In the midst of all this recollection about one's first contact with
Pound, perhaps we might exchange some thought about presenting Pound,
especially the Cantos, to (frequently sceptical) students.  It seems an
appropriate time of the year.
 
My own discovery of Pound was first through the Paige Selected Letters,
which still makes a fine introduction, I think.  And while toiling on an
M.A. thesis on Yeats, I kept a copy of the Cantos open at a desk, together
with the old _Annotated Index_, and worked through a little at a time.  It
struck me, then and now, that reading Yeats is a centripetal process,
Yeats forever drawing one into his personal world, while reading the
metonymic Pound is centrifugal, always sending me to areas I might not
have visited otherwise.  In this, I second Robert Kibler's comments.
 
As an academic, I study Pound "professionally."  But I'm glad,
and pleasantly surprised to see how many non-academic admirers there are
on the list.  We should complement each other well.
 
                                Stephen Adams
                                Department of English
                                University of Western Ontario
                                London, Canada  N6A-3K7
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