Apollinaire Prize 2022
The presentation of the prestigious Apollinaire Prize and the Apollinaire Discovery Prize took place on Monday, November 7, at Les Deux Magots, in the presence of Catherine Mathivat, the president of the famous literary café, and with the complicity of Virginie Ledoyen who read poems from the winning works.
Denise Desautels, winner of the Prix Apollinaire 2022
Born in Montreal, Denise Desautels has published some thirty collections of poems and numerous artist’s books both in Quebec and abroad.
She has received, among others, the Governor General’s Award of Canada (Le saut de l’ange, 1993, L’Arbre à paroles & Le Noroît), the Prix Athanase David and the Prix de Littérature francophone Jean Arp, both of which were awarded to her for the whole of her work. Vice-president of the Académie des lettres du Québec from 1996 to 2002, member of the organizing committee of the Rencontre québécoise internationale des écrivains from 1997 to 2012, and member of numerous literary juries, she was awarded a career grant by the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec in 2005-2006 for her “exceptional contribution to Quebec culture”.
Among his most recent publications are Disparaître (L’herbe qui tremble, 2021), the work awarded this year’s Prix Apollinaire, and L’angle noir de la joie (“Poésie / Gallimard”, 2022).
Quentin Dallorme, winner of the Apollinaire Discovery Prize 2022
Quentin Dallorme, born in 1989, studied political science in Lyon. He works with elected officials in an agglomeration community. His passion for literature and sports, including rowing, led him to write Le Cœur sur l’eau, a novel published in 2021 by Éditions de l’Astre Bleu. Inspired by the social news, he writes in parallel several articles and fictions for various literary or political magazines. After several trips to the South of France and Italy, he published his first collection of poems – Plein sud – with Éditions de l’Aire in 2022, which was awarded the Prix Apollinaire Découverte 2022.
The Apollinaire Prize
The Apollinaire Prize, founded in 1941, crowns each year “without any dogmatism of school or technique a collection characterized by its originality and its modernity”. It is considered a Goncourt of poetry – partly because some members of the jury were or are Goncourt jurors, such as Hervé Bazin, Robert Sabatier or Tahar Ben Jelloun. Chaired by Jean-Pierre Simeon, the jury is composed of personalities from the world of poetry: Marc Alyn, Adeline Baldac-chino, Linda Maria Baros (general secretary), Tahar Ben Jelloun, Zéno Bianu, Fabienne Courtade, Philippe Delaveau, Guy Goffette, Jean Portante and Jean Rouaud. Since 2016, the Apollinaire Prize has been awarded to Les Deux Magots.
Virginie Ledoyen, Patron of the Prix Apollinaire 2022
Sparkling, light, stunning, Virginie Ledoyen is a pillar of French cinema. The actress has a long and successful career behind her, a series of successful films: “Jeanne and the Boy Wonder”, “The Beach”, with Leonardo DiCaprio, or “8 Women”. However, it is as if we discover her in each film, as she always reveals a different facet. For a long time, she has been a muse of auteur cinema, but she also likes to make people laugh and prefers films whose story touches her.
The Apollinaire Prize is endowed thanks to the generosity of Catherine Mathivat, president of Les Deux Magots. With the active complicity of the Printemps des Poètes.