Poems for Notre Dame

It was late afternoon on April 15, 2019, when we first noticed a thin trail of smoke wafting out near the spire of Notre Dame. Within the hour, the whole world was watching with us as a monstrous fire raged through the Cathedral, felling the ancient-timbered roof and threatening the two towers. It was as if we were seeing something happen to the moon: here was our great neighbor, so familiar and constant, now impossibly marked. It was otherworldly; it was utterly heartbreaking.

To help raise funds for the heroic Paris Fire Brigade—without whom the towers would certainly have been destroyed—and the now-ongoing rebuilding efforts, we have produced a pamphlet of poems, selected by our staff, which is available only at the bookshop and on our website.

The poets include E. E. Cummings, Eileen Myles, Théophile Gautier, Richard Wright, Marie Ponsot, and Osip Mandelstam. And the pamphlet itself unfolds into a poster featuring lines from Victor Hugo, along with the gorgeous illustration “La Comète Donati au-dessus de Notre Dame,” by Amédée Guillemin (1877), freshly scanned just for this project by the wonderful Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Designed by Rosie Larue, the pamphlet was printed in Bordeaux, France, by Atélier Bulk on 100% recycled paper.

ALL PROFITS WILL BE DONATED.