It's been a very long time. I looked into dragons about 30
years ago, so what I say may be woefully out of date, but
here goes.

They aren't the same dragon. The Northern dragon is the
guardian of wealth, who keeps good things from men. The
hero kills him to free the wealth.

The Greek dragon is a demon or demiurge to whom human
sacrifice is required, especially a young woman. Killing
it frees man from the sacrifice.

The Chinese dragon is a symbol of good fortune. Dragons
appeared at Confucius's birth as a sign of auspiciousness.
So far as I know nobody kills Chinese dragons.

There is really quite a literature on dragons East and
West.

--
John K. Taber


-----Original Message-----
From: - Ezra Pound discussion list of the University of Maine
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of charles moyer
Sent: Saturday, June 17, 2000 6:02 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Cantos as heroic epic


    Tim Romano writes, "Pound's reaction to these religions is not
unlike
that of the pagan norseman in europe's early middle ages when
missionaries
brought them news of the Christ. They wanted nothing of this religion
for
weaklings and quitters."
    Tim, you have raised an interesting point here. What happens to the
archetypal theme of the heroic epic in the Christianized landscape? I am
thinking especially of that archetypal myth of the dragonslayer.
Throughout
Indo-European and Semitic myth the theme finds expression, e.g. Indra
vs.
Vritra, Apollo vs. Python, Sigurd vs. Fafnir, Cadmos vs. a well-guarding
dragon, Perseus vs. ketos, Beowulf vs. Grendel only to mention a few.
    As Calvert Watkins puts it in "How to Kill a Dragon; Aspects of
Indo-European Poetics", "This Proto- Indo-European poetic repertory
includes
a central mythographic formula
              (HERO) SLAY (*g'hen-) SERPENT
whose verbal history can be traced through nearly every branch of the
Indo-European family."
    And Pound did not miss this. See Addendum for Canto C, "neschek, the
serpent", Fafnir the worm", "Snake of the seven heads, Hydra" and again
"The
Serpent". Does not Pound see in this symbol the ancient and traditional
obstructor of the waters of life, and does he not attempt to give it new
and
expanded meaning for our age?
    There's more to this, but we must invoke Clio, the musa of epic and
history.

Charles Moyer

p.s. I just remembered the Church also has St. George of Cappodocia, but
he's a rip-off from Perseus and a bit of an embarassment to the Church
if
one reads between the lines in Butler's "Lives of the Saints".