My dear Wei - I hope you will excuse the tardiness of my response; a
tardiness arising from the combination of illness and my university reading
list. Nonetheless, I now offer my (belated) riposte to your perceptive
dissection of my remarks.

First, may I thank you for taking the time to suggest possible reading
material: as an 18 year old student I am keen to acquire knowledge as
quickly as possible, particularly when that knowledge pertains to Pound (or
to Wallace Stevens, if you, or anyone else is interested). For this I am
grateful - thankyou.

1. With regard to your inaugural observations-

"We cannot simply say, "Pound was against usury," and end our inquiry
there"

- I agree wholeheartedly. Moreover, I believe that I am capable of
responding to the question that follows ("What exactly about usury does
Pound condemn?"). As a follower of Major Douglas' school of Social Credit,
Pound no doubt felt that the value of money was, in the words of Thom Gunn, "false and arbitrary", and as a primarily capitalist society revolved about such values, the world at large was tainted, contaminated in its entirety by this sole dram of eale. Thus, it was the wider consequences of usury that
Pound detested: the manner in which capitalist abstractions - such as
interest and credit - spread their cancer far beyond the realms of economics
that he refused to ignore. In Pound's eyes, usury/usura is, as Canto XLV
vividly informs us, "CONTRA NATURAM"; it is, he rages, a "sin against
nature". Furthermore, the manner in which this particular Canto is littered
with references to activities far removed from the economic sphere
indicates exactly what Pound hated about Usura: namely the manner in which
it perverts all aspects of life.

2.Your second query is more difficult for me to answer. My knowledge of
Fascist politics, after all, is terribly thin. However, I believe Pound
differed from the "traditional fascist" in a single major fashion. For as I
understand it, it was Pound's dislike of usura and capitalism that caused
him to be attracted to Mussolini and his policies - not
vice-versa. Thus, because fascism and racism go hand in hand, Pound came to deride and denigrate the Jews - a race associated with money-lending and
usura long before the twentieth century. Indeed, we need not look hard
through the European canon in order to illustrate this point: Shakespeare's Shylock is an excellent example. It is here, then, that Pound and his "condemnation" break away from their archetypal fascist framework. For if I may make so bold an assertion, most fascist ideologies use economic arguments to support primarily SOCIAL theories; put simply, they condemn usura in order that they may condemn the Jews (or any other creed
who do not conform to their misguided social ideals). Theirs, then, is a
racial agenda. By contrast, Pound's real hatred was usura: his was an outlook INITIALLY monetary (that is to say concerned with the values of work and society) rather than intrinsically fascist or racist. That it became both these things, this said, is beyond doubt - and here I cannot exonerate him.

3. No one NEED condemn capitalism or usury, but all have the RIGHT to do so.
Personally, I consider capitalism a flawed concept at best, and at worst an
entirely misguided idea. As you say, any society that enables a tiny
percentage of its population to gain control of an enormous share of its
wealth or financial resources is clearly failing somewhere. However, there
appears no obvious "solution" to this problem: fascism is evidently repellent to us all, and Confucianism is, equally evidently, not a viable alternative, at least not in the West. Therefore, the only "conclusion" we may thus draw is that Pound, like all of us, had his own views as regards what was wrong with the world and how to set right a time out of joint. And like the speaker of that
famous last phrase, he was faced with an insoluble problem. Consequently, he couldn't win; to borrow your own phrase, the treatment he so
enthusiastically endorses is worse than the disease he attempts to treat. In
short, Pound was and is reviled because he wasn't right. But was he wrong
either? - for he saw a cancer on our world and, albeit by a grossly
incorrect manner, he attempted to remove it. I realise, nonetheless, that
this statement is a provocative one: I include it only to further
discussion.

4. I agree, broadly speaking. My statements COULD be applied to all of the
Romantic/Revolutionary figures you mention. But does the very similarity of
your examples - all, after all, had clear political/social agendas - not
alert you to the truth of what I say? Pound is, in many respects, no
different from Milton insofar as both had clearly defined political and societal ideas; both were writing in turbulent, dangerous and changing times. However, we remember Milton, Blake, Wordsworth etc. primarily for
their contributions to English literature: their political ideas have not
continuously blighted their names. It therefore seems meet that we should
regard Pond and his work in the same manner; i.e. we should accept that his
politics are distinct from our own and concentrate instead on his poetry.
This said, I appreciate that Pound's doctrinal theories are so integral to his work that we cannot ignore them. On this point I concede.

5. I too agree with the Marxist dictum you quote. However, I stand by my
initial remarks and their wording. For if we concur to regard history as a
societal and political construct, at least insofar as these are its primary
concerns, then mankind too must be such a thing. After all, as you and I
agree, socio-political forces shape man, and yet man formulates in
collective these socio-political forces. Therefore, he is, BY DEFINITION, a
socio-political creature. My own opinion as regards to man's role in
determining his own fate is probably similar to yours: I consider that
forces largely beyond our control - i.e. social, political, even genetic constraints - create the framework in which we must make the "choices" you speak of; moreover, I believe that our selections themselves are likewise
influenced. But we do clearly have an enormous role to play in determining
our own natures; it is, as you say, simply a question of "degree".

6. Finally - I am only too aware of infuriating all other list members with
the length of this posting, and apologise in advance - I acknowledge that
Pound's attitude to war needs to be thoroughly considered; to be, as you put
it, characterised. However, I feel I need to conduct some further reading in
order to respond to your final query in full. The implications of your
question, though, have prompted me to reconsider the tone of my original
remarks.

Returning Salutations,

James Hughes.