Stoner,
You have to remember that most of the members of this list, at least of the
active ones, have a professional investment in Pound studies.  This fact
bodes ill for any objective assessment of Pound's literary worth coming
from this group.  I'm afraid you'll have to rest content in your own
judgment, which I hope you'll always keep open to challenge.  Or else wait
fifty years and see if the universities have still managed to keep Pound
relevant and alive.
==Dan P

At 07:54 AM 12/27/2002 -0800, you wrote:
>I've recently wondered if the mark of a truly great writer is to leave a
>huge sea of ambuguity, the depths of which are discoverable by each diver
>who plunges into the murky waters, but that there must be some actual
>treasure that is there in the deep to be discovered.  Plato, Emerson, and
>folks like them are rich, but I'm afraid Pound can't share their company.
>
>I must admit that when it comes to Pound, I wonder if is myth of the man
>is more substantial than his actual writing--obscure, erudite, elitist,
>psychotic, meglamaniacal.  I wonder where the beauty in his work lies. I
>have not studied a lot of Pound but again I must admit, now, after
>listening to this group, that only a few people even want to swim through
>the thick, electric eel infested waters that he created.  I feel like I've
>swam every inch of the ocean bottom, sucked mud into my lungs, and I'm in
>need of finding real treasure, not mere mud.  I'm pretty sure that I've
>about had my fill of the salty mud and want to fill my glass with clear
>spring water, and refresh my tongue with real writing.  I need something
>to wash him down and maybe even a labotomy to remove what I do know from
>my brain.  I'm not sure that you folks will agree, but I'm not just some
>inpatient sophmore sitting in one of your classes listening to words fly
>over my head and vaporize like midst exposed to the bright moring sun.
>
>I'm certain you must agree.  Should we not just leave him to rot and decay
>at the bottom of the ocean like the iron skeleton of some worthless ship
>that sank 100 years ago.  We have surveyed the hull and found nothing,
>really, nothing, except maybe a myth of our own making.  The man has been
>given far too much credit, I think.  I do, however, have an open mind,
>open to pusuasion, finding none so far from any of you folks.
>
>stoner
>
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