The Big Apple is a good place for reinvention, and the Swiss poet Frédéric-Louis Sauser had reason for a restart here in the spring of 1912.
At 25 years old he’d washed up in New York Harbor, nearly penniless after trying his luck in Russia and Brazil.
Henceforth he would be called Blaise Cendrars: a name for a poet of fire, a promise of ash (cendres) and art.
“Blaise Cendrars: Poetry Is Everything,” at the Morgan Library & Museum, is one of the most appealing and eye-opening shows of the summer — a concentrated pop of free-spirited trans-Atlantic modernity, alive with rich color and typographical pyrotechnics.
If you haven’t heard of Cendrars, you’re not alone; in an intro French poetry class you are more likely to encounter his good friend Guillaume Apollinaire, a more polished example of modern alienation and fractured style.
Persons:
Frédéric, Louis Sauser, he’d, chucked, Sauser, ”, Blaise Cendrars, “ Blaise Cendrars, you’re, Guillaume Apollinaire
Organizations:
nickelodeon, First Presbyterian Church, Morgan Library & Museum
Locations:
Swiss, New York Harbor, Russia, Brazil, Greenwich Village, New York