What was Pound's general pupose in littering his poetry, especially the
Cantos, with fairly obscure references, foreign phrases and dropped names? I
wonder how this tendency gels with Imagist rule no. 1: "To use the language
of common speech, but to employ the exact word, not the nearly-exact, nor
the merely decorative word."

I would argue that Pound's reluctance to let go of the mythical references
of which he was so fond, combined with a high-toned diction, ultimately
restricted his ability to produce resonant poetry. Pound deserves great
credit for his part in the Imagist movement, but he was not the most
accomplished practitioner. I don't think this is entirely the poet's fault.
We are all products of our times. T.S. Eliot's poetry sprung from the same
classical groundings, as evidenced be _The Waste Land_ and _Prufrock_, among
other examples. But Eliot also knew how to cut to the quick of the human
condition with the language of common speech: "I shall wear the bottoms of
my trousers rolled." So even if Pound was "il miglior fabbro" (another
reference), Eliot was a better poet.

Now this is not to say that Pound did not have his successes and that he
always leaned on his litany of references to achieve his effect. I simply
maintain that he was perhaps too much a die-hard intellectual to really
produce poetry that matched his own Imagist standards.

I welcome your comments.

Brennen Lukas
Annandale, Virginia


>
>But Pound's writing, line by line, is perfectly clear. The references,
>foreign phrases, can be cleared up with a gloss, or one can skip them to
>begin with.

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