Jacob, Max

(1876-1944)

   poet

   Of Jewish ancestry, Max Jacob, who was born in Quimper, Brittany, at first led a bohemian existence in the Montmartre district of Paris in the early years of the 20th century. There, he met Pablo Picasso and other artistic and literary figures of the period. After a religious experience (1909), he converted to Catholicism and chose to retire a few years later (1921) to the Abbey of Saint-Benoit-sur-Loire, a retreat where he remained, with the exception of a visit to Paris (1927) and of a few trips abroad. it was at the abbey that he was arrested during World War II (1944) by the Gestapo and interned at the concentration camp at Drancy, where he died in a state of exemplary serenity. An exceptional poet, who drew inspiration from dreams and fantasy, Jacob's first works foreshadow surrealism, long before the advent of that movement (Le Cornet à dés). Always tinged with humor, but filled also with mysticism, his abundant poetry deals with the ephemeral, and it strips objects and beings of their appearances.