Tim Romano wrote:

>In one of the wartime radio broadcasts (I don't have them handy and can't
remember which -- it's an especially nostaligic one) Pound is remembering
his days at home as a boy; he reveals a fondness for the black man who
helped out around the house and for the excellent culinary skills of the
family's black cook . The memories, while racially stereotypical and
patronizing (e.g. the man could be found playing checkers as often as he
could be found working) do not jibe at all with the radical view En Lin Wei
paints of Pound.

I think that you are right that this account is racially stereotypical and
patronizing.  Seen in the larger context of Pound's other references to
"breeding," and his expressed admiration for Hitler's racial program, I see
it as worse than patronizing.

Does anyone know if any Black, African American, or African critic has
written essays on Pound, and if so, what they have said?

The main question for me in the racial context is this:

If we find one or two references to Blacks in Pound's writings which are
moderately complimentary or sentimental, how do we weigh them against the
literally hundreds of offensive racial epithets contained throughout his
work?

Another issue, from the East Asian point of view, would be his treatment of
the Chinese in his rhetoric during World War Two.  His whole attitude toward
China was a bit like, "we must destroy the village in order to save," in
other words, he was perfectly willing to countenance (and even encourage)
any number of hostile actions committed by the Japanese imperialists against
the people of China.  As far as I know, he was never any more repentent of
his support for the Japanese invasion of China than he was of the Italian
invasion of Ethiopia.  Yet that invasion caused the deaths of over twenty
million Chinese.  Pound's attitude toward China and the Chinese was
extremely contradictory.  One the one hand the "morally healthy Chinese
race," to use his phrase, produced the same Confucian philosophy which he so
greatly admired; on the other he hand he lent his support to the traitors
and those who collaborated with the Japanese, who sought the total
subjugation of the mainland to Emperor Hirohito.

[see       www.geocities.com/weienlin/raceandempire.html     for details]

Mr. Surette says that it is innacurate to argue that Pound's anti-semitism
stemmed from one negative encounter with a potential sponsor who was Jewish.
  I don't think I was arguing that.  Pound himself describes the incident in
his letter, and he apparently attaches some importance to it.  My only claim
is that this is just one early illustration of the larger pattern.  I don't
think Mr. Surette is denying this pattern.  I think he agrees with me that
Pound's antisemitism was ingrained and was a sort of illness.

He says,

>Once he had contracted that sickenss, he attributed
everything he disliked to Jewish conspiratorial activity.

We are in accord on that at least.  Regarding other issues, such as Pound's
attitude toward Chinese historical and political reality, I would like to
say more in a later post.


Regards,

Wei




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