Bob Scheetz,
My motives have been to shed some light in this forum on Pound's ideology
because I think it is necessary to understand his IDEAS if we are to
understand his poetry and his political views. Pound thought so too. The
current context was "racism" and "anti-semiticism". I have been trying to
encourage a balanced use of the source material, letters AND published
writings, when Pound's views on these matters are the topic of discussion.
Thus, my participation in this thread has NOT been
> a exercise
> in emasculation...a smugly superior fastidiousness
Without an understanding of how he makes distinctions, how he draws
comparisons, how are we to perceive the thematic connections Pound was
making between, say, canto XXXII and canto XXXVI?
Between
'The revolution', said Mr Adams,
'Took place in the minds of the people.'"
...
and
A lady asks me
I speak in season
She seeks reason for an affect, wild often
That is so proud he hath Love for a name.
...
The view of Poetry that you express in the following lines
> ...and it's precisely this pathetic (ie love/hate) perception
> of living identities (namings, substantives, stereotypes..)
> what enables our poetry.
is unclear (I don't see how "namings" or "stereotypes" can be regarded as
"living") though I think I get the pulp of what you're saying. I believe
your stated view runs counter to Pound's view of poetry. If I understand
you correctly, yer sayin' poetry is an emotional affair that is fueled by
raw cognitive conflict: "pathetic (ie love/hate) perception". Whereas for
Pound, fine poetry makes fine distinctions.
Tim Romano
----- Original Message -----
From: bob scheetz <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, 21 Oct 1999 10:36 PM
Subject: Re: Racial or cultural?
> tim romano writes:
> >And we also
> >may differ in our definition of "racist". For me a racist is one who
ranks
> >races as relatively superior or inferior.
>
> there's the pt, chauvinism (of whatever sort), not racism, 's the vice.
>
> this "racism" thread's become
> a veritable masterpiece of idealist speciousness.
>
> race, like ego, gender, family, ethnicity, ...nso on, is an
> identity construct that goes to fitting into ever larger myth-manifolds
> that make worlding and thence, meaning (ie humanist pursuits
> as poetry...nso on), possible. in the republic of dogs it is
> doubtful herr doberman, who has no difficulty with misceginat'n
> the handiest bitch, is aware of his pedigree difference
> ...and for this, is incapable of poetry.
>
> ep's colloquial expositions are astounding for capturing and articulating
> the background meanings of everyday existence.
> ...the unbearable crudeness of being, eh?
> spike lee's "do the rite thing" microcosm (no melting-pot)
> shows a mixtum gatherum of passionately conflicting identities,
> hunkies hate niggers, hate cops, hate koreans, hate
> ricans, women hate men, brother hates brother, sons hate father,
> mother hates baby, young, old, mid-age...nso on,...bellum omnium.
> ie a pretty good image of the nihilist ground of the wasteland.
> ...and it's precisely this pathetic (ie love/hate) perception
> of living identities (namings, substantives, stereotypes..)
> what enables our poetry.
>
> this thread's like the old saw bout see'n obscenity
> in the crotch of every tree...of course, yer right coz race,
> like eros, is everywhere; and so yer crit becomes a exercise
> in emasculation...a smugly superior fastidiousness
> ...and o course, there's none can blame uze?
> fillistinism 's where the money is, eh?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Tim Romano <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Thursday, October 21, 1999 10:06 AM
> Subject: Re: Racial or cultural?
>
>
> >Jonathan,
> >I am trying to understand Pound's CONSCIOUS MOTIVES with respect to
issues
> >of race and culture. His ideology. So I place more weight on passages
where
> >Pound seems to be more careful and reflective than on passages where he
> >seems to be blurting out one of the unthinking fears and prejudices that
> >were no doubt growing like kudzu in his unconsious mind. By contrast, you
> >seem to regard the letters and offhand remarks as the keys with which to
> >unlock that mind in order to see what was really going on BENEATH its
> >self-reflective surface. The whole truth being better than the partial
> >truth, both approaches are necessary.
> >
> >I think we must mean different things by "race" for I don't understand
why
> >you regard Leopold Bloom's reckoning up the tidy sum from the empty
> bottles,
> >to which Lewis refers, as a racial, not a cultural, stereotype. And we
also
> >may differ in our definition of "racist". For me a racist is one who
ranks
> >races as relatively superior or inferior. (I understand a cultural
> >supremacist to be one who ranks cultures as relatively superior or
> >inferior.) In the letter to Williams, I understand Pound to be referring
to
> >the American people as a breeding population whose stock has been
weakened
> >due to a lack of acceptable variety in its strains. (I use the phrase
> >"_acceptable_ variety" to describe what I believe to have been Pound's
> >attitude.) Are eugenists de facto racists in your view? What do you
> >understand "the disease" to be?
> >Tim Romano
> >
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: Jonathan Morse <[log in to unmask]>
> >To: <[log in to unmask]>
> >Sent: Thursday, 21 Oct 1999 1:27 AM
> >Subject: Racial or cultural?
> >
> >
> >> At 07:46 AM 10/19/99 -1000, Tim Romano wrote:
> >>
> >> >I will be on the lookout for "a racist base" as I read further in the
> >radio
> >> >broadcasts, the Zukofsky letters, and then the Agresti. It is
> >interesting
> >> >to compare "the intramural, the almost intravaginal warmth of hebrew
> >> >affections" with Joyce's ULYSSES and then to refer to the critique by
> >> >Wyndham Lewis of that novel's depiction of the Jew, Leopold Bloom. I
> >posted
> >> >an excerpt of the Lewis piece here not long ago. These are
> ><i>cultural</i>
> >> >not <i>racial</i> stereotypes.
> >>
> >> They're racial stereotypes.
> >>
> >> It's easy enough to demonstrate that Pound in his last phase was a
racist
> >> through and through. We could drop the name "Kasper," for instance. Or,
> if
> >> you want some comic relief from a very sad book, page through the
Agresti
> >> letters and watch what happens when Pound belatedly learns that
Alexander
> >> Del Mar was Jewish.
> >>
> >> As to the young Pound:
> >>
> >> In 1920 Pound writes to William Carlos Williams, "I don't care a
> >fried ----
> >> about nationality. Race is probably real. It is real." And from there
he
> >> goes on to say, "There is a blood poison in America [. . .] but you
> >haven't
> >> a drop of the cursed blood in you, and you don't need to fight the
> disease
> >> day and night; you never have had to. Eliot has it perhaps worse than I
> >> have -- poor devil." And why, specifically, isn't the future author of
> _In
> >> the American Grain_ really an American? Because "You [Williams] have
the
> >> advantage of arriving in the milieu with a fresh flood of Europe in
your
> >> veins, Spanish, French, English, Danish." (Paige, _Selected Letters
> >> 1907-1941_, no. 170)
> >>
> >> Of course Williams was born in the USA. But of course, too, Pound
thought
> >> of the word "race" in the ordinary fin-de-siecle way. If you're
> >interested,
> >> you can probably pin down the cognate usages by looking through a book
> >(any
> >> book) by H.G. Wells -- or, for that matter, by looking through Frank
> >> Norris's _The Octopus_, whose hero spends his time receiving
> extra-sensory
> >> communications via his Anglo-Saxon blood. But for a specific Pound
> >example,
> >> all you have to do is open Paige again and look at letter 73.
> >>
> >> The subject of that 1915 letter is the first consequential review in
the
> >> United States of Robert Frost's first book. This appeared in a major
> >> newspaper, _The Boston Evening Transcript_, it was highly favorable,
and
> >it
> >> marked a turning point in Frost's career. Frost recognized that, and he
> >did
> >> his best to butter the reviewer up, addressing him as a fellow poet and
> >> inviting him up to the farm. In Lawrance Thompson's account the
incident
> >is
> >> pretty disgusting, because the reviewer, William Stanley Braithwaite,
was
> >> black, and Frost had all the prejudices of his Copperhead father.
> Compared
> >> to Frost's behavior -- sycophantic to Braithwaite's face, venomous
behind
> >> his back -- Pound's attitude has at least the merit of being
> >> straightforward. Still, how does Pound refer to Braithwaite?
> >>
> >> This way: "your (?negro) reviewer."
> >>
> >> You get the idea.
> >>
> >> As to the middle-period letter to Zukofsky that we've been talking
about:
> >>
> >> Of course this is an informal communication, probably banged out
without
> >> much thought. If Pound had revised it for publication, for instance, he
> >> would probably have caught his elementary failure to distinguish the
> >> propositions "All bankers are Jews" and "All Jews are bankers." Still
(as
> >> to Pound's specific concerns), Louis Zukofsky had no connection with
any
> >> bank, no connection with any rabbinical organization, no connection
with
> >> any university, no money, and no power. He wasn't even a gynecologist.
> And
> >> Pound was perfectly aware of all that -- at least with the part of his
> >mind
> >> that thought. But when he wrote to Zukofsky he covered his brain with
his
> >> James Whitcomb Riley coonskin cap (so much for fighting the American
> >> disease), addressed him in the plural as "yew hebes," and ordered him
to
> >> "cease the intrauterine mode of life." He refused to see Zukofsky as an
> >> individual, and that means he couldn't possibly understand him as a
> member
> >> of a culture -- any culture.
> >>
> >> Well, when Ross Perot addressed the NAACP as "you people" he got put in
> >his
> >> place. Of course Ross Perot isn't a great poet, and Ezra Pound was. But
> >> let's not confuse the greatness of Pound's art with any aspect of his
> >> thought.
> >>
> >> Jonathan Morse
> >>
> >>
>
>
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