>Dearlaura and Jeff:
 
just jeff. laura is my partner -- the person actually attending school here.
 
>Some guides to Pound that I think you will find
>accessible are:
>        Witemeyer -- for the early poems
>        George Kearns - Guide to EP's Selected Cantos
>        Michael Alexander - The Poetic Achievement of EP
>         (with good bibliography)
 
thanks. i'll check these out.
 
>        But the Cantos do take some plugging -- not all good -- though
>Pound said to read quickly. But you can do that only if you know
>everything he knew.
 
i've read them somewhere in the neighborhood of ten times and have yet to
have any trouble. one of the most facinating things about the cantos is that
when i first read them (in high school-- is was 16 or 17) it didn't even
occur to me to look up any of the references. i just enjoyed them on a
purely emotional level. i understood most of the theories being put forth,
but they seemed secondary to the emotions that brought on those ideas. i
still believe this. i really think that it is intellection that gets in the
way of reading them for many people. they think that pounds poetry is -just-
intellectual and forget the things he said about imagism and the one liners
like: only emotion endures.
i think reading them in a state of virtual innocence has helped me
understand them even more in my adult life.
and so on...
jeff.
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        There are no hierarchies, no infinite, no such many as mass,
        there are only
        eyes in all heads
        to be looked out of
 
                             -charles olson, from "letter 6" (of the maximus                                    poems)