One of the things I meant to mention but forgot is that although
Hemingway continued to correspond with E.P. while he was in St Elizabeths
(I think he wrote about one letter a year), he never did pay a visit in
person.  Consequently anything he said about the scene on the hospital
lawn (and inside the ward, in cold weather) was based purely on newspaper
accounts and not a first-hand observation.
 
In a way, I think it is accurate to call the group of disciples
"fawning," in the same way that all students of professors tend to be a bit
fawning.  (One may remember a recent letter posted to this list.)  Although
he encouraged all the young disiples (not just Sheri) to refer to him as
"grampa," we certainly accepted E.P. at his own valuation --- a service
his old friends were not willing to oblige him with.
 
As to being dangerous, though...  Well, some of us might have been
dangerous in our dreams.  John Kasper would definitely have liked to
have been dangerous, but succeeded only in putting himself in jail as a
convenient (but by no means innocent) fall guy for something that would
have happened more or less the same way without him.
 
I only met Kasper once, and then quite briefly, after he was already
notorious and under indictment.  I knew his ex-girlfriend Nora quite
well, and she talked about him a lot (a whole lot), but what she said
didn't give much insight into him.  He was certainly more complicated
than people want to present him as.  From Humphrey Carpenter's book I
learn that that he had graduated from Columbia and had intended to work
for a doctorate in English and Philosophy.  He apparently had quite mixed
feelings about Negroes, having been somewhat attracted to some of those
he met in Greenwich Village, while maintaining his Southern prejudices
about those in the South.  (This was also very much true of Nora, who
tended to fawn --- to use a convenient word --- over Black jazz musicians
in the D.C. night clubs, and generally get along wonderfully well with
the Blacks she encountered, while at the same time being completely
racist in her politics.)  E.P. seemed to sincerely believe that
segregation was in the best interest of Blacks, and to have no ill will
towards them, but it seems fairly clear that that Kasper catered to the
racism of his Tennessee following.
 
I never met Eustace Mullins, on the other hand.  I seem to remember Sheri
saying that he was a "dear boy," but then Sheri said that of many young
men (certainly including myself!)  Nora frequently talked about his book
(on the Federal Reserve system), but I don't remember her ever talking
about Mullins as a person.  Mullins, in any case, eventually became a
rather pathetic supporter of right-wing militia groups.  There's lots
of information about him on the net, although I can't find anything
except old history about Kasper.
 
What other "dangerous fawning" characters are we talking about?  Bill
McNaughton, who edited STRIKE?  He was really much more serious about
beoming a writer and a scholar than about politics.  John Chatel?  Give
me a break!
 
Me?  Moi???  I went along with my father's wishes and went off to
college, first to Johns Hopkins and later the University of Arizona to
study engineering, later changing my major to mathematics and almost
accidentally also picking up a degree in classical Greek.  Pound's
influence had prompted me to read the memoirs of Thomas Hart Benton and
Martin Van Buren and subscribe to the Congressional Record for at least
a year, as well as learning Greek and taking a one-year course in
classical Chinese, but not to go out and try to incite people to riot.
I doubt that Pound had recommended that to Kasper either.  It was not
E.P.'s style.  Publishing books and newspapers was more the sort of
action he favored.
 
 
 
>From:  Jonathan Morse <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject:      Animal House at the Ezuversity
>To:    [log in to unmask]
>Date:  Tue, 11 Jan 2000 14:37:05 -1000
>
>Understandably, members of this list don't spend much time talking about
>John Kasper, Eustace Mullins, or the other political Poundians who hung
>around the lawn at St. Elizabeths. In a letter to Pound, Ernest Hemingway
>called them "dangerous fawning jerks," and -- for the poetry, at least --
>that does seem to wrap the topic up. Pound was lonely and despised, but
>some people were willing to give him their love. It was a questionable
>love, but while it lasted it was something. Add a few explanatory lines to
>the _Companion_ and let it go at that.
>
>But fifty years later the lawn is still alive on the Web. No big deal
>outside northern Idaho, but offlist I've recently received a distressed
>note from a member who has just discovered the nut orchard. So to that
>member, and anyone else who's interested, let me offer these informational
>links to the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish organization.
>
>"Hate on the World-Wide Web: A Brief Guide to Cyberspace Bigotry."
>http://www.adl.org/frames/front_hate_on_www.html
>
>"Jewish 'Control' of the Federal Reserve: A Classic Anti-Semitic Myth"
>http://www.adl.org/frames/front_federal.html
>
>Jonathan Morse
>Co-editor, H-Net list H-Antisemitism