Words like Fire: Prophecy and Apocalypse in Apollinaire, Marinetti, and Pound by James P. Leveque (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Words like Fire: Prophecy and Apocalypse in Apollinaire, Marinetti, and Pound by James P. Leveque Willard Bohn Words like Fire: Prophecy and Apocalypse in Apollinaire, Marinetti, and Pound. By James P. Leveque. (Studies in Comparative Literature, 50) Cambridge: Legenda. 2021. x+ 221 pp. £85. ISBN 978–1–78188–443–0. This book is a welcome contribution to avant-garde studies in Europe and North America. Devoted primarily to poetry, it examines the early literary activities of three giants who helped shape our response to the twentieth century: Guillaume Apollinaire in France, F. T. Marinetti in Italy, and Ezra Pound in England and America. To my knowledge, this is the only book-length study of all three poets, each of whom—officially or unofficially—headed a major literary movement. Associated with Cubism, Futurism, and Imagism respectively, they strove to create a revolutionary poetry that reflected the values of the modern age. Unlike the Italian leader, who was the official head of the Futurist movement, the other two led largely by example, juxtaposing their revolutionary poems with articles defending the poetics in question. Alternating between prophecy and apocalypse (or combining the two), as James P. Leveque demonstrates, they drew on biblical literature to establish various religious parallels. In particular, the author claims, apocalyptic attitudes and prophetic poses were used by all three men 'to establish poetry as the authoritative voice on the meaning of [the First World War] and the potential for the post-war future' (p. 18). [End Page 587] The following three chapters consider the role played by prophecy in the poets' early works, which in Apollinaire's case was far from negligible. As Leveque is not the first to point out, the French author frequently refers to personages and themes in the Bible. Published in 1966, Robert Couffignal's L'Inspiration biblique dans l'œuvre de Guillaume Apollinaire (Paris: Lettres Modernes) has been a valuable reference for many years. However, since Leveque's biblical knowledge is much more exhaustive, he is able to paint a more detailed portrait of the poet's indebtedness. The prophetic bent of Marinetti's works is not as evident as Apollinaire's because it assumes a different form. Arguing that the Futurist leader considered his writings to be a form of prophecy, the author focuses on Le Monoplan du pape (The Pope's Monoplane) and several Futurist manifestos. In his opinion, the latter represent 'perhaps the modern prophetic mode par excellence' (p. 64). Marinettti hoped to become a modern Joshua, he explains, leading the Italian people into the conquest of a Promised Land. In a similar manner, Pound also viewed himself as a poet and something of a prophet. Unlike the previous leaders' works, which tended to be optimistic, his own were marked by pessimism and a profound sense of loss. Since he believed that modern poetry was vastly inferior to traditional poetry, his works were filled with bitter satire and social criticism. Tn just this way', Leveque observes, 'do prophets acquire their authority to judge the world' (p. 105). Paralleling the previous section, the next three chapters examine the thematic role of the biblical apocalypse in all three poets' works. Defining the concept as 'a cataclysm with meaning', David G. Bromley insists that its ultimate purpose is not destruction but creation (p. 119, referring to 'Constructing Apocalypticism: Social and Cultural Elements of Radical Organization', in Millennium, Messiahs, and Mayhem: Contemporary Apocalyptic Movements, ed. by Thomas Robbins and Susan J. Palmer (Routledge: New York, 1997), pp. 31–46 (p. 35)). Considering each of the three leaders in turn, Leveque begins by noting that Apollinaire's poems were directed towards three distinct audiences: his avant-garde colleagues, the citizens of several European countries, and his fellow soldiers in the First World War. Although these three groups called for different strategies, his poetry constantly poses questions about individual identity and its relation to society. In particular, as the author demonstrates, the war prompted Apollinaire to imagine a brand new world, one in which the contradictions and binary structures of ordinary life would be absorbed into each other in a single apocalyptic moment. Devoted to Marinetti, the next chapter concentrates on Futurist theatrical...