-blue officer

Long after Christmas sweet spring
Will decorate you with a golden sun
With a golden sun
The cook is plucking the geese

Ah! Fall snowflakes
Fall and if only I had
My sweetheart in my arms)
Mechtild Cranston speculates that “La Blanche Neige” dates

from March 1902, when Apollinaire went to Cologne to observe the
Mardi Gras celebration.12 However, internal evidence suggests the

poem was composed during the Christmas season—either in 1901 or a
few years later. Citing the cook, the Christmas goose, and the snow,
LeRoy C. Breunig conjectures that it depicts a Rhineland scene but
does not propose a date.13 Since the final line seems to refer to Annie
Playden, Michel Décaudin suggests the poem was composed during
the winter of 1903-1904.14 Scholars also disagree about the source of
“La Blanche Neige.” Stressing its fundamental indeterminacy,
Cranston concludes that the poem is modeled on fairy tales.15 Fo-
cusing on the role of the angels, Mario Richter suggests it is indebted
to various Christmas carols.16 Analyzing the equation between
angels, geese, and snowflakes, Antoine Fongaro detects traces of
several literary models.17 My own guess is that the poem was inspired
by a visual source. I suspect Apollinaire borrowed the fanciful scene
either from an illustration or from a window display.
What matters ultimately, to be sure, is how Apollinaire trans-
formed his original burst of inspiration into the finished composition.
As Michael Riffaterre has demonstrated, every poem results from “the
transformation of ... a minimal and literal sentence into a longer, com-
plex, and non-literal periphrasis.”18 This operation is performed by a
“hypogram” (primary intertext), which distorts the sentence and
12
Mechtild Cranston, “A la découverte de ‘La Blanche Neige’ de Guillaume
Apollinaire,” French Review, Vol. XXXIX, No. 5 (April 1966), p. 685. We now know
Apollinaire witnessed the Cologne Mardi Gras in February. See Apollinaire,
Correspondance avec son frère et sa mère, ed. Gilbert Boudar and Michel Décaudin
(Paris: Corti, 1987), p. 39.
13
LeRoy C. Breunig, “The Chronology of Apollinaire’s Alcools,” PMLA, Vol.
LXVII, No.7 (December 1952), p. 919.
14
. Michel Décaudin, “La Blanche Neige,” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 104-
107 (1964), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 3, p. 128.
15
Cranston, “A la découverte de ‘La Blanche Neige’ de Guillaume Apollinaire,” p.
693.
16
Mario Richter, Apollinaire: il rinnovamento della scrittura poetica all’inizio del
novecento (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1990), pp. 67-78. Entitled “‘La Blanche Neige’
d’Apollinaire”, an earlier version appeared in Etudes autour d”Alcools”, ed. Anne de
Fabry and Marie-France Hilgar (Birmingham, Alabama: Summa, 1985), pp. 41-50
and earlier in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Apollinaire, 2nd ser.,
Nos. 6-7 (April-September 1983), paginated separately.
17
Antoine Fongaro, “Des Sources d’Apollinaire,” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos.
146-149 (1966), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 5, pp. 112-114.
18
Michael Riffaterre, Semiotics of Poetry (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1978), p. 19.
produces the final text through conversion and expansion. The

hypogram may consist of a quotation, a thematic configuration, a set
of literary conventions, or a cliché. In the absence of actual citations,
therefore, a poem will incorporate themes and/or stylistic devices bor-
rowed from other works. This procedure is illustrated by “La Blanche
Neige,” whose tone, imagery, and rhetorical devices recall those of
children’s rhymes. Instead of evoking a specific model, the poem
embodies a series of generic expectations.
Except for the final two lines (which may have been added later),
“La Blanche Neige” was clearly designed for children. Or rather, since
Apollinaire was writing for an adult audience, it was intended to give
the impression that it was designed for children. In keeping with this
mission, as A. E. Pilkington remarks, “the poem exploits the mode of
the nursery rhyme.”19 Together with the frequent repetitions, which
lend a singsong quality to the work, the final twist recalls various chil-
dren’s songs. Greet agrees with this assessment but attributes the
resemblance to the irregular line lengths, occasional rhyme, and fairy-
tale imagery.20 In addition, as Décaudin points out, several identical
rhymes (“ciel” / “ciel”; “soleil” / “soleil”) and one banal rhyme (“prin-
temps” / “longtemps”) contribute to the general echolalia.21
To a considerable extent, these rhetorical devices are responsible
for the childish tone that pervades the composition. They are com-
plemented not only by the simple diction, which verges on banality,
but by the fact that the speaker joyfully embraces the Christmas
fantasy. Indeed, by the end of the second stanza, he has become an
active participant. Observing the angelic army officer shivering
beneath his sky-blue overcoat, he assures him that spring is just
around the corner. Since the speaker turns out to be Apollinaire,
however, these remarks are entirely fanciful. They are addressed not
to the “bel officier” but to an implicit audience composed of one or
more children. This impression is reinforced by the angels’ costumes,
which are equally fanciful. Shedding their long white robes, they have
disguised themselves as a cook and a soldier—exactly like two
children playing “dress-up.” These and other playful touches provide
19
Guillaume Apollinaire, Alcools, ed. A. E. Pilkington (Oxford: Blackwell, 1970), p.
128.
20
Guillaume Apollinaire, Alcools, tr. and ed. Anne Hyde Greet (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1965), p. 82.
21
Décaudin, “La Blanche Neige,” p. 126
the key to the poem, which depicts a fantasy world where anything
can occur. Like every good children’s story, it strives to be enter-
taining. When Apollinaire reminds us of his presence in the last two
lines, it comes as quite a shock. Like the imaginary children grouped
around him, we are so immersed in the tale that reality—and the adult
world—takes us by surprise.
“La Dame”
Besides stylistic and thematic traces of children’s rhymes, “La
Dame” contains several quotations. Unlike the innocent fantasy pre-
sented in “La Blanche Neige,” the drama that it enacts borders on the
bizarre. In contrast to the first poem, which is perfectly coherent, the
second is fragmentary and fraught with mystery.
Toc toc Il a fermé sa porte

Les lys du jardin sont flétris
Quel est donc ce mort qu’on emporte
Tu viens de toquer à sa porte

Et trotte trotte
Trotte la petite souris
(Knock knock He has closed his door

The garden lilies are withered
Whose corpse are they carrying off
You just knocked on his door

And the little mouse
Goes trot trot trot)
“La Dame” was originally taken from a much longer work entitled
“La Clef” (“The Key”), whose female protagonist sets out in search of
a symbolic key.22 When she returns with the object of her quest, she
discovers her lover is dead and drowns herself in a lake. Published in
1903, “La Dame” was conceived initially as a dialogue between the
woman and an anonymous bystander. Originally entitled “Le Retour”
(“The Return”), it consisted of five octosyllabic lines rhyming
22
Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, ed. Marcel Adéma and Michel Décaudin
(Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1965), p. 553.
ABAAB. Apollinaire eliminated the fifth verse in 1912, added two

more lines, and changed the title to “La Dame.” Finally, as he would
do in Alcools the following year, he removed the commas, periods,
and quotation marks. This decision drastically altered the way in
which the reader perceives the poem. By abolishing the punctuation
signs, Décaudin notes, “Apollinaire a transmuté un petit drame en une
scène énigmatique” (“Apollinaire transformed a brief drama into an
enigmatic scene”).23
Just how enigmatic can be seen from the first stanza, which
juxtaposes three apparently unrelated remarks. Uttered by one or more
disembodied voices, they appear to be completely unmotivated. Who
is knocking at the door, one wonders, and what does he or she want?
Who is the man in the house, and why has he shut his door? Why are
the lilies withered? Where did the corpse come from? Not sur-
prisingly, critics are divided on these and similar questions. Since the
poem is basically indeterminate, several different scenarios are pos-
sible. Although Didier Alexandre disagrees, most scholars believe the
corpse belongs to the man mentioned in the first line.24 The reason he
refuses to answer the door is because he is dead. And while the same
critic claims the visitor is “la cruelle et insouciante incarnation de la
mort” (“the cruel and remorseless incarnation of death”), we know
from “La Clef” that she is the man’s fiancée—who is evoked in the
title. Wondering why there is no response, she looks around
distractedly and notices several people carrying a coffin, which ironic-
ally contains her lover.
Thus the poem opens on a negative note that becomes more
intense as the reader progresses. In addition, the withered lilies intro-
duce a funereal atmosphere, which deepens with the discovery of the
corpse in the next line. While it is not surprising to encounter flowers
at a funeral, those in “La Dame” possess a symbolic function. Upon
reflection, one perceives that they are emblems of mortality. “C’est
parce que les lis sont flétris,” Marc Poupon explains, “que le lecteur
divine aussitôt que le mort est le propriétaire du jardin” (“Since the
lilies are withered, the reader deduces that the garden belongs to the
23
Décaudin, “Alcools” de Guillaume Apollinaire, p. 52.
24
Didier Alexandre, Guillaume Apollinaire, “Alcools” (Paris: Presses Universitaires
de France, 1994), pp. 51-52.
dead man”).25 Ultimately, the garden and the vacant house belong to
Death, which presides over the first three lines.
Despite the stanza’s morbid thematics, which seem far removed
from the experience of childhood, several echos of children’s rhymes
can be detected. Since the latter contain frequent references to death,
this is not terribly surprising. A simple comptine like that quoted by
Pierre Roy could conceivably have served as a point of departure:
J’entre dans un petit cabinet

J’y vois la Mort qui rôtissait
Je la prends par les pieds par la tête
Je la jette par la fenêtre.
(I enter a small room

I see Death roasting by the fire
I take her by the feet by the head
I throw her out the window.)
Where one finds the clearest influence of children’s rhymes, how-

ever, is at the beginning and the end of “La Dame.” Like “eenie,
meenie, minie, moe” in English, “toc toc toc” is a phrase used in
counting-out rhymes. In the following comptine, for example, the
children stand in a circle around their leader, who counts them by
reciting the rhyme. When he or she reaches the final word (“tonnere”),
the child in question receives a tap on the cheek and must withdraw.
Toc toc toc
Il pleut sur la terre;
Toc toc toc
Il fait noir et claire;
Toc toc toc
Tu bats des paupières;
Toc toc toc
Tu fais des éclairs;
Toc toc toc
Voici le tonnerre.
(Knock knock knock

It is raining outside;
25
Marc Poupon, “Sources allemandes d’Apollinaire,” Revue des Lettres Modernes,
Nos. 530-536 (1978), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 14, p. 14.
Knock knock knock

It is dark and bright;
Knock knock knock
You blink your eyes;
Knock knock knock
You make lightning;
Knock knock knock
Here comes the thunder.)26
As several critics have noted, threshold imagery plays an im-

portant role in Apollinaire’s works. However, the same doors and
windows that allow us to pass from one realm to another can also
serve as impediments. It depends on whether they are open or closed.
Whereas “Les Fenêtres” invites readers to throw back the shutters and
admire the Paris rooftops, “La Porte” dissuades them from opening the
door to a dismal hotel. Other doors—like that in “La Dame”—remain
tightly shut no matter how hard one pounds on them.27 Interestingly,
portes (both doors and gates) also play a significant role in children’s
rhymes, where they are associated with similar rites of passage. Since
they are usually closed, most of the rhymes exhort the children to open
them. This describes several comptines associated with the jeu du
tunnel, traces of which appear in “Le Pont Mirabeau.” As they pass
under a bridge formed by their friend’s arms, some children chant “Pic
et pic bagnolet, / Les portes sont-elles ouvertes?” (“Pic et pic bagnolet,
/ Are the doors open?”). Others prefer a version of “Enfilons les
aiguilles de bois,” which includes the following lines:
Saint Pierre nous a donné
Les clés du Paradis
Pour ouvrir les portes, les portes,
Pour ouvrir les portes, les portes du Paradis.
(Saint Peter has given us

The keys to Paradise
To open the gates, the gates,
To open the gates, the gates of Paradise).28
26
Baucomont et al, Les Comptines de la langue française, p. 293.
27
See Madeleine Boisson, Apollinaire et les mythologies antiques (Paris: Nizet &
Fasano: Schena, 1989), p. 354 and Marie-Jeanne Durry, Guillaume Apollinaire:
“Alcools” (Paris: SEDES, 1964), Vol. II, pp. 120-23, respectively.
28
Baucomont et al, Les Comptines de la langue française, pp. 312 and 311-12
respectively.
As Marie-Jeanne Durry notes, the last two lines of “La Dame”

“font une disparité guillerette avec la mélancolie de ceux qui
précèdent” (“contrast vividly with the melancholy lines that precede
them”).29 Not only is the rhythm much more lively, but the conclusion
catches the reader by surprise. Introduced at the very last moment, the
image of the scurrying mouse appears to be entirely gratuitous.
Divorced from the rest of the poem, the last two lines strike one as
completely illogical. Fortunately, with a little effort the mouse’s
identity and motives can be reconstructed. Critics generally agree that
the lines refer to the dead man’s fiancée, who, receiving no response
to her knock, decides to leave.30 Significantly, the poem was originally
entitled “La Petite Souris” (and before that “La Souris”) until Apol-
linaire changed the title to “La Dame.”
While this much is fairly clear, one wonders why the poet chose
to compare the lady to a tiny rodent. Greet believes the last two lines
represent a verbal play on a popular cliché: “On entendrait trotter une
souris” (“You could hear a pin drop”).31 According to this scenario,
the knocking on the dead man’s door would be followed by a deep
silence. She adds that the mouse itself may have been suggested by the
lady’s feet appearing and disappearing beneath her long skirts. Indeed,
since “trotte trotte / Trotte” records the sound of her heels clicking
briskly on the pavement, this is more than likely. By contrast, Scott
Bates and Didier Alexandre believe the lady is a prostitute (one of the
numerous meanings of souris).32 Bates reports that streetwalkers were
called trotteuses and cites a popular refrain: “trotte, trotte / Javote / Et
toujours / Revends tes amours” (“trot, trot / Javote / And sell your love
/ Again and again”). Finally, Décaudin suggests that Apollinaire was
thinking of a poem by Verlaine, entitled “Impression fausse,” which
includes the following stanza:
Dame souris trotte
Noire dans le gris du soir,
Dame souris trotte
29
Durry, Guillaume Apollinaire: “Alcools,” Vol. II, p. 64.
30
However, Poupon thinks the conclusion depicts the departure of the dead man’s
soul, which is disguised as a mouse (“Sources allemandes d’Apollinaire,” p. 14).
31
Apollinaire, Alcools, tr. and ed. Greet, p. 266.
32
Scott Bates, Dictionnare des mots libres d’Apollinaire (Sewanee, Tennessee: pri-
vate printed, 1991), pp. 142-43 and Alexandre, Guillaume Apollinaire, “Alcools,” p.
52.
Grise dans le soir.
(Lady mouse trots along

Black in the gray evening,
Lady mouse trots along
Gray in the evening).33
Although it is tempting to conclude that “La Dame” was modeled

on “Impression fausse,” Apollinaire actually drew on a different
source. The two poems resemble each other not because one is
indebted to the other but because they were both influenced by
children’s rhymes. The latter’s impact on the second composition is
signaled, among other things, by the abrupt change in tone that
introduces the conclusion. As Pilkington remarks, the last two lines
possess the disarming logic of nursery rhymes.34 All of a sudden,
Apollinaire seems to be addressing an audience composed of children
rather than adults. The manner in which the mouse departs, for
example, recalls any number of comptines. Not only does she trot
off—instead of running or scampering—but she trots off in triple
time. Compare the following rhyme:
Quand madame va en campagne,
Elle va au pas, au pas, au pas;
Quand le fils va en campagne,
Il va au trot, au trot, au trot;
Quand le monsieur va en campagne,
Il va au galop, au galop, au galop.
(When Madam goes to the country,

She goes at a walking pace;
When the son goes to the country,
He goes trot, trot, trot;
When Monsieur goes to the country,
He goes at a gallop, gallop, gallop).35
Nevertheless, the most obvious token of Apollinaire’s interest in

children’s rhymes is clearly the little mouse herself, who figures
33
Michel Décaudin, Le Dossier d’”Alcools”, rev. ed. (Geneva: Droz and Paris:
Minard, 1965), p. 200.
34
Apollinaire, Alcools, ed. A. E. Pilkington, p. 148. Greet also notes their resem-
blance to nursery rhymes.
35
Eugène Rolland, Rimes et jeux de l’enfance (1883) (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose,
1967), p. 27.
prominently in French folklore. The subject of a well-known comptine

(with countless variations), she has been a favorite of French children
for centuries. As the following excerpt will demonstrate, she is
thoroughly charming:
Quelle heure est-il?
—Il est midi.
—Qui est-ce qui l’a dit?
—La petite souris.
—Où donc est-elle?
—Dans la chapelle.
—Qu’est-ce qu’elle y fait?
—De la dentelle.
(What time is it?

“It is noon.”
“Who told you?”
“The little mouse.”
“Where is she?”
“In the chapel.”
“What is she doing?”
“Making lace.”)36
Unlike the Three Blind Mice (who are frankly repulsive) or the
star of “Hickory Dickory Dock” (who seems demented), la petite
souris embodies a whole series of human virtues. In contrast to her
Anglo-Saxon cousins, she is a civilized mouse—which is to say a
French mouse. According to all indications, she is clever, pious, and
talented. Not only does she know how to tell time, but she is also an
accomplished lace-maker. By contrast, the little mouse in “La Dame”
merely serves as a metaphor. Despite her virtual existence, she is far
more than a pale reflection. Indeed, since her metaphorical function is
largely implicit, she is endowed with a surprising presence. The fact
that she has an extensive history means that she is accompanied by
substantial cultural baggage. A popular figure in her own right, she
completely eclipses the lady whom she supposedly represents.
36
Baucomont et al., Les Comptines de la langue française, pp. 233-34.
“Salomé”
Published in Vers et Prose in 1905, “Salomé” has attracted far
more critical attention over the years than “La Dame.” Since it re-
volves around a legendary femme fatale, this is not particularly sur-
prising. However, “Salomé” is also much more ambitious than the
preceding poem, more finely crafted, and—doubtless for this reason—
ultimately more successful. And yet, despite their obvious differences,
the two compositions have quite a bit in common. Like “La Dame,”
for example, “Salomé” features a female protagonist whose loved one
has recently passed away. Like the earlier poem, it encompasses a
garden whose lilies are strangely wilted. In addition, the two works
possess the same structure and are similarly indebted to children’s
rhymes. Finally, as numerous critics have commented, they are both
ambiguous—although not as much as is generally supposed. Most of
“Salomé”‘s ambiguity stems from readers’ failure to grasp the under-
lying assumptions that govern the text.
Celebrated by the Symbolists in particular, Salomé was an
extremely popular character at the dawn of the twentieth century. As
Décaudin remarks, she was “une figure privilégiée, chargée des rêves
et des phantasmes de l’époque”(“a privileged figure, expressing the
dreams and the fantasies of the period”).37 In France alone, according
to Maurice Kraft, 2789 poets celebrated the dancer during the fifty
years preceding World War I!38 By the time Apollinaire decided to
write about her, she had acquired mythic proportions. Nevertheless,
while the cult of Salomé was widespread, the tradition was gradually
coming to an end. Few aesthetic options remained that had not already
been explored. For someone like Apollinaire, who prized originality
above all else, this presented a serious problem. Instead of simply
writing a pastiche, he chose to create a revolutionary new poem, one
that would make the literary world sit up and take notice. Toward this
end, he devised four principal strategies.
Apollinaire first decided to create a radical new mise-en-scène.
Defying spatial and temporal conventions, he transposed the biblical
tale to a different country and a different historical period. Readers
37
Michel Décaudin, “Un Mythe ‘fin de siècle’: Salomé,” Comparative Literature
Studies, Vol. IV, Nos. 1-2 (1967), p. 110.
38
Cited in ibid., p. 109.
expecting to revisit ancient Palestine are astonished to encounter a

medieval French court. Herod and his wife have been transformed into
the king and queen of France, and Salomé has become a French
princess! Commentators have generally assumed that the drama takes
place in France and the Holy Land simultaneously. Thus Durry calls
the poem “une bigarrure d’époques juxtaposées” (“a hodgepodge of
different periods”) and Robert Couffignal “une rêverie envoûtante, où
se mêlent les époques: temps évangéliques, moyen âge, temps
modernes” (“an enchanting fantasy combining biblical times, the
Middle Ages, and the modern period”).39 Most critics find the chrono-
logical mixture disturbing or confusing (or both). While Durry accuses
Apollinaire of creating a carnival atmosphere, others complain that the
poem is filled with anachronisms.
Nevertheless, close examination fails to substantiate these and
similar complaints. In actuality, “Salomé” is situated neither in mul-
tiple countries nor during different historical periods. The medieval
French setting displaces, effaces, and replaces the biblical setting al-
together. While the transition from one to the other is startling, with a
little effort it is possible to discover a logical explanation. As Jacque-
line Bellas mentions, Apollinaire may have been inspired by a
medieval painting or drawing.40 Indeed, since he possessed a keen
interest in art, this is quite likely. A painting such as Benozzo
Gozzoli’s The Feast of Herod and the Beheading of Saint John the
Baptist could well have provided the necessary inspiration. The center
of Gozzoli’s exquisite composition depicts Salomé dancing for Herod
39
Durry, Guillaume Apollinaire: “Alcools”, Vol. III, p. 146 and Robert Couffignal,
L’Inspiration biblique dans l’oeuvre de Guillaume Apollinaire (Paris: Minard, 1966),
p. 35.
40
Jacqueline Bellas, “L’Equivoque de Salomé dans la littérature et l’art ‘fin de
siècle’” in Poésie et peinture du symbolisme au surréalisme en France et en Pologne,
ed. Elzbieta Grabska (Warsaw: University of Warsaw, 1973), p. 46.
Figure 3.1 Benozzo Gozzoli, The Feast of Herod and

the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist (1461-1462)
and his guests, all of whom are dressed in fifteenth-century finery. On

the left, John the Baptist prepares to be beheaded by a soldier wearing
medieval armor. At the rear, Salomé presents the severed head to her
mother.
Couffignal offers a different explanation of Apollinaire’s poem
entirely. He suggests that it is concerned with a French princess who
has lost her mind and believes she is Salomé.41 However, there is
really no need to justify the geographical and chronological changes in
“Salomé.” Like modern directors who situate Hamlet in Brazil or
Heart of Darkness in Viet Nam, Apollinaire may simply have decided
that medieval France would make a good location. In order to make
the transition more convincing, he added a number of contemporary
details. Herodias is dressed like a French countess, while her eldest
son is called the Dauphin. The king has a jester to entertain him and
soldiers with halberds to protect him. Even the trees are arranged in a
French pattern!
Apollinaire decided next to center the poem around a single, sym-
bolic date. The day he selected was June 24th which, as Rafael Cansi-
nos-Asséns notes, traditionally marks the summer solstice.42 However,
the events recounted in “Salomé” do not take place on Midsummer’s
Day but rather the evening before—on Midsummer’s Night. The
composition is precisely situated both in time and in space. While the
full significance of this date will become evident as we progress,
several aspects are readily apparent. In France, for example, Mid-
summer’s Night is called la nuit de la Saint-Jean because it is the eve
of John the Baptist’s birthday. In addition, as Shakespeare’s A Mid-
summer’s Night’s Dream attests, it was associated in the popular
imagination with the height of madness—foolishness as well as
insanity. Marveling at Malvoglio’s strange behavior in Twelfth Night,
Olivia protests: “Why, this is very midsummer madness” (Act III,
Scene 4). Although it is not immediately apparent, this theme is
introduced at the very beginning of “Salomé.”
Whereas Apollinaire’s first two strategies set the stage for the
story, the last two focused on the story itself. They determined not
only how the narrative would be presented but also how it would be
structured. Rejecting the dialogue form adopted by Mallarmé in
41
Couffignal, L’Inspiration biblique dans l’oeuvre de Guillaume Apollinaire, p. 35.
42
Rafael Cansinos-Asséns, Salomé en la literatura (Flaubert, Wilde, Mallarmé,
Eugenio de Castro, Apollinaire) (Madrid: América, 1919), pp. 241-43.
Hérodiade, which interrupts the alexandrines’ stately flow,

Apollinaire decided to compose a dramatic monologue. By reducing
the descriptive elements to a minimum, he allowed the hapless protag-
onist to reveal her innermost thoughts and feelings. Though troubling,
the resulting portrait of Salomé’s psychological distress is intimate
and unforgettable. Surprisingly, the portrait that gradually emerges
does not conform to her traditional depiction. Generally portrayed as
cruel and unfeeling, Apollinaire’s Salomé seems strangely vulnerable.
In contrast to Mallarmé’s princess contemplating her reptilian nudity,
she seems immensely human.
Apollinaire’s final stroke of genius was to focus on the aftermath
of Salomé’s actions rather than on the actions themselves. Eschewing
the anecdotal approach favored by many writers, the poem com-
mences where the traditional story leaves off. It begins not with John
the Baptist’s denunciation of Herodias’ incestuous marriage, nor with
her plans for revenge, nor even with Salomé’s famous dance, but after
the prophet has been beheaded. Apollinaire had treated Salomé once
before, in a short short story published in 1902 (collected in
L’Hérésiarque et Cie). Entitled “La Danseuse,” it contains the fol-
lowing description: “Salomé, enjolivée, attifée, diaprée, fardée, dansa
devant le roi et, excitant un vouloir doublement incestueux, obtint la
tête du Saint refusée à sa mère” (“Looking beautiful, wearing a lovely
dress, attractively made up, scintillating, Salomé danced before the
king and, arousing a doubly incestuous desire, obtained the Saint’s
head which he had refused her mother”).43 This account, which re-
flects the fin-de-siècle myth, depicts her not only as a willing
participant but as a scheming accomplice. By contrast, Salomé was
transformed into a completely different figure three years later.
Instead of a voluptuous temptress, she was cast as a naive adolescent.
Consisting of five quatrains loosely rhymed ABAB, “Salomé” is
composed largely of alexandrines. Apollinaire varies the formula by
introducing a decasyllable in the fourth stanza, rhyming the final
stanza ABBA, and appending three half lines at the end. The reader’s
first glimpse of Salomé is profoundly astonishing. Although she had
asked Herod to bring her the head of John the Baptist, she is overcome
by grief when she finally receives it.
43
Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose, Vol. I, p. 125.
Pour que sourie encore une fois Jean-Baptiste

Sire je danserais mieux que les séraphins
Ma mère dites-moi pourquoi vous êtes triste
En robe de comtesse à côté du Dauphin
(If John the Baptist could smile again

Sire I would dance better than the seraphim
Tell me mother why you are so sad
Dressed like a countess beside the Dauphin).
The first stanza orients the reader with respect to the story and
evokes Salomé’s extraordinary talent. Elsewhere Apollinaire calls her
“la danseuse au pied prompt.”44 As this felicitous phrase implies,
Salomé is totally consumed by dance. Dancing is not only her favorite
pastime but her raison d’être. And yet, while the first two lines
acknowledge her remarkable gift, they are also deeply ironic. Al-
though her marvelous dancing brought about John the Baptist’s death,
it is powerless to restore him to life. Even the heavenly seraphim—
who according to Talmudic lore are dancing-masters—could not ac-
complish such a feat.45 While the third line is uttered by Salomé, as is
the entire work, in reality it is concerned with her mother. Here and
elsewhere, Salomé serves as an unconscious mirror, reflecting the
actions of those around her. We never view the other characters
directly. Only through her, for example, do we learn that Herodias has
a sad expression on her face.
Like Salomé’s sudden grief, this discovery comes as a
considerable surprise. Since her mortal enemy John the Baptist is
dead, one would expect Herodias to be jubilant. As the story unfolds,
however, the reader gradually perceives that her daughter has lost her
mind. This is the source of Herodias’ sadness. But what could have
happened to drive Salomé insane? As it turns out, there are two
answers to this question. The first one is relatively simple: she is
suffering from midsummer madness. Her illness stems from
Midsummer’s Night itself, which exerts a mysterious influence over
her. The second explanation is more complicated.
44
Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, p. 1030.
45
Scott Bates, “Notes sur ‘Simon Mage’ et Isaac Laquedem,” Revue des Lettres Mo-
dernes, Nos. 123-126 (1965), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 4, p. 68.
Mon coeur battait battait très fort à sa parole

Quand je dansais dans le fenouil en écoutant
Et je brodais des lys sur une banderole
Destinée à flotter au bout de son baton
Et pour qui voulez-vous qu’à présent je la brode

Son baton refleurit sur les bords du Jourdain
Et tous les lys quand vos soldats ô roi Hérode
L’emmenèrent se sont flétris dans mon jardin
(My heart beat how very fast it beat

Dancing in the fennel as I listened to him
And I embroidered lilies on a banner
Meant to fly from the tip of his staff
For whom should I embroider it now

His staff blooms on the Jordan’s banks
And all the flowers withered in my garden
King Herod when your soldiers led him away).
The conclusion that inevitably emerges from these two stanzas is

that Salomé was in love with John the Baptist. The construction
“battait battait” mimics her quickening heartbeat, for instance, and
betrays her excitement at hearing his voice. And the banner she is
embroidering recalls a similar device in courtly romances. Whenever a
knight enters a jousting tournament, his lady presents him with a scarf
or a handkerchief to affix to his lance as a sign of her favor. Serving as
a badge of his authority, John’s staff even resembles a lance. Depicted
in countless paintings and drawings, it is long and straight with a short
crosspiece near the top. Since the fleur-de-lys pattern was reserved for
French royalty, the fact that Salomé chose to embroider it on the
banner is also significant. Like the king of France, who governs the
secular domain, John is the supreme authority in the spiritual realm.
As the flower of Easter, moreover, the lily symbolizes rebirth and
spiritual renewal. Viewed in this perspective, it alludes to the fact that
John is the great Precursor whose role prefigures that of Jesus. His
staff not only resembles Aaron’s rod in the Bible but is imbued with
the same symbolism as the lily. Blooming on the banks of the Jordan
River (where he used to baptize his disciples), it symbolizes the
coming of Christ.
Since Salomé possesses lilies of her own, however, the situation
is considerably more complicated. Insofar as she is concerned, the
flowers are associated with purity and virginity. In many paintings of

the Annunciation, the angel carries a stalk of lilies for the same
reason. The theme of purity would seem to indicate that the love
between her and John the Baptist was strictly platonic. An argument
could even be made that she was in love with his religious message,
rather than with the man himself, and thus that she was a potential
convert. This interpretation is subverted by other symbols which
imply that she was passionately in love with John. In particular,
several critics have called attention to the sexual symbolism that
permeates the two stanzas. Bates points out that the staff is a common
symbol for the phallus and that fennel traditionally represents pubic
hair.46 Refuting Poupon’s contention that the lilies are associated with
violent death, Fongaro emphasizes their phallic nature and the fact that
they are planted in the yonic garden.47 He concludes from this that
Salomé and John the Baptist were lovers. Whichever interpretation
one chooses, the spiritual or the carnal, the withered flowers
(borrowed from “La Dame”) clearly parallel John the Baptist’s death.
Both groups of lilies, the heraldic and the biblical, are eclipsed at the
same moment.
Ultimately, the withered flowers reflect far more than the death of
John the Baptist. Since they are related to Salomé metonymically,
their unfortunate fate mirrors her own. Serving as objective cor-
relatives, they translate her deteriorating mental condition into
concrete terms. Retracing the preceding chain of events, it is clear that
Salomé’s madness stems above all from the death of the man she
loved. The recognition that she was to blame has caused her to lose
her mind. And yet the question remains: how could Salomé have done
such a thing? How could she have betrayed the man she loved? Since
she asked for John’s head in person, it is hard to believe she didn’t
know what she was doing.48 Couffignal attributes her actions to her
“demonic personality,” but this describes the mythical Salomé better
than the sorrowful adolescent in the poem.49 The best explanation is
doubtless the traditional one: that she was manipulated by her evil
46
Bates, Dictionnaire des mots libres d’Apollinaire, pp. 247 and 160 respectively.
47
Poupon, “Sources allemandes d’Apollinaire,” pp. 14-18. Antoine Fongaro, “Des
‘lys,’” Que Vlo-Ve? Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th
series, No. 14 (April-June 2001), pp. 42-45.
48
Décaudin, Le Dossier d’”Alcools,” p. 140.
49
Couffignal, L’Inspiration biblique dans l’oeuvre de Guillaume Apollinaire, p. 35.
mother. How Herodias managed to achieve this goal is left to the

reader’s imagination.
Ironically, despite her murderous history, Salomé is a surprisingly
sympathetic character. This is due partly to her mother’s manipulation,
partly to her obvious remorse, and partly to the fact that she has lost
her mind. Like John the Baptist, she is a victim of Herodias’ thirst for
revenge. Until this point, however, there has been no obvious indica-
tion that Salomé is insane. Only in the last two stanzas does the reader
perceive that she is demented. The earlier experience has so unhinged
her that she has become a child again. Her mental age is perhaps five
or six. Unlike the first three stanzas, which are situated in the royal
palace, the final two appear to take place on the palace grounds. All of
a sudden, Salomé invites everyone to come outside and dance.
Venez tous avec moi là-bas sous les quinconces
Ne pleure pas ô joli fou du roi
Prends cette tête au lieu de ta marotte et danse
N’y touchez pas son front ma mère est déjà froid
(Come with me under the quincunxes everyone

Please don’t cry charming jester
Take this head for your scepter and dance
Don’t touch mother his forehead is already cold).
Consisting of four objects at the corners of a square and a fifth in

the middle, a quincunx is a common floral pattern in public gardens.
However, the first line refers not to flowers but to plane trees, which
have been planted in alternate rows. Salomé’s sudden gaiety contrasts
vividly with the weeping jester who, like Herodias, is distressed by her
madness. Presenting him with John the Baptist’s head, which she has
been cradling in her arms, she advises him to lay down his scepter and
join in the future dancing. Since the scepter is adorned with bells and
topped by a hooded fool’s head, her suggestion possesses a certain
bizarre logic. Finally, Salomé commands the king and his attendants,
including a Spanish princess, to form a procession.
Sire marchez devant trabants marchez derrière

Nous creuserons un trou et l’y enterrerons
Nous planterons des fleurs et danserons en rond
Jusqu’à l’heure où j’aurai perdu ma jarretière
Le roi sa tabatière
L’infante son rosaire
Le curé son bréviaire
(Sire march before halberdiers march behind

We will dig a hole and bury it
We will plant flowers and dance in a ring
Until I have lost my garter
The king his snuff-box
The Infanta her rosary
The priest his breviary).
Suddenly, as Durry remarks, “tout se met à tourner au galop”

(“everything begins to whirl around and around”).50 The accelerating
rhythm at the end is complemented by the quadruple rhyme scheme,
both of which contribute to the general gaiety. The poem concludes on
an unexpected note with the royal party joining hands and dancing
around John the Baptist’s grave until they are exhausted. Although we
can visualize their actions easily enough, the conclusion is entirely
imaginary. The reader is swept up by the accelerating rhythm like the
characters themselves. Not surprisingly, since she has reverted to her
former childhood, Salomé is attracted to childish games. “The final
three lines dissolve away into a dance of pure unreality,” Pilkington
comments, “with an incantation like that of a children’s rhyme.”51
Similarly, Anna Boschetti declares that the poem concludes “au
rythme de comptine” (“with the rhythm of a comptine”).52 In addition,
the final scene recalls a traumatic experience that befalls every child at
one time or another—the death of a beloved pet. Like a group of
children who have organized a mock funeral, the king and his
followers march to the appointed spot and bury the object they are
carrying with all the pomp and ceremony they can muster.
Bellas provides an even closer link to the experience of child-
hood. Evoking her youth in the Ardennes, where Apollinaire spent the
summer of 1899, she recalls a similar song that that she and her
friends used to act out.53 Accompanying a dead heroine who refused to
marry the “p’tit roi d’Angleterre,” they would dig a hole, pretend to
bury her, plant flowers, and dance around her grave. Finally, as Serge
and Hélène Auffret note, Salomé herself resembles a character in a
50
Durry, Guillaume Apollinaire: “Alcools,” Vol. III, p. 146.
51
Apollinaire, Alcools, ed. A. E. Pilkington, p. 130.
52
Anna Boschetti, La Poésie partout: Apollinaire, homme-époque (1898-1918),
(Paris: Seuil, 2001), p. 74.
53
Bellas, “L’Equivoque de Salomé dans la littérature et l’art ‘fin de siècle,’” p. 47.
popular comptine. Like her, the miller’s daughter loves to dance but
ends up losing her garter.54
C’est la fille de la meunière
Qui dansait avec les gars;
Elle a perdu sa jarretière,
Sa jarretière ne tenait pas.
Gibouli, giboula,
On dit qu’elle est malade;
Gibouli, giboula,
On dit qu’elle en mourra.
(It’s the miller’s daughter

Who liked to dance with the boys;
She lost her garter,
Her garter wouldn’t stay up.
Gibouli, giboula,
They say that she is sick;
Gibouli, giboula,
They say that she will die.)55
Although “Salomé” ends “in the whirl of a nonsense rhyme,” as

Garnet Rees puts it, the conclusion itself is far from nonsensical.56 C.
M. Bowra offers an allegorical interpretation, for instance, in which
the frenzied dancing constitutes a myth of artistic creation.57 In
addition, the conclusion was clearly inspired by an ancient folkloric
rite handed down through the centuries. It is modeled not on a
maypole dance, as I suggested in an earlier study, but on another
picturesque custom known as le feu de la Saint-Jean.58 “Coutume po-
pulaire qui subsiste encore dans nombre de villages et de faubourgs,”
La Grande Encyclopédie reported in 1902; “la veille ou le jour même
de la fête de saint Jean-Baptiste (23 ou 24 juin), on allume des feux
autour desquels on danse, par-dessus lesquels on saute” (“A popular
rite that still exists in a number of villages and suburbs: the evening
before John the Baptist’s feast day, or the day itself (June 23rd or 24th),
people light bonfires and dance around or leap over them”). After a
54
Serge and Hélène Auffret, Le Commentaire composé (Paris: Hâchette, 1968), p.
163.
55
Baucomont et al, eds. Les Comptines de la langue française, p. 310.
56
Guillaume Apollinaire, Alcools, ed. Garnet Rees (London: Athlone, 1975), p. 147.
57
C. M. Bowra, The Creative Experiment (London: Macmillan, 1949), p. 74.
58
Willard Bohn, Apollinaire and the International Avant-Garde (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 1997), p. 190.
decline in popularity, the custom is currently experiencing a massive

revival in France.
An extensive discussion of this pan-European phenomenon can be
found in Sir James George Frazer’s book The Golden Bough, which
describes several French celebrations. “In Provence,” he declared in
1922, “the midsummer fires are still popular. Children go from door to
door begging for fuel, and they are seldom sent empty away. Formerly
the priest, the mayor, and the aldermen used to walk in procession to
the bonfire, and even deigned to light it; after which the assembly
marched thrice round the burning pile.”59 According to La Grande
Encyclopedie, a similar ceremony used to take place in Paris, at the
place de Grève, until it was abolished in 1768. Apollinaire was
obviously familiar with the midsummer celebration—which he pro-
bably witnessed in Provence during his youth—from which he bor-
rowed two key elements. The conclusion to “Salomé” incorporates not
only the circular dance around the fire but the formal procession that
preceded it.
Surprisingly, several critics find “Salomé” to be amusing—pre-
sumably because of its curious ending.60 By contrast, Leroy Breunig
emphasizes the anxiety that the composition elicits in the reader,
which I think is closer to the mark.61 The impression of gay abandon
that accompanies the conclusion is patently artificial—too much
gloom hangs over the poem for it to be convincing. Although Salo-
mé’s gaiety is doubtless sincere, her companions are simply humoring
her. They know the princess is mad and that their behavior is totally
inappropriate. For these and other reasons, “Salomé” is not an
amusing poem—nor was it ever intended to be. On the contrary, as I
have tried to show, Apollinaire created a psychological study that is
deeply disturbing. Although it begins and concludes with the theme of
dancing, Salomé’s childish game at the end bears little resemblance to
the performance that beguiled Herod. Ironically, despite her royal
blood, she fares little better than John the Baptist. By the end of the
59
Sir James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion,
abridged ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1963), p. 730.
60
See, for example, Apollinaire, Alcools, ed. A. E. Pilkington, p. 129.
61
L. C. Breunig, “Les Phares d’Apollinaire,” Cahiers du Musée d’Art Moderne, Vol.
LXXXI, No. 6 (1981), p. 66.
poem, she is reduced to a pathetic figure, a poignant shadow of her

former self.
Chapter 4
The Mammaries of Tiresias
“Rien ne m’intéresse.”
“Rie, en aimant, Thérèse.”
—Robert Desnos,“Dialogue”
Performed on June 24, 1917, at the Conservatoire Renée Maubel

in Montmartre, Les Mamelles de Tirésias attracted artists and writers
from all over Paris. It generated so much interest in fact that many
people had to be turned away. Of the 490 spectators who managed to
obtain tickets, the vast majority came prepared to have a good time.
Word had leaked out about the play’s extravagant stage effects, and a
festive atmosphere prevailed from the very beginning. Two women
even appeared with yellow paint smeared all over their faces and
bright blue eye-shadow. The performance itself took place before a
tumultuous house that was packed to the rafters. In the best avant-
garde tradition, members of the audience bantered with each other—
and with the actors on stage—as the play progressed. “Le spectacle
était dans la salle,” Paul Souday reported; “Ce furent deux heures de
reposante folie” (“The real show was provided by the audience. The
refreshing madness continued for two hours”).1 Writing to Pierre
Varenne the next day, Apollinaire declared: “Je crois que le succès a
été très franc et très net” (“I think the play was very clearly a
success”).2 No one tried to sabotage the performance, he added, and
no one fell asleep.
Not surprisingly, in view of its revolutionary aesthetics, Les Ma-
melles de Tirésias received mixed reviews from the critics. While
some writers responded positively, others complained that the
performance was a waste of time. An angry polemic also ensued
1
Paul Souday, Paris-Midi, June 26, 1917. This and other reviews are reprinted in Que
Vlo-Ve”, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 3rd ser., Nos.
15 (January 1978), 17-18 (July-October 1978), 19 (January 1979), 20 (April 1979), 23
(January 1980), 26 (October 1980), and 4th ser., No. 4 (October-December 1998).
2
Letter from Guillaume Apollinaire to Pierre Varenne, June 25, 1917. Repr. in
Apollinaire, Oeuvres complètes, ed. Michel Décaudin (Paris: Balland-Lecat, 1965-
66), Vol. IV, p. 886.
between Apollinaire and some of the Cubist painters, who publicly

disassociated themselves from the play. By avant-garde standards,
however, Les Mamelles de Tirésias was immensely successful. The
negative reviews and hostile protests simply contributed to the succès
de scandale that it enjoyed.
Following Apollinaire’s death on November 9, 1918, the play
gradually sank into obscurity. Apart from a handful of disciples and a
few cognoscenti, no one paid much attention to Les Mamelles de
Tirésias for many years except to dismiss it as a crude experiment.3 As
late as 1965, Michel Décaudin noted that the play was under
appreciated and deserved to be better known.4 Since Les Mamelles de
Tirésias influenced a number of playwrights who came after
Apollinaire, this situation was highly ironic. Happily the play has
received the recognition it deserves since then and occupies a secure
place in the history of the French avant-garde. Like Alfred Jarry’s Ubu
roi, for instance, it is considered to be an important precursor of the
Theater of the Absurd.
The Aesthetics of Surrealism

Whereas Apollinaire could simply have continued to write poetry
when he returned from the front, Henri Béhar observes, “il prit la
direction de l’avant-garde et commanda une véritable attaque du thé-
âtre avec la représentation des Mamelles de Tirésias ... , montrant qu’il
avait parfaitement médité l’exemple d’Alfred Jarry” (“he assumed the
leadership of the avant-garde and ordered a serious attack on the
theater with the performance of The Mammaries of Tirésias ...
revealing that he had studied Alfred Jarry’s example closely”).5
Indeed, traces of the latter’s influence abound in the play, from the
wordplay involving merde to the funny accent adopted by the husband
and the collective character called the People of Zanzibar. Like them,
the gendarme’s cardboard horse, the masks worn by some of the
3
For example, David Grossvogel in The Self-Conscious Stage (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1958), p. 46 and Jacques Guicharnaud, in his Anthology of 20th
Century French Theater (Paris and New York: Paris Book Center, 1967), p. 44.
4
Michel Décaudin, preface to Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 123-126 (1965),
special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 4, p. 3.
5
Henri Béhar, Le Théâtre dada et surréaliste (Paris: Gallimard, 1979), p. 77.
The Mammaries of Tiresias 107
actors, and the placards on stage were inspired by Ubu roi. In addition
to rapid rhythms and abrupt transitions, Peter Read adds, both plays
also make abundant use of caricature.6
As we saw in Chapters 2 and 3, one way in which Apollinaire
strove to revolutionize modern aesthetics was by importing cultural
artifacts. Besides games, common objects, and children’s rhymes, he
incorporated posters, handbills, graffiti, and bits of everyday speech
into many of his works. In addition to compositions like “Le Pont
Mirabeau,” “La Dame,” and “Salomé,” this describes the conversation
poems, the calligrams, the Quelconqueries, the simultaneous poems,
and Les Mamelles de Tirésias. Like its companions, the latter
constitutes “un hybride de culture populaire et de recherches d’avant-
garde” (“a hybrid of popular culture and avant-garde experiments”).7
In particular, Apollinaire drew heavily on popular forms of theater
such as the circus, the music hall, silent films, marionettes, and Punch
and Judy shows (which also fascinated Jarry).8 Parodying American
cowboy movies at one point, two clowns called Presto and Lacouf
draw their pistols, fire at each other, fall down dead, and miraculously
come back to life.
As Apollinaire insisted in the prologue to Les Mamelles de
Tirésias, the modern age demanded a new kind of theater—one that
would reflect modern experience. In contrast to Classical French
drama, with its emphasis on decorum, verisimilitude, and the three
unities, the new theater would be brash, provocative, and absurd. In
contrast to the Naturalist theater, with its trompe l’oeil effects and
“slice of life” philosophy, it would be profoundly anti-realistic. Des-
pite its aversion to mimesis, Apollinaire added with a paradoxical
flourish, the new theater would actually be more realistic than
traditional theater. Privileging human experience over visual
perception, it would “faire surgir la vie même dans toute sa vérité”
(“conjure up life itself in all its truth”). Focusing on basic principles
rather than physical phenomena, the latter concept was crucial to
6
Peter Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias: la revanche d’Eros (Rennes:
Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2000), p. 65. Alfred Jarry discusses several of these
devices in “De l’inutilité du théâtre au théâtre,” Oeuvres complètes, ed. Michel Arrivé
(Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1972), Vol. I, pp. 405-10.
7
Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias: la revanche d’Eros, p. 72. For a list
of the different kinds of modern media that figure in the play, see p. 73.
8
Pierre Caizergues, “Apollinaire, le cirque et les marionnettes,” Berenice (Rome),
Vol. II (July 1981), pp. 32-44.
Apollinaire’s project. In order to reveal a superior truth (sur-vérité), he

reasoned, the playwright would need to employ a superior realism
(sur-réalisme). Since Les Mamelles de Tirésias embodied precisely
this approach, he added the following subtitle: drame surréaliste.9
Although “Surrealism” was destined to gain worldwide fame, the
program outlined above was relatively short-lived. Following Apol-
linaire’s death, the term was appropriated by André Breton and his
colleagues, who set out to explore the Freudian unconscious. In the
beginning, however, surrealism was associated with literary cubism.
The prefix sur- served as an intensifier rather than a transcendental
marker. According to Jacques Guicharnaud, the initial term was all
but meaningless. “For Apollinaire,” he asserts, “the word ‘surrealist’
had no specific artistic or literary credo.”10 Upon close examination,
however, this impression turns out to be mistaken. For one thing, an
excellent definition of surrealism occurs in the prologue to Les
Mamelles de Tirésias, where it is described as “l’usage raisonnable
des invraisemblances” (“the reasonable use of unreasonable inven-
tions”). For another thing, Apollinaire elaborated on his initial
discussion in two documents that appeared the following year. In an
article entitled “L’Esprit nouveau et les poètes,” for example, he
stressed the crucial role of surprise.11 In addition, he drafted a preface
for Les Mamelles de Tirésias (published in January) that contained the
following remarks:
Quand l’homme a voulu imiter la marche, il a créé la roue qui

ne ressemble pas à une jambe. Il a fait ainsi du surréalisme sans
le savoir.
9
For a more extensive discussion of Apollinaire’s surrealism, see Willard Bohn, The
Rise of Surrealism: Cubism, Dada, and the Pursuit of the Marvelous (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 2001), pp.122-29. Curiously, Picasso once told his
dealer that he invented the term surréalisme. See Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles
de Tirésias: la revanche d’Eros, p. 140.
10
Guicharnaud, Anthology of 20th Century French Theater, pp. 40-41.
11
Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, ed. Pierre Caizergues and
Michel Décaudin (Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1991), Vol. II, pp. 941-54.
(When man wanted to imitate walking, he created the wheel,

which does not resemble a leg. Thus he committed a surrealistic
act without knowing it).12
Reflecting the traditional dichotomy between form and content,

Apollinaire’s surrealism exploits two key principles: surprise and ana-
logy. It systematically violates the audience’s expectations, and it pro-
jects the drama onto a parallel plane. Interestingly, this situation
recalls Pierre Reverdy’s discussion of the dynamics of metaphor.13 In
order to qualify as surrealist, according to Apollinaire, the relation
between the parallel elements must be valid but not immediately
evident. The farther apart they are, the more surprising the analogy
will be. The most obvious example is the reversal of gender roles in
the play. A dedicated feminist, Thérèse transforms herself into a man
at the beginning and changes her name to Tirésias. In return, her hus-
band becomes a woman and assumes her wifely duties. Since she
refuses to have children, he gives birth to 40,049 infants during the
intermission. Discussing this event in the preface, Apollinaire
identified it as the crux of the play. As with other vérités supposées
(“imaginary truths”), he added in “L’Esprit nouveau et les poètes,” the
surprise that it generates stems from its novelty.14
In the Tradition
In fact, as Apollinaire well knew, the reversal of gender roles has
an extensive history going back to Classical antiquity. For example,
three of Aristophanes’ comedies portray worlds dominated by women:
Lysistrata, Thesmophoriazousae, and Ecclesiazousae. As Froma Zeit-
lin observes in her exhaustive survey of Classical Greek literature, the
reversal of gender roles is usually symmetrical. “When women are in
a position to rule men,” she concludes, “men must become women.”15
Not only does Euripides’ The Bacchae contain a similar reversal,
12
Guillaume Apollinaire, Oeuvres poétiques, ed. Marcel Adéma and Michel Décaudin
(Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1965), pp. 865-66. The basic comparison dates back at least
to 1913. See Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol. II, p. 525.
13
Pierre Reverdy, “L’Image,” Nord-Sud, No. 1 (March 1918), not paginated.
14
Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol, II, p. 950.
15
Zeitlin, Playing the Other: Gender and Society in Classical Greek Literature
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), p. 384.
Marianne Bouchardon points out, but it anticipates the main themes in

Les Mamelles de Tirésias as well.16 In addition, a number of other
possible sources exist. Apollinaire could have seen an early German
film, for example, in which a scientist enables a couple to have huge
numbers of children.17 Or he could have observed that several Punch
and Judy scenarios require the characters to trade gender roles.18 Or
again he could have been inspired by a play about repopulation,
published by Pierre-Jean Baptiste Chaussard in 1791.19
Unfortunately, none of these involve actual gender reversals and
thus do not seem especially promising. However, Jean Laude has dis-
covered a more likely candidate: an amusing novel by Edmond About
entitled Le Cas de M. Guérin, published in 1862.20 In contrast to Mme
Guérin, who possesses a mustache and other masculine attributes, her
husband is markedly feminine, even to the point of suffering monthly
nosebleeds! Eventually she manages to impregnate him, and he gives
birth to a son. On the other hand, Pol-P. Gossiaux suggests that Apol-
linaire’s play may have been inspired by a comic opera dating from
1722: Alexis Piron’s Tirésias.21 Since both works feature the Greek
soothsayer, whom the gods transformed into a woman for seven years,
they inevitably contain several similarities. However, Apollinaire
could simply have drawn his inspiration from the Classical myth with-
out consulting Piron at all. In any case, as Peter Read and Anne
Clancier have observed independently, gender reversals occur in a
16
Marianne Bouchardon, “Les Mamelles de Tirésias: le retour de Dionysos,” Que
Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser., No. 16
(September-December 2001), pp. 108-13. In addition, she argues that Les Mamelles
de Tirésias was inspired by Dionysiaque rites. See also Willard Bohn, Apollinaire and
the Faceless Man: The Creation and Evolution of a Modern Motif (Rutherford, New
Jersey: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1991), pp. 16-76.
17
Michel Décaudin, “Tirésias et Max Linder,” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International
des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 3rd series, No. 19 (July-August 1995), p. 84.
18
Caizergues, “Apollinaire, le cirque et les marionnettes,” p. 40.
19
Mihaïlo Pavlovic, “La Repopulation et Les Mamelles de Tirésias,” Revue des
Lettres Modernes, Nos. 166-169 (1967), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 6, pp.
133-50.
20
Jean Laude, contribution to a debate on literary cubism, Cahiers du Musée National
d’Art Moderne, No. 6 (1981), p. 137.
21
Pol-P. Gossiaux, “Sur une source possible des Mamelles de Tirésias: le Tirésias de
Piron,” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 576-581 (1980), special issue Guillaume
Apollinaire 15, pp. 172-73 and “Les Mamelles de Tirésias: note historique et
anthropologique,“ Berenice (Rome), Vol. II (July 1981), pp. 25-27.
number of works by Apollinaire. Citing Le Poète assassiné and other

texts, they each conclude that the fantasy of a pregnant man was
firmly rooted in the poet’s psyche.22
Male pregnancy was also a recurrent theme—or at least a
recurrent metaphor—in avant-garde circles, where it was associated
with modern machinery. Since mechanical inventions were created
exclusively by men, the process was compared to parthenogenesis.
Thus Francis Picabia baptized the machine “fille née sans mère”
(“motherless daughter”), and F. T. Marinetti proclaimed in Mafarka le
futuriste:
Je vous annonce que l’heure est proche où des hommes aux
tempes larges et au menton d’acier enfanteront prodigieusement,
d’un seul effort de leur volonté exorbitée, des géants aux gestes
infaillibles.
(The hour is near when men with large brows and chins of
steel will prodigiously give birth, with a single effort of their
tremendous will-power, to giants with infallible gestures).23
What makes this quote especially interesting—besides the al-

lusion to male pregnancy—is the role that Marinetti assigned to la
volonté, which recalls a similar comment in Les Mamelles de Tirésias.
Following the prolific intermission, the husband is interviewed by an
American journalist who comes, ironically, from a town named
Paris.24 Asked how he managed to produce so many children, the
husband replies: “La volonté Monsieur elle nous mène à tout” (“Will-
power Sir enables us to accomplish anything”). The conjunction of
these two themes suggests that Apollinaire was thinking of Marinetti’s
novel at this point.
22
Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias: la revanche d’Eros, pp. 171-72.
Anne Clancier, “Amour parental et amour filial dans l’oeuvre de Guillaume Apolli-
naire,” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 805-811 (1987), special issue Guillaume
Apollinaire 17, pp. 16-22. While Clancier attributes Apollinaire’s fascination with
gender reversal to his sexual ambiguity, Read relates it to his broader preoccupation
with the androgyne. See also Peter Read, “Apollinaire et la fécondité masculine,” Que
Vlo-Ve? Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th series, No.
20 (October-December 2002), pp. 118-120.
23
F. T. Marinetti, Mafarka le futuriste (Paris: Sansot, 1909), p. xi. The final chapter,
which is devoted to precisely this project, contains several similar statements.
24
Seven states have towns named Paris: Illinois, Texas, Tennessee, Idaho, Arkansas,
Kentucky, and Missouri.
Besides the literary, mythical, psychological, and popular models

discussed previously, Les Mamelles de Tirésias may have been in-
spired by an anthropological source. On January 15, 1910, Apollinaire
published a brief notice in Paris-Journal which began: “On se
souvient des paroles de la veuve à sir Hudibras: ‘Il paraît qu’en Chine
les maris accouchent à la place de leurs femmes’” (“I am reminded of
the widow’s words to Sir Hudibras: ‘It seems that in China the
husbands give birth instead of their wives’”).25 Apollinaire was
referring to a mock-heroic poem by Samuel Butler entitled Hudibras
(1663), which contains the following lines: “For though Chineses go
to bed, / And lye in, in their ladies stead; / And for the pains they took
before, / Are nurs’d, and pamper’d to do more ... .” As the editors of
the Pléiade edition note, the way in which Apollinaire modified this
passage clearly anticipates Les Mamelles de Tirésias.
The importance of Apollinaire’s notice derives not from the
reference to Samuel Butler, however, whose influence is problematic,
but from its title: “La Couvade.” This term describes a custom that
exists in tribal societies in various parts of the world. When a woman
has a baby, the father takes to his bed, receives well-wishers, and
submits to fasting, purification, and certain taboos. In other words, he
acts as if he had given birth himself. Employed exclusively by
anthropologists, the term is rarely encountered outside the discipline.26
Indeed, the six volume Dictionnaire Robert does not even mention it.
This indicates that Apollinaire possessed some sort of specialized
knowledge, probably gleaned from Max Müller’s Essais sur la mytho-
logie comparée (1873) or from an anthropological journal. Coupled
with the reference to Hudibras, it suggests not only that he had begun
to work on Les Mamelles de Tirésias but that the play may have been
inspired by this curious custom.
25
Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol. II, p. 1265.
26
There is a medical condition called “couvade syndrome,” when a man develops
sympathetic symptoms in response to his wife’s pregnancy.
The Plot
Like Goethe’s Faust, Peter Read notes, Les Mamelles de Tirésias
begins with a lengthy prologue—delivered by an actor representing
Apollinaire.27 Dressed in a tuxedo and carrying a canne de tranchée
(used to climb in and out of frontline trenches), he emerges from the
prompter’s box like a rabbit from a top hat. According to an earlier
manuscript, “Il est extrêmement pâle et il boite” (“He is extremely
pale, and he is limping”).28 Written in the first person, the prologue is
divided into two equal halves consisting of an allegory and an ars
poetica respectively. Speaking for the wounded poet, the actor re-
counts how the Germans extinguished the stars with their cannons and
how the French artillery managed to relight them. “As a light shining
in the darkness,” J. E. Cirlot remarks, “the star is a symbol of the
spirit.”29 For Apollinaire it symbolized the human spirit in particular
and all that it had accomplished. Not only is traditional theater is
mired in the past, the actor complains, but it is hopelessly pessimistic.
A new theater is needed, he continues, that will portray the joy and the
complexity of modern life. The remainder of the prologue consists of
a defense and illustration of the new aesthetics and a general call to
arms.
The published version of Les Mamelles de Tirésias differs from
that performed at the Conservatoire Renée Maubel in quite a few
respects. In 1917, for example, the first act consisted of just three
scenes.30 By the time the play appeared in print, however, Apollinaire
had divided it into nine scenes. The first of these presents the two
main characters and initiates the crisis that will drive the rest of the
play. As Béhar rightly observes, Les Mamelles de Tirésias was
27
Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias, p. 133. Two fragments of a
preliminary manuscript are reproduced on pp. 134-35. The actor was presumably
carrying the poet’s own cane, which Jacqueline Apolllinaire later gave to André Billy.
See Jean Adhémar et al., Apollinaire (Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, 1969), item 395.
28
See Willard Bohn, “Autour des Mamelles de Tirésias,” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin
International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th series, No. 20 (October-
December 2002), p. 111.
29
J. E. Cirlot, A Dictionary of Symbols. Tr. Jack Sage. 2nd ed. (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1971), p. 309.
30
Rehearsal scripts by Germaine Albert-Birot, Harry Ransom Humanities Research
Center, University of Texas. The second act originally consisted of six scenes instead
of seven.
conceived as an act of aggression.31 Pulling out all the stops,

Apollinaire subjects the audience to a constant barrage of apparent
nonsense. “La surprise ... justifie toutes les incohérences,” Caizergues
adds, “et donne son unité à l’ensemble” (“Surprise ... justifies all the
incoherencies and succeeds in unifying the whole”).32 It governs every
aspect of the play, from the staging to the action to the language
employed by the characters. This is particularly true of the first scene,
which is as surprising today as when it was first performed.
Since Zanzibar is an African island and the name of a popular
dice game, the set depicts both at the same time. An ambulatory
newspaper kiosk stands on one side of the marketplace, while a
collective character called the People of Zanzibar is seated toward the
rear.33 All the sound effects are produced by the latter character, who
possesses a large array of instruments. Wearing a blue dress adorned
with tropical motifs, Thérèse enters as soon as the curtain rises.
Unexpectedly, her face is also painted blue!34 “Non Monsieur mon
mari,” she announces, “Vous ne me ferez pas ce que vous voulez”
(“No my dear husband / You will not make me do whatever you
want”). Since she has become a feminist, she continues, she refuses to
recognize masculine authority. After each of these statements, she
hushes the restless audience, which is still settling down. Here as
throughout the play, Apollinaire abolishes the traditional barrier
between the stage and the hall. In addition, Thérèse confides, she
plans to usurp a whole series of male prerogatives. She proposes to
become a soldier first, so she can make war instead of love. This
statement is greeted by thunder--produced by the People of Zanzibar.
31
Béhar, Le Théâtre dada et surréaliste, p. 77.
32
Pierre Caizergues, “Apollinaire inventeur d’un nouveau langage théâtral?” in
Apollinaire inventeur de langages, ed. Michel Décaudin (Paris: Minard, 1973), pp.
187-88.
33
This character was played by an individual named Howard who seems to have been
an artist (Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol. II, p. 1422). Apollinaire’s
address book contains an entry for an American sculptor named Cecil Howard (1888-
1956), who is doubtless the same person (Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des
Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 2nd ser., No. 1 {January-March 1982}, p. 7). See
Janis Conner and Joel Rosenkranz, Rediscoveries in American Sculpture: Studio
Works, 1893-1939 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1989), pp. 63-70.
34
Like several other devices in the play, this idea was taken from an earlier
pantomime entitled A Quelle Heure un train partira-t-il pour Paris? —which
borrowed it from the Italian Futurists and an opera by Alberto Savinio. See Bohn,
Apollinaire and the Faceless Man, pp. 144-50.
In theory, these and other comments are addressed to Thérèse’s

husband, who remains inside their house next door. Since she is
standing in the middle of the marketplace, however, their conversation
is scarcely private. “Donnez-moi du lard je te dis donnez-moi du lard”
(“Bring me some bacon I tell you bring me some bacon”), exclaims
the husband, who seems to be eating breakfast. Delivered in a comical
Belgian accent, this demand is followed by the sound of broken
crockery—produced by the People of Zanzibar—and by a blatant non
sequitur. Thérèse accuses her husband of thinking about nothing but
sex and becomes hysterical. She finally calms down enough to
mention other masculine occupations that interest her but succumbs to
a fit of sneezing. Three lines later, she begins to cackle like a hen. The
section culminates in an orgy of sneezing and cackling, after which
Thérèse imitates the sound of a train. When the husband orders her to
bring him some bacon again, she replies: “Mange-toi les pieds à la
Sainte-Menehould” (“Eat your own trotters fried in batter”).35 In other
words, although it takes a moment to sink in, Thérèse calls him a big
fat pig. What she said during the original performance was less
elegant but more direct: “Mange ta queue, cochon!” (“Eat your own
tail, swine!”).36
At this point, something even more unexpected occurs. Thérèse is
transformed into a member of the opposite sex by a doubly miraculous
process. Not only does she suddenly acquire a beard and mustache,
but she loses her breasts in the process. Represented by helium
balloons—one red the other blue—they emerge when she opens her
blouse but remain attached by strings. Separated by an expanse of
white skin, they briefly evoke the French flag. “Envolez-vous oiseaux
de ma faiblesse” (“Fly away birds of my frailty”), Thérèse exclaims as
she watches them soar upward. After tugging on the strings to make
the balloons dance, she explodes them with a cigarette lighter. Next
35
Pieds de cochon Sainte-Menehould are the specialty of a town in the Marne region.
The precooked trotters are covered with bread crumbs, broiled, and served with
mustard or a special sauce.
36
Guillot de Saix, La France, June 25, 1917. Repr. in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin
International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 1st series, No. 15 (January 1978),
p. 20. The actors’ copies at the University of Texas contains a different reply: “Mange
tes pieds, espèce de cochon!” (“Eat your own feet, you filthy pig!”). And before that,
Thérèse said: “Mange tes fesses, espèce de cochon!” (“Eat your buttocks, you filthy
pig!”). See Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias, p. 122.
she makes a face, thumbs her nose at the audience with both hands,
and throws them some balls she has in her bodice.
In the following scene Thérèse adopts the name Tiresias and sets
out to conquer the world. Before she leaves, she overpowers her
husband, dresses him in her skirt, puts on his pants, cuts her hair, and
borrows his top hat.37 While she goes on to experience a series of
masculine triumphs, her former mate remains at home caring for all
the children he has produced. Following various trials and tribulations,
Thérèse and her husband are eventually reunited. How and why they
get back together will become clear as we proceed.
Repopulation and Feminism

As has already become evident, Les Mamelles de Tirésias is
structured around two themes in particular: feminism and repopu-
lation.38 Each of these is associated with a particular individual in turn.
While Thérèse advocates social, political, and educational equality for
women, her husband insists that women should concentrate on having
large families. Since these goals are diametrically opposed, husband
and wife go their separate ways. And yet, the two goals are related to
each other as well—if only by the apparent impossibility of com-
bining them. As Guicharnaud remarks, “Apollinaire chose [to
examine] the ‘realistic’ problem of female emancipation and its
relation to population decline.”39 Indeed, he links the two themes to-
gether himself at one point: “La femme à Zanzibar veut ses droits
politiques / Et renonce soudain aux amours prolifiques” (“Women in
Zanzibar want their political rights / And suddenly renounce prolific
lovemaking”). Les Mamelles de Tirésias asks whether a cause and
effect relation exists between these two phenomena and, if so, whether
it can be reversed.
37
Apollinaire envisioned a different scene initially: “Il pleure, elle le bat, il tombe,
elle le ligotte, lui tire le pantalon et le tirant par les jambes l’allonge et l’attache d’un
bout à l’autre de la scène” (“He cries, she hits him, he falls down, she ties him up,
pulls off his pants, and by pulling on his legs, stretches him and attaches him to
opposite ends of the stage” (ibid.).
38
Read examines these themes in more detail in Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de
Tirésias, pp. 159-68.
39
Guicharnaud, Anthology of 20th Century French Theater, p. 41.
By 1917, Feminism and repopulation had received widespread

publicity and were constantly in the newspapers. Although both
movements had been gathering momentum for years, they acquired a
sense of urgency during the First World War. Not only were large
numbers of men being killed at the front, but their wives and
sweethearts were left behind to fend for themselves. Following huge
military losses early in 1915, repopulation received more and more
attention in the press and became the object of official propaganda.40
In addition, the government instituted a system of ten day leaves, so
soldiers could return home once or twice a year and impregnate their
wives. Whereas the play’s first act celebrates the attractions of
feminism, which are enumerated by Thérèse, the second act celebrates
the joys of maternity. Marveling at the codfish’s amazing fertility, the
husband adopts the creature as his emblem. A single fish produces
enough offspring, he announces, to keep the entire world in brandade
and aïoli for a year. As this example demonstrates, children are not a
useless expense but a source of great riches.
Quels sont donc ces économistes imbéciles

Qui nous ont fait croire que l’enfant
C’était la pauvreté
Tandis que c’est tout le contraire
Est-ce qu’on a jamais entendu parler de morue
morte dans la misère
(Who are these foolish economists

Who have led us to believe that children
Are a financial drain
Whereas it is exactly the opposite
Have you ever heard of a codfish dying in
poverty)41
The theme of repopulation is handled in a straightforward manner

in the play and presents few, if any, problems. The French citizenry
was being depleted at an alarming rate, and something plainly needed
to be done about it. Although the gendarme objects that so many new
40
Pascal Pia, Apollinaire par lui même (Paris: Seuil, 1969), p. 165.
41
These remarks may have been inspired by an article entitled “La Vie et la
dépopulation,” published in L’Humanité on October 1, 1913. Under the subheading
“Trop de morues” (“Too Many Codfish”), the anonymous author claimed that a
healthy female codfish could produce forty billion offspring in three years, whose
volume would be four hundred times that of the earth.
mouths will cause a famine in Zanzibar, the situation in France was

quite different. In contrast to the first theme, the second is consider-
ably more complicated. Unlike the husband’s enthusiasm for repopu-
lation, which is presented in a sympathetic light, Thérèse’s passion for
feminism is viewed unsympathetically. The question that arises at this
point arises is why? How are we to explain this discrepancy?
According to Barbara Lekatsas, the answer is obvious: the play
represents “an attack on the suffrage movement and feminism.”42
Scott Bates basically agrees with her and adds that Les Mamelles de
Tirésias reflects the “fundamental male chauvism of the play’s
author.”43Even Pierre Caizergues appears to espouse the anti-feminist
interpretation at one point.44
Is it true, as these critics claim, that Apollinaire was opposed to
women’s liberation and that Les Mamelles de Tirésias is an anti-
feminist play? Although it takes a while to sort through the conflicting
testimony, the answer is essentially no. To be sure, Apollinaire made a
few remarks at the beginning of his career that were less than
complimentary. Since the young mal-aimé had little success with
women, but a desperate need to be loved, his early writings reveal
considerable frustration. Dating from 1905, the most damning text
(examined by Caizergues) is a scathing portrait of German women.
However, since these are isolated examples, they are not particularly
significant. Not only is there no consistent anti-female pattern in
Apollinaire’s writings, but he repeatedly supported the feminist cause.
In an early poem beginning “A tous tes noirs désirs,” for example, he
concluded: “Et c’est le rêve ardent du féminisme / Qui a raison de
vouloir l’égalité” (“And this is the ardent dream of feminism / Which
rightfully desires equality”).45 Similarly, reviewing a book in 1911,
Apollinaire paused to praise a militant feminist from the previous
century.
42
Barbara Lekatsas, ed. The Howard L. and Muriel Weingrow Collection of Avant-
Garde Art and Literature at Hofstra University: An Annotated Bibliography (West-
port, Connecticut: Greenwood, 1985), p. 9.
43
Scott Bates, “Erotic Propaganda in Apollinaire’s Les Mamelles de Tirésias,” French
Literature Series, Vol. X (1983), pp. 35 and 40.
44
Pierre Caizergues, “De la femme allemande à la fille-soldat ou la femme et l’amour
dans les chroniques et les échos d’Apollinaire,” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos.
805-811 (1987), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 17, p. 37.
45
Guillaume Apollinaire, Soldes, ed. Pierre Caizergues (Fontfroide: Fata Morgana,
1985), not paginated. This poem probably dates from 1898-1899.
Un grand esprit féminin, aujourd’hui bien oublié, Mme

Clémence Royer, demandait la suppression du vocable
“mademoiselle”, dont le sens actuel est tout récent et qui sépare
bien inutilement les femmes en deux classes, celles qui sont
mariées et les autres. On n’a pas établi pour les hommes de ces
distinctions.
(A great feminine spirit who is entirely forgotten today, Mme

Clémence Royer demanded the abolition of the term
“Mademoiselle,” whose present meaning is quite recent and
which--quite uselessly --divides women into two classes, those
who are married and the remainder. Similar distinctions do not
exist for men.)46
Interestingly, none of the critics who witnessed the first perfor-

mance of Les Mamelles de Tirésias thought the play was anti-feminist.
Neither did any of those who reviewed the published version the fol-
lowing year—with one exception. Writing in the Giornale del Mattino
in Bologna, Francesco Meriano identified one of the play’s goals as
“la ridicolizzazione del femminismo.”47 Ironically, Apollinaire had
attempted to forestall this accusation when he revised the play for
publication. Like most plays, in any case, Les Mamelles de Tirésias
achieves its full effect only when it is performed. The way the actors
speak, look, and gesture contributes to the total Gestalt. The scenery,
the music, and the stage effects create a certain atmosphere. Hence the
play needs to be viewed in a theatrical context rather than a literary
one. The audience is in a better position to grasp Apollinaire’s
intentions than the reader.
One of the first discoveries that emerges from a theatrical
perspective is that the actors’ roles are more nuanced than they first
appear. Thérèse is not really to blame for leaving her husband, one
discovers, nor is her husband the innocent victim he pretends to be.
Not only does he expect Thérèse to wait on him hand and foot, but he
behaves in an abusive manner. Furious at having to wait for his
breakfast, he bellows at his wife to bring him some bacon and begins
smashing dishes. When she fails to appear, he rushes out of the house
46
Guillaume Apollinaire, “Mademoiselle par René Maizeroy,” “L’Intransigeant, Au-
gust 2, 1911. Repr. in Apollinaire, Oeuvres en prose complètes, Vol. II, pp. 1177-78.
47
Francesco Meriano, “Umane lettere: Il simbolismo in soffitta (Tre scrittori francesi:
Apollinaire, Jacob, Cendrars),” Il Giornale del Mattino (Bologna), March 28, 1918.
Repr. in Quaderni del Novecento Francese, No. 14 (1991), p. 249.
and raises his hand to slap her. Thus the husband turns out to be the
male chauvinist pig, not Apollinaire. Although he adopts the codfish
as his official emblem, he consistently behaves like a swine. He is so
obsessed with food, moreover, that Gossiaux concludes he suffers
from bulimia. The reason the husband assumes his wife’s role, he
adds, is not to ensure the survival of the species but to satisfy his
gargantuan appetite. His innumerable children “n’ont d’autre fonction
... que de l’enrichir et le nourrir” (“have no other function ... than to
provide him with riches and nourishment”).48
Not only is Thérèse perfectly justified in leaving her husband,
therefore, but she is the most important character in the play. By
comparison, we know virtually nothing about her spouse, who is
simply referred to as “Le Mari.” An anonymous figure with no real
presence, identity, or history, he is a function rather than a person. To
be sure, he spends more time on stage than Thérèse, but she appears in
five key scenes situated at the beginning and the end. After setting the
drama in motion, she disappears for a while but returns in time to
resolve the central conflict. Interestingly, feminist critic Gloria
Orenstein argues that Thérèse is the first in a long line of Surrealist
heroines. “The most interesting aspect of this play,” she declares, “is
not the fact that Thérèse gives up the conventional woman’s role but
that her metamorphosis occasions her total psychic emancipation and
that she is ... transformed into a visionary, a seer.”49 Apollinaire
depicts women both as the victim of man’s stupidity and as the hope
of his salvation. By the end of the play, when Thérèse returns, she has
become a fortune teller and a clairvoyant. Symbolizing her uncanny
ability to see into the future, her skull is illuminated electrically.
Casting off her exotic robes, Thérèse informs her husband that
she has finally decided to return. While she has achieved many
impressive accomplishments since she left home, she has discovered
they are meaningless without his love. By this time, she has become a
woman again and has resumed her original shape—with one im-
portant difference. Whereas formerly she was well-endowed, her
husband is dismayed to discover that she is as flat as a pancake. When
he offers to restore her breasts (with some balls and balloons), she
replies: “Nous nous en sommes passés l’un et l’autre / Continuons”
48
Gossiaux, “Les Mamelles de Tirésias: note historique et anthropologique,” p. 28.
49
Gloria Orenstein, The Theater of the Marvelous: Surrealism and the Contemporary
Stage (New York: New York University Press, 1975), p. 100-01.
(“We have both gotten along fine without them / Let’s continue like
that”). To which the husband readily agrees.
Although Apollinaire insists in the preface that the play contains
no symbols (in response to a reviewer’s comments), this is not strictly
true. Not only do the balls and balloons symbolize Thérèse’s breasts,
but her breasts possess a symbolic function as well. In retrospect, the
entire play can be seen to revolve about her (former) female
attributes—which are celebrated in the title. Although her slim profile
anticipates that of the flappers in the 1920’s, it is far more than a
fashion statement. The reason Thérèse discards her breasts, as one
contemporary critic realized, is because they are “fâcheux symboles
d’une servilité devenue insupportable” (“distressing symbols of a
servility that has become unbearable”).50 They symbolize woman’s
traditional subservience to man. This is why Thérèse says “Envolez-
vous oiseaux de ma faiblesse” (“birds of my frailty”). By divesting
herself of her breasts, she is freeing herself from her symbolic chains.
That the husband readily acquiesces to Thérèse’s demands at the
end of the play signals another important development. Since he is
prepared to accept his wife on her own terms, he is no longer a male
chauvinist. Both he and Thérèse have progressed significantly since
their original dispute. She has experienced a change of heart, and he is
prepared to treat her as an equal. Their symmetrical evolution ensures
their successful reconciliation. Thus Les Mamelles de Tirésias ends
happily as Thérèse and her husband set about creating a model
marriage. Ironically, the original performance ended on a different
note—not with the triumph of feminism but with Thérèse’s
capitulation. According to one reviewer, she begged her husband to
take her back with tears in her eyes.51 Apollinaire himself says she
returned home “repentante et résignée,” promising to have lots of
children.52 A set of proofs at the University of Texas contains the
following conclusion:
50
F. Laya, “Guillaume Apollinaire: Les Mamelles de Tirésias,” L’Eventail, April 15,
1918. Repr. in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume
Apollinaire, 4th series, No. 4 (October-December 1998), p. 113.
51
Gaston Picard, “Les Mamelles de Tirésias ou la folle journée,” intended for the June
29, 1917, edition of Le Pays but never published. Repr. in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin
International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, lst series, No. 19 (January 1979),
p. 19.
52
Reported by G. Davin de Champclos in “Les Mamelles de Tirésias,” Le Petit Bleu,
June 26, 1917. Repr. in ibid., Nos. 17-18 (July-October 1978), p. 29.
Thérèse: Et combien cher mari

M’avez-vous fait d’enfants?
Le Mari: Quarante mille cinquante et un
Thérèse: Je t’en ferai le double!
Le Mari: Mais pas toute seule.
CHOEUR
(Thérèse: And my dear husband how

Many children have you made?
Husband: Forty thousand and fifty-one
Thérèse: I’ll make twice as many!
Husband: But not by yourself
CHORUS).
Between the play’s performance and the date it appeared in print,

Apollinaire revised the conclusion completely. The final version ends
not with the victory of one spouse over the other but with the
recognition that marriage is an equal partnership. Thérèse and her
husband have learned from experience that they need each other.
Significantly, Thérèse is neither resigned nor repentant. She does not
apologize for leaving her partner, and she has no intention of resuming
her former role. Nor, in contrast to her previous incarnation, does she
offer to have more children. Despite her earlier boast, Thérèse and her
husband have more than enough already. Signaling her refusal to
conform to traditional expectations, Les Mamelles de Tirésias
concludes with a distinctly feminist gesture. Seizing the symbolic
breasts she has just declined, she throws the balls at the audience and
releases the balloons into the air.
Final Considerations
Apollinaire insisted repeatedly that he sought to accomplish two
time-honored goals in the play: to entertain and to instruct. Faced with
hostile criticism from several quarters following the performance, he
downplayed the first goal and emphasized the second. Les Mamelles
de Tirésias was a patriotic gesture, he insisted, which sought to alert
the public to the danger of depopulation. Although this claim seriously
misrepresented the play’s goals, it silenced a few critics who did not
wish to appear unpatriotic. Conceived essentially as a political
expedient, the statement exemplifies Apollinaire’s fondness for

private jokes. Like his insistence that the so-called Portrait de Guil-
laume Apollinaire by Giorgio de Chirico was a good likeness, it was
patently untrue.53 As several critics have remarked, the fact that the
play is filled with absurdities undermines its serious pretensions.
When Apollinaire lectures his audience on condoms, for example, or
extols the codfish’s incredible fertility, he is obviously joking. And
yet, as Béhar points out, he needed to maintain a serious demeanor at
the same time.54 If he had allowed himself to smile, the game would
have been up. The joke would no longer have been private.
Despite Apollinaire’s protestations to the contrary, therefore, the
play is not a pièce à thèse. Asserting that it is concerned with
feminism or with repopulation is like claiming that Ubu roi is about
political ambition. The view that the play is propaganda is contra-
dicted not only by its frequent absurdities but also by its obvious
literary character. Apollinaire employs a whole series of complicated
devices including irony, parody, word play, and burlesque. In ad-
dition, as he proclaims over and over, Les Mamelles de Tirésias is an
anti-realistic composition. While it incorporates several realistic
themes, these are subjected to considerable abuse. In particular, as
Gloria Orenstein recognizes, the play contains “a blatant satire of
feminism.”55 It does not attack the movement itself, Victor Basch
noted in 1917, but satirizes certain excesses committed in the name of
feminism.56 While these receive a certain amount of the poet’s
attention, his mocking gaze encompasses everything in the play. As
one reviewer remarked following the first performance, “l’oeuvre
d’Apollinaire est … une façon de se moquer de tout” (“Apollinaire’s
play … manages to make fun of everything”).57
53
See Willard Bohn, “Giorgio de Chirico et le Portrait de Guillaume Apollinaire,”
Revue des Lettres Modernes, special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 22, forthcoming
and “Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire’ of 1914,” The
Burlington Magazine, CXLVII (November 2005), pp. 751-54.
54
Béhar, Le Théâtre dada et surréaliste, p. 79.
55
Orenstein, The Theater of the Marvelous, p. 99.
56
Victor Basch, “Les Mamelles de Tirésias, drame sur-réaliste de M. Guillaume
Apollinaire,” Le Pays, July 14, 1917. Repr. in Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des
Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 1st series, No. 20 (April 1979), p. 30.
57
René Wisner, “Manifestation Sic—Les Mamelles de Tirésias, par Guillaume
Apollinaire,” Le Pays, June 24, 1917. Repr. in ibid., No. 19 (January 1979), p. 15.
Although Les Mamelles de Tirésias appears initially to be

centered around feminism and repopulation, these are essentially
pretexts. The point at which the two themes intersect marks the site of
Apollinaire’s principal concern. The most important theme is neither
political nor demographic, it turns out, but erotic. “La vérité est celle-
ci,” he announces in the preface; “on ne fait plus d’enfants en France
parce qu’on n’y fait pas assez d’amour” (“The reason we don’t make
children in France any more is because we don’t make love enough”).
Apollinaire’s remark is echoed by Thérèse in the final scene, who
exclaims: “Qu’importe le trône ou la tombe / Il faut s’aimer ou je
succombe” (“Who cares about the throne or the tomb / Let’s make
love before I succumb”). This, in the last analysis, is the moral of the
play. French men and women need to have sex more often. As Peter
Read declares, the last scene illustrates Apollinaire’s conviction that
sexuality is the decisive force that shapes human existence.58 Indeed,
he adds, this theme presides over the last half of the play. Subtly
evoking the pleasures of procreation, the music that introduces the
second act is taken from the song “Plaisir d’amour.”59
As we have seen, Apollinaire celebrates sexuality not only as an
abstract force but as a pleasurable activity to be enjoyed in its own
right. Although much of what he says is implicit, the final scene
exhorts the members of the audience to go home and make love. This
message is conveyed by three double-entendres that are decidedly
risqué. Each is constructed in such a way that only someone who
knows the code—and who presumably will not be offended—can
decipher it. Masquerading as a gallant tribute, the first example is a
great deal lustier than it appears at first glance.
Ma foi les dames de Paris
Sont bien plus belles que les autres
Si les chats aiment les souris
Mesdames nous aimons les vôtres
(Yes indeed Parisian ladies

Surpass all others in beauty
If pussies love mice
Ladies we sure love yours).
58
Read, Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias, p. 175.
59
Ibid., p. 96
This statement is highly ambiguous to say the least. As Claude

Debon remarks, innocent readers (or spectators) will wonder which
animal Parisian men prefer—cats or mice?60 By contrast, those who
know that chat is a slang term for “vagina” will grasp the hidden
reference immediately. No sooner has the last line been uttered, how-
ever, than Apollinaire hastens to throw his audience off the track. At
his prodding, Thérèse intervenes and explains that “souris” is an
archaic term for “sourires.” This remark is followed by two imperative
constructions a little later that illustrate exactly what Apollinaire has
in mind. Whereas formerly Thérèse preferred to make war rather than
love, now she invites her husband to make love to her.61 “Viens
cueillir la fraise,” she exclaims, “Avec la fleur du bananier” (“Come
harvest my strawberry / With your banana flower”).
Although Scott Bates identifies fraise as a slang term for
“nipple,” it appears to describe the female genitalia as well.62 (A
similar expression exists in English.) This interpretation is reinforced
by the observation that “avec” can denote agency and that banana
flowers have a pronounced phallic shape. Before her husband can
respond, Thérèse repeats her passionate invitation: “Il faut s’aimer ou
je succombe” (“Let’s make love before I die”). In turn, following a
brief attempt to restore her breasts, the husband invites her to join him
in bed. Like his wife initially, he employs a slang expression to
disguise his request: “Allons plutôt tremper la soupe” (“Let’s go dunk
some bread in the soup”). To readers who are unfamiliar with the
code, he merely seems to be asking for something to eat. Thérèse and
her husband are not only happily reunited as Les Mamelles de Tirésias
concludes, therefore, but are also preparing to make love. They have
learned two important lessons in the course of the play: that husbands
and wives should be equal partners and that they should continue to
have an active sex life.
60
Claude Debon, “Relire et revoir Le Bestiaire ou cortège d’Orphée d’Apollinaire,”
Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th series,
No. 1 (January-March 1998), p. 7. According to Scott Bates, both words are slang
terms for “sexe de la femme.” See his Dictionnaire des mots libres d’Apollinaire
(Sewanee, Tennessee: privately printed, 1991), pp. 243 and 246.
61
Bates, “Erotic Propaganda in Apollinaire’s Les Mamelles de Tirésias,” p. 39.
62
Bates, Dictionnaire des mots libres d’Apollinaire, p. 194.
Conclusion
Although Apollinaire spent much, if not most, of his life working
on the aesthetic edge, his innate sensibility prevented him from
making a serious misstep. Like a performer on the high wire, he
managed to maintain a delicate balance between sense and nonsense.
Long before he composed “La Jolie Rousse” (“The Pretty Redhead”),
he succeeded in reconciling tradition and invention, order and ad-
venture. While his experiments extended into every conceivable
domain, Apollinaire was far from indiscriminate. He loved to ex-
periment with new ideas, especially those that were surprising, but he
knew instinctively whether a project was sound or not and could
defend it brilliantly if need be. Many of the people who knew him
have left accounts testifying to what an extraordinary conversationalist
he was and how much they enjoyed listening to him.
While Apollinaire left few theoretical writings, he had an
excellent grasp of modern aesthetics and a profound understanding of
the issues confronting modern artists and writers. One of the reasons
he became the leader of the avant-garde, as “L’Esprit nouveau et les
poètes” demonstrates, was because he understood exactly what the
modern movement was trying to accomplish. At the same time,
Apollinaire possessed an excellent grasp of the principles underlying
his own work. He knew precisely where he was going, what he was
trying to achieve, and why it was necessary in the first place. The best
example is Les Mamelles de Tirésias, where he describes his aesthetic
program in detail—first in the preface and then in the prologue.
Although comparable documents are lacking for the other three genres
we have examined, he was perfectly aware of their theoretical
underpinnings. Like the play, the bestiary, the whatnots, and the
poems inspired by children’s rhymes display meticulous attention to
detail. Like Les Mamelles, each employs a distinctive new way of
viewing the world and of representing reality itself.
Many of Apollinaire’s acquaintances recalled what a hearty ap-
petite he possessed and how much he appreciated good food. The truth
is that he possessed a tremendous appetite for life in general. “Je suis
ivre d’avoir bu tout l’univers” (“I am intoxicated from drinking the
whole universe”), he exclaimed in “Vendémiaire.” Coupled with his
insatiable curiosity, this hunger drove him to explore the world around
him and to experiment with its endless artistic possibilities. And since
Apollinaire resided in Paris, he was ideally situated to carry out this

ambitious program. The French capital was not only an exciting place
to live but a hotbed of intellectual and artistic ferment. Countless new
ideas were in the air, countless experiments were taking place that
Apollinaire found intoxicating and which he eagerly absorbed. The
flourishing avant-garde provided him with the critical mass he needed
to function as poet, critic, and playwright. In return, like Picasso or
Matisse, he served as an important catalyst that allowed the critical
mass to ignite.
Bibliography
Adéma, Pierre-Marcel. Guillaume Apollinaire. Paris: Table Ronde,

1968.
Adhémar, Jean et al. Apollinaire. Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, 1969.
Alexandre, Didier. Guillaume Apollinaire, “Alcools.” Paris: Presses

Universitaires de France, 1994.
Alter, Jean. A Sociosemiotic Theory of Theatre. Philadelphia:

University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990.
Antonelli, Paola. Humble Masterpieces: Everyday Marvels of Design.

New York: Regan, 2005.
Apollinaire, Guillaume. Album Apollinaire. Ed. Pierre-Marcel Adéma

and Michel Décaudin. Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1971.
_____. Alcools. Tr. and ed. Anne Hyde Greet. Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1965.
_____. Alcools. Ed. A. E. Pilkington. Oxford: Blackwell, 1970.
_____. Alcools. Ed. Garnet Rees. London: Athlone, 1975.
_____. Correspondance avec son frère et sa mère. Ed. Gilbert Boudar

and Michel Décaudin. Paris: Corti, 1987.
_____. “Des lettres inédites du mal-aimé à une amie.” Le Figaro

Littéraire, No. 1174 (November 4-l0, 1968, pp. 9-11.
_____. “Le Folklore des jeux d’enfant.” Paris-Journal, June 26, 1914.
_____. Oeuvres complètes. Ed. Michel Décaudin. Paris: Balland-

Lecat, 1965-66. 4 vols.
_____. Oeuvres en prose complètes. Ed. Michel Décaudin and Pierre

Caizergues. Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1977-1993. 3 vols.
_____. Oeuvres poétiques. Ed. Marcel Adéma and Michel Décaudin.

Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1965.
_____. Soldes. Ed. Pierre Caizergues. Fontfroide: Fata Morgana,

1985.
Auffret, Serge and Hélène. Le Commentaire composé. Paris: Hâchette,

1968.
Barthes, Roland. “Le Message photographique.” Communications,

No. 1 (1961), pp. 127-38.
Basch, Victor. “Les Mamelles de Tirésias, drame sur-réaliste de M.

Guillaume Apollinaire.” Le Pays, July 14, 1917.
Bates, Scott. Dictionnaire des mots libres d’Apollinaire. Sewanee,

Tennessee: privately printed, 1991.
_____. “Erotic Propaganda in Apollinaire’s Les Mamelles de

Tirésias.” French Literature Series, Vol. X (1983), pp. 32-41.
_____. “Notes sur ‘Simon Mage’ et Isaac Laquedem.” Revue des

Lettres Modernes, Nos. 123-126 (1965), special issue Guillaume
Apollinaire 4, pp. 68-77.
Baucomont, Jean et al. eds. Les Comptines de langue française. Paris:

Seghers, 1961.
Béhar, Henri. Le Théâtre dada et surréaliste. Paris: Gallimard, 1979.
Bellas, Jacqueline. “L’Equivoque de Salomé dans la littérature et l’art

‘fin de siècle.’” Poésie et peinture du symbolisme au surréalisme en
France et en Pologne. Ed. Elzbieta Grabska. Warsaw: University of
Warsaw, 1973, pp.27-56.
Bibliography 131
Bertrand, Gérard. L’Illustration de la poésie à l’époque du cubisme

1901-1914: Derain, Dufy, Picasso. Paris: Klincksieck, 1971.
Blachère, Jean-Claude. Le Modèle nègre: aspects littéraires du mythe

primitiviste au XXe siècle chez Apollinaire, Cendrars, Tzara. Dakar,
Abidjan, Lomé: Nouvelles Editions Africaines, 198l.
Bohn, Willard. The Aesthetics of Visual Poetry, 1914-1928.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986 and Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1993.
_____. Apollinaire and the Faceless Man: The Creation and

Evolution of a Modern Motif. Rutherford, New Jersey:
Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1991.
_____. Apollinaire and the International Avant-Garde. Albany: State

University of New York Press, 1997.
_____. “Autour des Mamelles de Tirésias.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin

International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser., No. 20
(October-December 2002), pp. 110-117.
_____. “Giorgio de Chirico et le Portrait de Guillaume Apollinaire.”

Revue des Lettres Modernes, special issue Guillaume
Apollinaire 22, 2007, pp. 131-148.
_____. “Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire’ of

1914.” The Burlington Magazine, CXLVII (November 2005),
pp. 751-54.
_____. Modern Visual Poetry. Newark, Delaware: University of

Delaware Press, 2000.
_____. The Rise of Surrealism: Cubism, Dada, and the Pursuit of the
Marvelous. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001.
Boisson, Madeleine. Apollinaire et les mythologies antiques. Paris:

Nizet and Fasano: Schena, 1989.
Bonnet, Marguerite. “Aux sources du surréalisme: place

d’Apollinaire.” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 104-107 (1964),
Boschetti, Anna. La Poésie partout: Apollinaire, homme-époque

(1898-1918). Paris: Seuil, 2001.
Bouchardon, Marianne. “Les Mamelles de Tirésias: le retour de

Dionysos.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur
Guillaume Apollinaire,4th ser., No. 16 (September -December 2001),
pp. 108-13.
Bowra, C. M. The Creative Experiment. London: Macmillan, 1949.
Breton, André. Anthologie de l’humour noir. Paris: Livre de Poche,

1966.
_____. Oeuvres complètes. Ed. Marguerite et al. Paris:
Gallimard/Pléiade, 1988-1998. 3 vols.
Breunig, LeRoy C. “The Chronology of Apollinaire’s Alcools.”

PMLA, Vol. LXVII, No. 7 (December 1952), pp. 907-23.
_____. “Les Phares d’Apollinaire.” Cahiers du Musée d’Art Moderne,

Vol. LXXXI, No. 6 (1981), pp. 62-69.
Cailler, Pierre. Guillaume Apollinaire: documents iconographiques.

Geneva: Cailler, 1965.
Caizergues, Pierre. “Apollinaire, le cirque et les marionnettes.”

Berenice (Rome), Vol. II (July 1981), pp. 32-44.
_____. “Apollinaire inventeur d’un nouveau langage théâtral?”

Apollinaire inventeur de langages. Ed. Michel Décaudin. Paris:
Minard, 1973, pp. 181-96.
_____. “De la femme allemande à la fille-soldat ou la femme et

l’amour dans les chroniques et les échos d’Apollinaire.” Revue des
Lettres Modernes, Nos. 805-811 (1987), special issue Guillaume
Apollinaire 17, pp. 25-40.
Bibliography 133
Cansinos-Asséns, Rafael. Salomé en la literatura (Flaubert Wilde,

Mallarmé, Eugenio de Castro, Apollinaire). Madrid: América, 1919.
Caws, Mary Ann. A Metapoetics of the Passage. Hanover, New

Hampshire: University Press of New England, 1981.
Cirlot, J. E. A Dictionary of Symbols. Tr. Jack Sage. 2nd ed. London:

Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971.
Clancier, Anne. “Amour parental et amour filial dans l’oeuvre de

Guillaume Apollinaire.” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 805-81
(1987), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 17, pp. 9-23.
Couffignal, Robert. L’Inspiration biblique dans l’oeuvre de Guillaume

Apollinaire. Paris: Minard, 1966.
Cranston, Mechtild. “A la découverte de ‘La Blanche Neige’ de

Guillaume Apollinaire.” French Review, Vol. XXXIX, No. 5 (April
1966), pp. 684-93.
Culler, Jonathan. Structuralist Poetics: Structuralism,Linguistics, and

the Study of Literature. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975.
Davies, Margaret. “Un Mouchoir qui tombe.” Hommage à Michel

Décaudin. Ed. Pierre Brunel et al. Paris: Minard, 1986, pp. 193-201.
Davin de Champclos, G. “Les Mamelles de Tirésias.” Le Petit Bleu,

June 26, 1917.
Debon, Claude. “Relire et revoir Le Bestiaire ou cortège d’Orphée

d’Apollinaire.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur
Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser., Nos. 1 (January-March 1998), pp. 1-
32.
Décaudin, Michel. “Alcools” de Guillaume Apollinaire. Paris:

Gallimard, 1993.
_____. “Autour de Stavelot: deux cahiers et un agenda.” QueVlo-Ve?,

Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 3rd ser.,
No. 21 (January-March 1996), pp. 1-48.
_____. “La Blanche Neige.” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 104-
107 (1964), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 3, pp. 125 -29.
_____. La Crise des valeurs symbolistes: vingt ans de poésie

française, 1895-1914. (1960) Geneva: Slatkine, 1981.
_____. Le Dossier d’”Alcools”. rev. ed. Geneva: Droz and Paris:

Minard, 1965.
_____. “Un Mythe ‘fin de siècle’: Salomé.” ComparativeLiterature

Studies, Vol. IV, Nos. 1-2 (1967), pp. 109-117.
_____. Preface to Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 123-126 (1965),

_____. “Tirésias et Max Linder.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International

des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 3rd ser., No. 19 (July-August
1995), p. 84.
Drucker, Johanna. The Visible Word: Experimental Typography and

Modern Art, 1909-1923. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
Durry, Marie-Jeanne. Guillaume Apollinaire: “Alcools”. Paris:

SEDES, 1956-1964. 3 vols.
Fongaro, Antoine. “Des ‘lys.’” Que Vlo-Ve? Bulletin International des

Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th ser., No. 14 (April-June 2001),
pp. 42-45.
_____. “Des Sources d’Apollinaire.” Revue des Lettres Modernes,

Nos. 146-149 (1966), pp. 112-14.
_____. “Deux Notes sur le Bestiaire.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin

(April-June 1998), pp. 42-43.
Bibliography 135
_____. “‘Les Sept Epées’ et Le Plaisir des dieux.” Revue des Lettres
Modernes, Nos. 327-330 (1972), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire
11, pp. 111-19.
_____. “Sources gaillardes (suite).” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos.

677-681 (1983), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 16, pp. 171-74.
_____. “Un Acrostiche peu visible.” Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin

(April-June 1999), pp. 84-85.
_____. “Un Poème retrouvé d’Apollinaire.” Studi Francesi, Vol. I,

No. 2 (May-August 1957), p. 252.
Foster, Stephen C. and Elmer Peterson. The History of Dada Paris,

2001.
Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and
Religion. Abridged ed. New York: Macmillan, 1963.
Gossiaux, Pol-P. “Les Mamelles de Tirésias: note historique et

anthopologique.” Berenice(Rome), Vol. II (July 1981), pp. 22-32.
_____. “Sur l’éléphant du Bestiaire.” Revue des Lettres Modernes,

Nos. 217-222 (1969), pp. 211-12.
_____. “Sur les chérubins du Bestiaire.” Revue des Lettres Modernes,

Nos. 249-253 (1970), special issue Guillaume Apollinaire 9, pp. 169-
70.
_____. “Sur une source possible des Mamelles de Tirésias:le Tirésias

de Piron.” Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 576-581 (1980), special
issue Guillaume Apollinaire 15, pp. 172-73.
Greet, Anne Hyde. Apollinaire et le livre de peintre. Paris: Minard,

1977.
Grossvogel, David. The Self-Conscious Stage. New York: Columbia

University Press, 1958.
Guicharnaud, Jacques. Anthology of 20th Century French Theater.

Paris and New York: Paris Book Center, 1967.
Harrow, Susan. The Material, the Real, and the Fractured Self:
Subjectivity and Representation from Rimbaud to Réda. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 2004.
Hervilly, Ernest d’. Les Bêtes à Paris. Paris: Launete, 1885.
Hubert, Etienne-Alain. “Petit Cortège pour le Bestiaire.” Que Vlo-

Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th
ser., No. 2 (April-June 1998), pp. 36-37.
Jannini, P. A. La fortuna di Apollinaire in Italia. 2nd ed. Milan: Istituto

Editoriale Cisalpino, 1965.
Jarry, Alfred. Oeuvres complètes. Ed. Michel Arrivé. Paris:

Gallimard/Pléiade, 1972, Vol. I.
Kamber, Gerald. Max Jacob and the Poetics of Cubism. Baltimore:

Johns Hopkins University Press, 1971.
Laude, Jean. Contribution to a debate on literary cubism. Cahiers du

Musée National d’Art Moderne, No. 6 (1981), pp. 135-37.
Laya, F. “Guillaume Apollinaire: Les Mamelles de Tirésias.”

L’Eventail, April 15, 1918.
Lekatsas, Barbara, ed. The Howard L. and Muriel Weingrow

Collection of Avant-Garde Art and Literature at Hofstra University:
An Annotated Bibliography. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood,
1985.
Logue, Christopher. New Numbers. New York: Knopf, 1970.
Longrée, Georges H. F. “Apollinaire parallèle: le cas des

‘Quelconqueries’ et de ‘La Fin de Babylone.’” Les Cahiers des
Paralittératures, Vol. I (1989), pp. 101-47.
Bibliography 137
_____. L’Expérience idéo-calligrammatique d’Apollinaire. Rev. ed.

Paris: Touzot, 1985.
Mallarmé, Stéphane. Correspondance. Ed. Henri Mondor and Jean-

Pierre Richard. Paris: Gallimard, 1959, Vol. I.
_____. Oeuvres complètes. Ed. Henri Mondor and G. Jean-Aubry.

Paris: Gallimard/Pléiade, 1956.
Marinetti, F. T. Mafarka le futuriste. Paris: Sansot, 1909.
Mathews, Timothy. Reading Apollinaire: Theories of Poetic

Language. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1987.
Meriano, Francesco. “Umane lettere: Il simbolismo in soffitta (Tre

scrittori francesi: Apollinaire, Jacob, Cendrars).” Il Giornale del
Mattino (Bologna), March 28, 1918.
Opie, Iona and Peter. Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes. 2nd ed.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977.
Orenstein, Gloria. The Theater of the Marvelous: Surrealism and the

Contemporary Stage. New York: New York University Press, 1975.
Pavlovic, Mihaïlo. “La Repopulation et Les Mamelles de Tirésias.”

Revue des Lettres Modernes, Nos. 166-169 (1967), special issue
Guillaume Apollinaire 6, pp. 133-50.
“Petite Bibliographie du Bestiaire.” Que Vlo-Ve? Bulletin Interna-

tional des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 1st ser., Nos. 28 (April
1981), pp. 16-18.
Pia, Pascal. Apollinaire par lui-même. Paris: Seuil, 1969.
Picard, Gaston, “Les Mamelles de Tirésias ou la folle journée.” (1917)

Que Vlo-Ve?, Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume
Apollinaire, 1st ser., Nos. 19 (January 1979), pp. 18-19.
Poupon, Marc. “Quelques énigmes du Bestiaire.” Revue des Lettres

5, pp. 85-96.
_____. “Sources allemandes d’Apollinaire.” Revue des Lettres

14, pp. 7-49.
Read, Peter. “Apollinaire et la fécondité masculine.” Que Vlo-Ve?,

Bulletin International des Etudes sur Guillaume Apollinaire, 4th
series, No. 20 (October-December 2002), pp. 118-120.
_____. Apollinaire et Les Mamelles de Tirésias: la revanche d’Eros.

Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2000.
_____. Picasso et Apollinaire: les métamorphoses de la mémoire

1905-1973. Paris: Place, 1995.
Reverdy, Pierre. “L’Image.” Nord-Sud, No. 1 (March 1918), n.p.
Richter, Mario. Apollinaire: il rinnovamento della scrittura poetica

all’inizio del novecento. Bologna: Il Mulino, 1990.
Riffaterre, Michael. Semiotics of Poetry. Bloomington: Indiana

University Press, 1978.
Rolland, Eugène. Rimes et jeux de l’enfance. (1883) Paris:

Maisonneuve et Larose, 1967.
Roussel, Raymond. Impressions d’Afrique. Paris: Pauvert, 1996.
Roy, Pierre. Cent Comptines. Paris: Jonquières, 1926.
Saix, Guillot de. Review of Les Mamelles de Tirésias. La France,

June 25, 1917.
Samaltanos, Katia. Apollinaire: Catalyst for Primitivism, Picabia, and

Duchamp. Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1984.
Bibliography 139
Sangiorgi, Giovanni and Jacopo Recupero, eds. Omaggio ad

Apollinaire. Rome: Ente Premi Roma, 1960.
Sanouillet, Michel. Dada à Paris. Paris: Pauvert, 1965.
Saussure, Ferdinand de. Course in General Linguistics. Ed. Charles

Bally et al. Tr. Wade Baskin. (1916) New York: McGraw -Hill, 1966.
Schopenhauer, Arthur. Parerga und Paralipomena. Stuttgart: Cotta

and Frankfurt: Insel, 1963. Sämtliche Werke, Vol. IV.
Soffici, Ardengo. Letter to Alfred Vallette. Mercure de France, May

15, 1920.
Souday, Paul. Review of Les Mamelles de Tirésias. Paris-Midi, June

26, 1917.
Strachan, W. J. The Artist and the Book in France. London: Owen,

1969.
Treich, Léon. L’Esprit d’Alfred Capus. 2nd ed. Paris: Gallimard, 1926.
“La Vie et la dépopulation.” L’Humanité, October 1, 1913.
Vigny, Alfred de. Oeuvres complètes. Ed. F. Baldensperger. Paris:

Gallimard, 1964.
Villatte, Césaire. Parisismen. Ed. Rudolf Meyer-Riefstahl and Marcel

Flandrin. Rev. ed. Berlin-Schönberg: Langenscheidt, 1912.
White, John J. Literary Futurism: Aspects of the First Avant-Garde.

Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990.
Wisner, René. “Manifestation Sic—Les Mamelles de Tirésias, par

Guillaume Apollinaire.” Le Pays, June 24, 1917.
Zeitlin, Froma. Playing the Other: Gender and Society in Classical

Greek Literature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.
Index
Apollinaire, Guillaume: and 73, 108, 127; “Etoile,” 47n.9, 65-

aesthetics, 12, 14, 16, 47, 49, 51, 66; “Fagnes de Wallonie,” 47n.9;
61-62, 72-73, 80, 106-109; and “Les Fenêtres,” 51, 88; “Fiord,”
cubist poetry, 51, 56; and Dada, 68; “Fusée,” 76-78;
46, 47, 48, 57n.24, 60, 62, 73; and L’Hérésiarque et Cie, 96; “Le
the Italian Futurists, 45, 54, Hibou,” 15n.1, 17, 24, 28-29, 33;
114n.34; and the Surrealists, 46, “Hôtel,” 54-55, 56; “Ibis,” 15n.1,
48, 63-64, 68, 71, 73,108, 120. 18, 19, 23, 33, 37; “La Jolie
Works: “Acousmate,” 47n.9; Rousse,” 127; “Le Lapin,” 15n.1,
“A Linda,” 47n.9, 57-60; A quelle 23, 30, 34; “Lettre-Océan,” 54;
heure un train partira-t-il pour “Le Lièvre,” 15n.1, 17, 23, 34;
Paris?, 48, 114n.34; “A tous tes “Le Lion,” 15n.1, 20, 30, 34, 38-
noirs désirs,” 118; “L’Arrivé du 40, 42, 43; “Lundi rue Christine,”
paquebot,” 45-46, 45n.3, 47n.9, 62; “La Maison des morts,” 80;
71; “Banalités,” 13, 45-73; Le Les Mammelles de Tirésias, 14,
Bestiaire, 15-43; “La Blanche 105-125, 127; Le Marchand
Neige,” 13, 82-85; “Le Boeuf,” d’anchois, 68; “Le Matin,” 47n.9;
15n.1, 16, 19-20, 23; “La Carpe,” “La Méduse,” 17, 23, 33, 43;
23, 33, 34-35, 40-42; “La “1890,”64-65; “La Mouche,”
Chanson du mal-aimé,” 24-25, 15n.1, 23, 24, 33; “Le Paon,”
75; “Chapeau -Tombeau,” 64, 71- 15n.1, 17, 30, 33, 36, 43; “Le
73; “La Chaste Lise,” 47n.9; “Le Petit Balai,” 68; “Le Phoque,”
Chat,” 15n.1, 18, 23, 26-28, 35, 64, 67-71; Le Poète assassiné, 48,
43; “La Chenille,” 15n.1, 30; “Le 49, 67; “Le Pont Mirabeau,” 81,
Cheval,” 15n.1, 16, 29-30, 35, 36- 88; “La Porte,” 88; “Le Poulpe,”
38; “La Chèvre du Thibet,” 15.n1, 24, 25, 26, 28, 33, 43; “La Puce,”
17-18, 21, 23, 34, 36; “La Clef,” 15n.1, 24-26, 28, 33, 43;
85; “La Colombe,” 20, 29-30, 35- “Quelconqueries,” 45-73; “Le
36, 43; “La Dame,” 13, 85-91; Repas,” 47n.9, 50-51; “Les
“La Danseuse,” 96; “Le Saisons,” 77-78; “Salomé,” 13,
Dauphin,” 23, 33, 35; “Un 92-104; “La Sauterelle,” 23, 24;
Dernier Chapitre,” 47n.9; “Le “Le Serpent,” 16, 17, 20-23, 30,
Dromadaire,” 15n.1, 23, 36; 33-34, 36; “Les Sirènes,” 16, 18,
“L’Ecrevisse,” 19, 23, 24, 33; 23; “69 6666 ...6 9...,” 71; “La
“L’Eléphant,” 18, 23, 32-33, 34; Souris,” 18, 24; “Le Tabac à
L’Enchanteur pourrissant, 13; priser,” 47n.9, 56; “Table,” 51-54,
“L’Esprit nouveau et les poètes,” 56; “Té,” 47n.9, 66-67; “La
Tortue,” 15n.1, 19, 20, 23; Chirico, Giorgio de, 123

“Vendémiaire,” 127; “Voyage à Cirlot, J. E., 113
Paris,” 68; “0, 50,” 47n.9, 60-63; Clancier, Anne, 110-111
“Zone,” 51. Cleopatra, 21, 23
About, Edmond, 110 Coligny-Chatillon, Louise, 78
Alexandre, Didier, 86, 89 Copperfield, David, 12
Antonelli, Paola, 53, 62 Couffignal, Robert, 93, 95, 99
Aragon, Louis, 48 Cranston, Mechtild, 82-83
Archimedes, 73 Culler, Jonathan, 47-48, 60
Aristophanes, 109
Auffret, Serge and Hélène, 101- Debon, Claude, 17, 18, 125
102 Descartes, René, 67
Desnos, Robert, 105
Ball, Hugo, 60 Décaudin, Michel, 47, 56, 72, 76,
Barthes, Roland, 13, 31, 34, 35, 83, 84, 89, 92, 106
42-43 Derain, André, 20
Basch, Victor, 123 Duchamp, Marcel, 47, 57n.24, 62,
Bates, Scott, 63n.37, 71, 89, 99, 75
118, 125 Dufy, Raoul, 13, 15-43
Baudelaire, Charles, 46 Durry, Marie-Jeanne, 89, 93, 101
Béhar, Henri, 106, 113-114, 123
Bellas, Jacqueline, 93, 101 Fongaro, Antoine, 46, 76, 78, 83
Bernini, Giovanni Lorenzo, 42 Frazer, Sir James George, 103
Bertrand, Gerard, 42
Bonnet, Marguerite, 49 Giono, Jean, 57
Boschetti, Anna, 101 Goethe, Wolfgang, 113
Bouchardon, Marianne, 110 Gossiaux, Pol-P., 110, 120
Bowra, C. M., 102 Gozzoli, Benozzo, 93-95
Braques, Georges, 20 Greet, Anne Hyde, 15, 19, 22, 23,
Breton, André, 46, 48, 63-64, 68, 28, 30, 37-38, 42, 84, 90n.34
71, 108 Guicharnaud, Jacques, 108, 116
Breunig, LeRoy C., 83, 103
Butler, Samuel, 112 Hagenbeck, Carl, 38
Harrow, Susan, 50
Caizergues, Pierre, 114, 118 Hausmann, Raoul, 60
Cansinos-Asséns, Rafael, 95 Hervilly, Ernest d’, 70
Capoul, Victor, 64
Capus, Alfred, 64 Ionesco, Eugène, 62
Catelain, Georgette, 53
Caws, Mary Ann, 51 Jarry, Alfred, 106, 107
Cézanne, Paul, 50 Joyce, James, 52
Chaussard, Piere-Jean Baptiste,
110 Kraft, Maurice, 92
Index 143
La Fontaine, Jean de, 30 Roussel, Raymond, 57n.24

Laude, Jean, 110 Roy, Pierre, 79, 87
Laurencin, Marie, 18, 28-29, 35 Royer, Clémence, 119
Lautréamont, Comte de, 46 Samaltanos, Katia, 75
Lawler, James, 56n.23 Saussure, Ferdinand de, 61
Lekatsas, Barbara, 118 Savinio, Alberto, 114n.34
Logue, Christopher, 11-12 Shakespeare, William, 73, 95
Longrée, Georges, 48, 49, 52, 58, Soffici, Ardengo, 44-45, 65,
61 Souday, Paul, 105
Lorrain, Jean, 69 Soupault, Philippe, 48
Strachan, W. J., 23
Mallarmé, Stéphane, 18, 58, 63, Sutherland, Graham, 15
95-96
Marinetti, F. T., 111 Themerson, Stefan, 57
Mathews, Timothy, 57, 59 Tydings, Millard, 32
Matisse, Henri, 20, 128
Meriano, Francesco, 119 Varenne, Pierre, 105
Molina da Silva, Linda, 57 Verlaine, Paul, 68, 89
Morin, Edgar, 32 Vigny, Alfred de, 73n.52
Müller, Max, 112
Warhol, Andy, 62
Orenstein, Gloria, 120, 123 White, John J., 61
Pagès, Madeleine, 78 Zeitlin, Froma, 109

Papini, Giovanni, 45
Picabia, Francis, 57n.24, 75, 111
Picasso, Pablo, 128
Pilkington, A. E., 84, 90, 101
Piron, Alexis, 110
Playden, Annie, 28, 83
Poiret, Paul, 20
Poupon, Marc, 17, 86, 89n.30, 99
Proust, Marcel, 67
Ray, Man, 60
Read, Peter, 107, 110-111, 113,
124
Rees, Garnet, 102
Reverdy, Pierre, 109
Richter, Mario, 83
Riffaterre, Michael, 83
Rimbaud, Arthur, 46
Roméo, Thérèse, 81

(Faux Titre No. 355) Apollinaire, Guillaume - Bohn, Willard - Apollinaire, Guillaume - Apollinaire On The Edge - Modern Art, Popular Culture, and The Avant-garde-Rodopi (2010)

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

(Faux Titre No. 355) Apollinaire, Guillaume - Bohn, Willard - Apollinaire, Guillaume - Apollinaire On The Edge - Modern Art, Popular Culture, and The Avant-garde-Rodopi (2010)

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Apollinaire on the Edge

Modern Art, Popular Culture,

Etudes de langue et littérature françaises

Keith Busby, †M.J. Freeman,

AMSTERDAM - NEW YORK, NY 2010

Cover design:: Pier Post.

The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of

1. Contemplating The Bestiary 15

2. In Search of the Whatnots 45

3. Apollinaire and Children’s Rhymes 75

4. The Mammaries of Tiresias 105

Figure 1.1 Raoul Dufy, The Serpent 22

Figure 1.2 Raoul Dufy, The Cat 27

Figure 1.3 Raoul Dufy, The Lion 39

Figure 1.4 Raoul Dufy, The Carp 41

Figure 3.1 Benozzo Gozzoli, The Feast of Herod and

The following study is dedicated to the memory of Michel

In contrast to the following pages, which are the result of lengthy

Come to the Edge

Come to the edge.

Conceived originally as a historical tribute, the poem contains a

believe the text was composed by Apollinaire. Even the illusionist

The marginal genre that achieved the greatest success was

Contemplating The Bestiary

In 1911, Apollinaire published a collection of poems entitled Le

way in which it evolved. Whereas authors traditionally exert little

The Verbal Images

Les poils de cette chèvre et même

(The hair of this goat, and even

In a study published in 1966, Marc Poupon wondered what

by a singular article. The only exceptions are “Les Sirènes,” discussed

Oui, j’irai dans l’ombre terreuse

(Yes, I will go into the dark earth

On the one hand, as Greet observes, the composition announces

Ce chérubin dit la louange

(This cherub sings the praises

Since the volume is modeled on earlier bestiaries, many of which

In contrast to Apollinaire, whose poems are deliberately evasive,

Tu t’acharnes sur la beauté.

(You eagerly pursue beauty.

The poem begins with a startling assertion: that serpents are

Focusing on expressions such as “cruauté” and “Tu t’acharnes,” Greet

Figure 1.1 Raoul Dufy, The Serpent

Miraculously, Dufy’s woodcut manages to reproduce both the

Puces, amis, amantes même,

(Fleas, friends, lovers even,

Another poet would have selected an evil character to represent

Lover”), he complains about being loved in the present poem--which

Jetant son encre vers les cieux,

(Spurting its ink toward the heavens,

That Apollinaire chose to compare himself to the Octopus is not

Since ink is the lifeblood of poetry, Apollinaire jokes that he is

Je souhaite dans ma maison:

(I wish to have in my house:

Figure 1.2 Raoul Dufy, The Cat

As Greet remarks, the Cat in Dufy’s illustration seems to have

Mon pauvre coeur est un hibou

(My poor heart is an owl

During 1901-1902, when he was employed as a French tutor in

the beginning, he treated the image as a picturesque detail, one of

marie” (“Like you I love someone called Marie / And I am going to

En faisant la roue, cet oiseau,

(Spreading its tail, this bird,