Guillaume APOLLINAIRE speaks of poetry from the trenches of the front.

Guillaume Apollinaire (1880.1918)

Autograph letter signed, written from the front, to Chérie Faure-Favier.

Two pages in-12° in purple ink. Autograph envelope.

45th ^Battery . 38th ^Regt . Sector 138. October 12, 1915

General correspondence. Volume II, pp. 842-843.

“I’ll send you a poem next time.” »  

Moving letter from the poet, at the front, recounting the war to his young friend. Apollinaire testifies to his valiant morale, his courage in the face of the German enemy and his inextinguishable quest for poetry.

_____________________________________________________________________

“Dear girlfriend, Why aren’t you nice. But you are all the same when thinking of me, when talking about me. However, you are exaggerating by complaining to me, I am not bored. Indeed, you have understood the indication in the photo which is accurate. That's it.

You think if we have time to bother and if we have had time to read The Pretty Girl of ... by Walter Scott [The Pretty Girl from Perth], to sing A menilmontant by Bruant and to look at what serves as a mouthful to the wild boars and the Boche all this to the roar of our cannons.

I will send you a poem next time. Remind me of this in your next letter. I 'm looking forward to my portrait as a gunner.  I will not go on leave to Paris. Besides, there has been no leave for 6 weeks and I don't know when it will be discussed again. If you see André Billy tell him that I haven't heard from him for a long time. Thank you for sending me a blank sheet of paper, but today I had papers, I'm using them all the same.

It's sector 138 again. You know, we've seen the war clearly now . That doesn't stop the swordsmen (which is the season) from throwing threads of the Virgin between the branches of the broken fir trees, partly scorched. Then from time to time it smells of chard pear like in the places where they put the fruit in the countryside. It’s the tear gas that has that autumnal smell and makes you cry. My very friendly hand GA »

_____________________________________________________________________

Daughter of Louise Faure Favier, Anne Chérie Faure Favier (1898.1990) was better known under her painter name Chériane. She married Léon-Paul Fargue at the dawn of the 1940s.

General correspondence. Edition by Victor Martin-Schmets. Ed. Honoré Champion.