Trans-Siberian Prose and Little Jeanne from France by Blaise Cendrars

                                                                           

The portrait of the author made by Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani

Cover of the poem

In the poem "Trans-Siberian Prose and Little Jeanne from France" written by Swiss novelist Blaise Cendrars, the life of an imaginary/unreal protagonist who takes the readers in its fictional/imaginary world by traveling around Russia, particularly during the Russian revolution is presented. The author tells readers that when he started his “epic journey” he was in his teenage years and everything seems to be so unclear to him such as not remembering his childhood memories. He also tells that during his world journey from Russia to Mongolia there were scenes of war and Russian revolution (1917; creation of Soviet Union). It is interesting how the writer lives in a world full of dreams and fantasies and not in reality. Moreover, he considers himself as “a bad poet”. Thus, the phrase “I am already a bad poet” is mentioned many times in the poem. This made me think that the author somehow judges himself or he used that phrase to grab the reader’s attention in order to make them think about it. Another thing that I noticed as I went through the poem is the order of sentences and lack of punctuation marks between sentences. What was interesting for me is that the poem made me do research. For instance, I have never heard before for Port Arthur. I found out that it is located in Hobart (the most populous city and Australia's second oldest city) in Tasmania. On the other hand, the author also mentions the Trans-Siberian and based on my research I found out that the Trans-Siberian is referred to railways that connect Moscow and Russia with Mongolia, China and the Sea of Japan.  Overall, I can say that I liked the poem as I found it very interesting, very well written and informative.

Port Arthur, Tasmania