POETRY

GUILLAUME APOLLINAIRE (1880/1918) – Leader of the Surrealist movement, which marked an epoch

He became friends with avant-garde artists (including Picasso and Braque, Rousseau and Duchamp). Illegitimate son of Polish woman and an unidentified man (his father may have been a cardinal in the Church or an Italian military officer) was born in Rome. His career influenced the development of such artistic movements (as Futurism and Cubism, Dadaism, and Surrealism). Guillaume Apollinaire was bohemian artist …

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GERMAN POETRY – Love poetry of Else Lasker-Schüler

She was German poetess, the lyrical phenomenon of modern Germany. She grew up as a prodigal child, in fact, at four years she already knew how to read and write. In 1894 he moved to Berlin, where he remained until 1933. Here she published first poems. Her first collection of poems was published in 1902. Else Lasker-Schüler with a collection …

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SHE WAS DEEPLY LOVED BY RUSSIAN PEOPLE – Anna Akhmatova, short lyric poems and structured cycles

Two years before her death at the age of 76, she was chosen president of the Writers’ Union. Anna Akhmatova was a Russian modernist poet, one of the most acclaimed writers in the Russian canon. Her work ranges from short lyric poems to structured cycles (such as Requiem, tragic masterpiece about the Stalinist terror). She was born into upper-class family …

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KOREAN POEMS – Chung Ho-seung

Chung Ho-seung was born in 1950 and since his debut in 1972 (with a poem featured in the Korea Daily News), he has published many poetry collections, which has achieved both critical acclaim and mass appeal. His minimal verse style interweaves the everday and the fantastic. His poems have the rhythm of songs, his vocabulary is chosen for its emotive …

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EXISTENTIALIST IDEAS MADE WITHOUT EMBARRASSMENT – Milton Acorn: Cold bundles within falling heavens

His power comes from images always drawn from everyday Island life. Milton James Rhode Acorn was a Canadian poet. He was born in Charlottetown (Prince Edward Island) and was a World War II veteran. http://meetingbenches.com/2017/04/stunning-canadian-landscapes-quebec-region/ In Montreal he published his early poems in an political magazine. With a radical personality and strong working-class sentiments, he translated these elements into his …

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THE ROMANTIC – Poem, by Adam Mickiewicz

Adam Bernard Mickiewicz was a Polish-Lithuanian poet of the Romantic period. He is seen as one of Poland’s Three Bards. http://www.allposters.com/-sp/The-Birthplace-of-Adam-Bernard-Mickiewicz-1798-1855-at-Zaosie-Posters_i10076977_.htm?ac=true He was a creator of Romantic drama and has been compared both at home and in Western Europe to Byron and Goethe. Born into an impoverished noble family, he studied at the University of Wilno and in 1817 he …

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THE STARTLING POETRY OF JAPANESE MODERNIST – Chika Sagawa: uses free verse to explore interiority

Few women wrote poetry and those who did, typically used traditional forms to address domestic concerns. Chika Sagawa, born in Kawasaki Ai in 1911 was one of the most innovative poets in early-twentieth-century in Japan. Rather than relying on traditional forms, she used free verse to explore her interiority through imagery and her images were shockingly new. Not long after …

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IRANIAN POETRY

So strong is the Persian aptitude for versifying everyday expressions, that one can encounter poetry in almost every classical work. http://meetingbenches.com/2017/04/iranian-inner-landscapes/ It spans two-and-a-half millennia. Persian literature is one of the world’s oldest literatures. Very few literary works of Achaemenid Iran have survived due to the destruction of the library at Persepolis. It was a spoken poetry. Rumi’s poetry is …

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KERALA POEMS

Modern literary movements in Malayalam literature began in the late 19th century with the rise of Kumaran Asan, Ulloor S. Parameswara Iyer and Vallathol Narayana Menon. Malayalam literature comprises literary texts written in Malayalam (a South-Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala). http://meetingbenches.com/2017/04/keralas-landscapes/ While the Manipravala poetry flourished (as a diversion from the mainstream), the tradition set up …

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AND WE DON’T REALLY KNOW – Reading Jacques Prévert

He was a French poet and screenwriter, and his poems remain very popular in the French-speaking world. His poems are often about life in Paris and life after the Second World War. Prévert’s first collection of poetry “Paroles” (Words) appeared late in 1945. One of his most famous poems – Barbara – were very popular among French youth in 50-es. …

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