A colleague has asked me to talk about Ezra Pound in a seminar on Henry
James's influence on modern poets. I thought we might talk about Canto VII
since James appears in the Canto.
 
My question concerns the lines near the end of the canto:
"And the tall indifference moves, / a more living shell, / Drift in the air
of fate, dry phantom, but intact."
 
The Norton Anthology of Modern Lit. (2nd. ed.) identifies the "tall
indifference" as James. However, Terrell's Companion does not make this
identification.
 
Is the Norton right? If so, don't the lines seem a rather harsh
characterization, or do they in fact match the way Pound describes James
earlier in the Canto, "old voice . . . weaving an endless sentence"?
 
If anyone can suggest something I can read on this matter of Pound and
James, please advise.
 
Timothy Materer, 107 Tate Hall,  English Department
University of Missouri, Columbia MO  65211
Fax: 573 882-5785
http://www.missouri.edu/~engtim