>From: Daniel Pearlman <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: - Ezra Pound discussion list of the University of Maine
>    <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: The Incoherence of the Pound List
>Date: Thu, 20 Dec 2001 17:57:48 -0500
>
>Carlo,
>Really, now, I quite know the difference between coherence and profundity!
>Lots of Hollywood movies are perfectly coherent without being profound.
>Coherence is also susceptible to critical demonstration--we are here in the
>world of technique, craft, but there is no doubt that a judgment about
>profundity will always be subjective or, as you say, "a function of the
>current
>state of the reader."  Having taught graduate courses in both Pound and
>Frost, I have to say that I have gradually come to see--without any
>suggestion of devaluing Pound or all that I have learned from him--that
>Frost appears the more tuned-in in every way, and is even, in the
>political realm, far more astute than Pound.  Frost approaches politics
>and history with a tragic sensibility; Pound, with the reformist's
>sensibility.
>==Dan
>
>At 04:22 PM 12/20/2001 -0500, you wrote:
>>I agree with your comments on Garrick's level of engagement with what he
>>criticizes. But I think you are simply substituting "profundity" for
>>"coherence" in
>>your critique. It seems obvious that finding more profundity in Frost or
>>early
>>Williams is a function of the current state of the reader unless
>>accompanied by a
>>detailed comparison. Others experience may certainly and validly be
>>apposed or
>>tangential to this ubiquitous response to "profundity" or "coherence."
>>Also,
>>notions of "coherence" and "profundity" don't respond well to hierarchies.
>>And
>>there are other hierachies for profundity. My uncles find Andy Rooney
>>"profound"
>>and Oakeshott "incoherent."
>>
>>And sometimes some of us find that history is just so much clutter. Carlo
>>Parcelli
>>
>>Daniel Pearlman wrote:
>>
>> > I for one am glad to hear a voice like Garrick's that questions
>> > fundamental literary values and suggests that we reassess
>> > our evaluation of the Cantos (and, perhaps, the reasons that
>> > a number of us become Pound-beguiled, unable to look at
>> > his work objectively).  I, too, would like us to stop pretending
>> > that "disjunction, disunity, lack of coherence and totality" are
>> > literary qualities to be championed.  The thing is, I don't have
>> > a problem with Cantos unity, coherence, etc.  I've seen it
>> > and I've expounded upon it, and if Garrick were actually to
>> > READ some of the critics of the poem--including my own
>> > BARB--he'd have a hard time defending his bravura dismissal
>> > of the work.  Instead, Garrick seems to rely too heavily for
>> > his breezy dismissal on listing a bunch of major literary critics
>> > throughout the century who have equally dismissed the Cantos
>> > (also, with little more reading effort than Garrick appears to
>> > have put into the job), and he does not seem to realize that
>> > much of the reason for the critical dismissal of the Cantos
>> > over the years stems not only from the work's difficulty but
>> > also from Pound's totalitarian and anti-semitic value system.
>> > (We on this list have wrestled with these issues on and off
>> > over the last several years, and many of us have been quite
>> > objective about the potentially damaging effects of the ideas
>> > on the art.)  I myself, to reiterate, do not have a problem
>> > defending the unity of the Cantos; rather, as I think more
>> > and more about what Pound has to say to us (above and
>> > beyond all that annoying political froth of his), I find that I
>> > cannot defend anything that remotely could be identified
>> > as a sophisticated, profound view of the world that the
>> > poem was intended to critique.  Such profundity and
>> > sophistication I find, to the surprising contrary, in the
>> > considerable body of the work of Robert Frost (Pound's almost
>> > complete opposite), and, to a somewhat lesser extent, in
>> > the earlier work of Pound's friend  W.C. Williams.  In my
>> > dubiousness about the depth of Pound's thinking, I suppose
>> > I am merely echoing his friend Wyndham Lewis, who
>> > expressed it all as early as 1927.
>> > ==Dan Pearlman
>> >
>> > At 01:35 PM 12/20/2001 -0500, you wrote:
>> > >Dear Listmembers,
>> > >
>> > >Thanks to Messrs. Gancie, Davis, and Pealrman for their responses.
>> > >
>> > >Many wondered whether I was being "willfully provocative" or "playing
>>the
>> > >devil" when I suggested that the Cantos are a junk heap--littered with
>>pearls
>> > >of course--so let me discomfort them by affirming that I am perfectly
>>serious.
>> > >
>> > >This judgment of the Cantos--it should be added--was one shared by
>>Yeats,
>> > >Randall Jarrell, R.P. Blackmur, and Allen Tate. In fact, it is an
>> > >illuminating experience to read Tate's opinion change drastically over
>> > >time---compare "Ezra Pound" to "Ezra Pound and the Bollingen Prize"
>>(both are
>> > >contained in Essays of Four Decades).
>> > >
>> > >In fact, the opinion I "provocatively" expressed has been the stated
>>opinion
>> > >of many great critics of the 20th century. I find it disheartening,
>>but
>> > >perfectly understandable, that the Pound List would not entertain this
>> > >opinion (except dismissively and in passing) but it shall not be
>>dispelled so
>> > >easily.
>> > >
>> > >What is most interesting is not that the members of this List have
>>difficulty
>> > >admitting that the Cantos are "nasty, obscure, fragmentary, and long"
>>(this
>> > >is a self-evident fact) but that justification of " the poetics" of
>>the
>> > >Cantos should finally, and fatally, involve embracing the virtues of
>>(to
>> > >paraphrase Alex Davis' response): disjunction, disunity, lack of
>>closure, and
>> > >lack of totality. Aren't these qualities the very hallmarks of the
>>failed
>> > >work of art?
>> > >
>> > >If we (as Tim Bray has) entertain the idea that the Cantos are a
>>miscellany,
>> > >and not "a unified work of art" then we explain many problems that
>>have
>> > >bedeviled Modernism for three quarters of a century. The Cantos are a
>>mess
>> > >because Pound had no epic plan in mind when he started, NOT because he
>>wished
>> > >to be "ahead of his time" and champion "disjunction, disunity, lack of
>> > >coherence and totality" as avant-garde aesthetic values. Talk of it
>>being an
>> > >epic poem simply dissipates, as it should. The Cantos become not one
>>thing,
>> > >but many things---whereas an epic poem is a unified work of art--and
>>so talk
>> > >of the Cantos fragments into various sections (Confucian, Adams,
>>Pisan,
>> > >Throne sections, ad infinitum). These values have--need it be
>>said?--polluted
>> > >Modernist and post-Modernist poetry to its great detriment and left
>>the
>> > >reader with more unreadable poetry (Olson, Duncan, et al. than any one
>> > >century ought to produce.
>> > >
>> > >The Cantos have no one "poetic theory" but many--and I have suggested
>>(in an
>> > >upcoming essay) that the Cantos would have suffered less had it simply
>>been
>> > >titled the Later Poetry of Ezra Pound. The Cantos are a collection of
>> > >disparate poems, without any doubt. "It" will not and does not cohere
>>as one
>> > >thing the author admitted (either  as "a unified work of art" or "an
>>epic
>> > >poem"). Isn't it time that we treated the Cantos as a miscellany? And
>>stopped
>> > >talking of "disjunction, disunity, lack of coherence and totality" as
>> > >literary qualities to be championed (alas, because we wished to defend
>>the
>> > >Cantos) rather than the very absence of those qualities which
>>characterize
>> > >the superior work of art?
>> > >
>> > >I shall finish by twisting a phrase by Robert Gorham Davis to my
>>purposes:
>> > >"The Cantos are, finally, a litmus test for a whole range of critical
>>values
>> > >(and for the excesses of Modernist taste) and stand self-condemned."
>> > >
>> > >Regards,
>> > >Garrick Davis
>> > >editor,
>> > >CPR
>> > >(www.cprw.com)
>> >
>> > Dan Pearlman's home page:
>> > http://pages.zdnet.com/danpearl/danpearlman/
>> >
>> > My new fiction collection, THE BEST-KNOWN MAN IN THE WORLD AND OTHER
>> > MISFITS, may be ordered online at http://www.aardwolfpress.com/
>> > "Perfectly-crafted gems": Jack Dann, Nebula & World Fantasy Award
>>winner
>> >
>> > Director, Council for the Literature of the Fantastic:
>> > http://www.uri.edu/artsci/english/clf/
>> >
>> > OFFICE:
>> > Department of English
>> > University of Rhode Island
>> > Kingston, RI 02881
>> > Tel.: 401 874-4659
>> > Fax: (253) 681-8518
>> > email: [log in to unmask]
>
>Dan Pearlman's home page:
>http://pages.zdnet.com/danpearl/danpearlman/
>
>My new fiction collection, THE BEST-KNOWN MAN IN THE WORLD AND OTHER
>MISFITS, may be ordered online at http://www.aardwolfpress.com/
>"Perfectly-crafted gems": Jack Dann, Nebula & World Fantasy Award winner
>
>Director, Council for the Literature of the Fantastic:
>http://www.uri.edu/artsci/english/clf/
>
>OFFICE:
>Department of English
>University of Rhode Island
>Kingston, RI 02881
>Tel.: 401 874-4659
>Fax: (253) 681-8518
>email: [log in to unmask]


Now you've shocked me ....

do I read that correctly? University students actually
study Robert Frost?



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