Topic Page: Apollinaire, Guillaume, 1880-1918
(Wilhelm Apollinaris de Kostrowitzky) French experimental poet, essayist, and playwright. One of the most extraordinary artists of early 20th-century Paris, his Peintres Cubistes (1913) was the first attempt to define cubism. He also experimented with typography in his poetry collection Calligrammes (1918). His masterpiece was the wholly unpunctuated Alcools (1913), in which he relived the wild romances of his youth.
(gēyōm' äpōlēnâr'), 1880–1918, French poet. He was christened Wilhelm Apollinaris de Kostrowitzky. Apollinaire was a leader in the restless period of technical innovation and experimentation in the arts during the early 20th cent. Influenced by the symbolist poets of the previous generation, he developed a casual, lyrical poetic style characterized by a blend of modern and traditional images and verse techniques. His best-known lyrical poems are collected in Alcools (1913) and Calligrammes (1918). A friend of many avant-garde artists, including Picasso and Braque, Apollinaire is credited with introducing cubism with his book Les Peintres cubistes (1913, tr. The Cubist Painters, 1949). Les Mamelles de Tirésias (1918), his only play, was one of the earliest examples of surrealism.
- See biographies by F. Steegmuller (1963, repr. 1971) and M. Davies (1964);.
- studies by L. C. Breunig (1969), K. Samaltanos (1984), T. Mathews (1988), and S. Bates (1967, rev. ed. 1989).
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