Tanya:
 
"Villon" could refer to the executed French poet of the same name, about
whom Pound wrote an opera.
 
James Atkinson
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Responding To:    Tanya Adele Koehnke <[log in to unmask]>
Original Date:            Mon, 30 Mar 1998 14:47:24 -0500
>
> Dear Ezra Pound List Subscribers:
>
> In my second-last year of undergraduate studies in English Literature, I
> wrote an essay
> on Ezra Pound's poem, "Villonaud for this Yule".  After researching the
> word
> "villonaud", I came up with little more than my own insight about its
> meaning.  I
> suggested that Pound, an Early Modernist, may have been mocking the
> traditional
> "villanelle" form by using the term "villonaud".  Noting that "vil" is
> the French word
> for "cheap, of little value", and that "aud" rings of "ode", I further
> argued that
> "Villonaud for this Yule" is a cheap ode (or spiritually impoverished
> "hymn") about
> Christmas.
>
> In retrospect, I am now wondering whether I was on the right track with
> regards to the
> term "villonaud".  I would greatly appreciate any responses to my
> insights!!
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Tanya ([log in to unmask])
>