Poetry for Students

24 Poetry for Students

join his creative expeditions in the poem, Apolli-

naire challenges them to discover fresh and invig-

orating visions of the world.

Source:Wendy Perkins, Critical Essay on “Always,” in

Poetry for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006.

L. C. Breunig

In the following essay, Breunig explores the

“fusion of laughter and despair” and the resulting

sense of malaise in Apollinaire’s poetry.

Always

What

Do I Read

Next?

• Cubism(1998), by David Cottington, is a com-
  prehensive overview of this important art
  movement.


• Stanley Appelbaum’s Introduction to French
  Poetry(1991) is a collection of poems by sev-
  eral important French poets, including Voltaire,
  Victor Hugo, Arthur Rimbaud, and Apollinaire,
  that includes critical and biographical informa-
  tion on each poet.


• T. S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred
  Prufrock” (1915), one of the most celebrated po-
  ems of the age, captures the pessimism and sense
  of hopelessness of the war years. It can be found
  in Eliot’s Collected Poems, 1909–1962(1963).


• “Ocean of Earth,” another selection in Cal-
  ligrammes(1918), is often cited as one of Apol-
  linaire’s most inventive poems.