Dear Tim:
        Yes, his debt to Browning has been long established, and it isn't
just late. Besides the Three Cantos, there is his letter to Rene Taupin,
-- "Pourquoi nier son pere?"(Pound's grip on French was never entirely
secure.)
        I was  not suggesting that you actually drop Men and Women for
Sordello -- except in jest. Of course, the links are more numerous, but
the dramatic monologues are more attractive -- and less formidable. I'm
sorry to see them go, if you really do make the switch.
        Incidentally, what text of Sordello would you use in class?
                                        Jacob
On Fri, 10 Jan 2003, Tim Redman wrote:

> Dear Jacob,
>
> Late in his life, Pound said that he had been influenced most heavily by
> Browning and Dante, adding, "I'm still learning from Dante."  Sordello it
> will be, not just for the Italian setting, but for the poetics of
> impersonality Pound learned from him (I just read an excellent book on
> Pound's early poetics, name and title escape me just now, that convincingly
> argues that the development of Pound's poetry in the early years, 1908-1915,
> was a gradual attempt to take the poet out of the poem).  Anwyway, thanks
> for the advice!
>
> Cordially,
>
> Tim
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: - Ezra Pound discussion list of the University of Maine
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jacob Korg
> Sent: Tuesday, January 07, 2003 5:15 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Difficulty in Dante and Pound
>
>
> Dear Tim:
>         I was going tosecond Dirk's suggestion about Sordello before he
> beat me to it. But you have been noble enough in trying to get both
> graduates and undergranduates through the great traditional epics.
>         I didn't at first see how the Browning poems would fit in -- but
> there may be a valid connection through the Italian setting  many of
> them have, plus the meditations on the nature of art.
>         A small and perhaps trite tip to all and sundry plus Stoner; entry
> to many of Pound;'s obscruties is through his own superpsition -- the
> contiguity of apparently unrelated particulars.
>                         Jacob Korg
>