On 98-07-21, at 02:19, Jonathan Morse wrote:
>Sursum corda, Pawel, and consider the case of eighteenth-century English poetry: a body of verse dominated from beginning (the death of Dryden in >1700) to end (the publication of Wordsworth and Coleridge's _Lyrical Ballads_) by the overwhelming influence of a single great writer Alexander Pope. Pope himself died in 1744, but his influence on language was so pervasive (even now, he's the second-most-quoted English poet after Shakespeare) that for the next half-century the poets could hardly write unless they submitted themselves to his genre model. Result: not surprisingly, most English poetry in the second half of the century is simply an inferior imitation of Pope. Yes, that reminds me of the second half of the twentieth century.But then Wordsworth and Coleridge came along, demonstrated that poetry was ready again for change, and thereby brought closure at last to the Age of Pope. And in what year did they publish _Lyrical Ballads_? Be of good cheer and invest in a rhyming dictionary; the an
swer is 1798. If that history is a guide, the Pound Era too may be about to come to its end. Let's honor it as it passes, but let's let it pass as it must.
Mr Morse
I entirely agree with you ,but anyway I would like to point on certain elements of E. P. writing which are according to my opinion - still actual . Those are :
>1 . The ideographical method / resembling quick movie with all
the time changing pictures ,but anyway with relations between them strictly organized / I disaree with opinions that they are "chaotical" /
>2 . The "incomparable Pound's ear" ,which first of all means a phenomenal sense of rhytm and music, taken from Provance and perfectly developed .
/I think that XXI cent . poetry simply must to go into that direction . Michel Butor words he has written 40 years ago are surprisingly still valid /.
3 . Genial method of formulating questions - I dont know any other poet , who sets questions like Pound - that is - questions to "something" E.P. has in mind ,but God knows what is it and how to conect this "something" with maine subject . Additionally it doesn't disturb my possibilyty of the comprehention
/ abstractive comprehention/ of the text.
As long as I will not find a poet who sets questions better than E. P. so long I will not believe in the end of "Pound Era".
>4 . Pound was equally poet of the West and the East . He tried to balance in himself the rational mind of western people and
" irrationalism & spirituality" of the East . Even not as much excited about E.P. writing H. Carpenter wrote in his biography something like " certain passages of Pisan ... give to the reader a sort of "enghlitenment" / I forget on which page / . In my opinion Pound understood that the whole Western Cyvilization has strong limits and those limits are generally conected with "a broken symmetry of reactions on events " . Typical Westerner uses only his own rational mind and doesn't pay attention on the rest of the spectrum .
>5 . Looking from distance I have to agree with Ch. Booth opinion that O'Hara , Ashberry , Schulyer and other writers are inferior to Pound . There is not as much "relations between relations " which Pound has found so many and if ever some E.P. passages are presently "old fashioned " there is still a lot of actual . Pound crosses the boundry of XXI century practically / and almost / alone .I think that his writing can be compared to Homer's writing which was actual for a couple of hundred of years after his death .
Pawel Karwowski Cracow 25.07.98
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