See more objects with the tag poetry.

Object Timeline

  • We acquired this object.

1949

  • Work on this object began.

2021

2025

  • You found it!

Book, Exile and Other Poems

This is a Book. It was written by St.-John Perse and designed by E. McKnight Kauffer and published by Pantheon. It is dated 1949. Its medium is lithograph. It is a part of the department.


Kauffer was deeply conflicted about his national identity. Throughout his life, he made contradictory statements about his feelings toward England and America. But the theme of exile resonated with Kauffer. In New York he befriended St.-John Perse, an antifascist French diplomat who was forced to leave France when Germany invaded. For Perse’s book of poems, Kauffer stretched one arm of the letter X out into indefinite space, a metaphor for endless displacement.

It is credited Exhibition purchase.

Its dimensions are

H x W x D: 0.8 × 16 × 23.5 cm (5/16 × 6 5/16 × 9 1/4 in.)

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Underground Modernist: E. McKnight Kauffer.

There are restrictions for re-using this image. For more information, visit the Smithsonian’s Terms of Use page.

For higher resolution or commercial use contact ArtResource.

If you would like to cite this object in a Wikipedia article please use the following template:

<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://www-4.collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/2318805324/ |title=Book, Exile and Other Poems |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=11 February 2025 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>