Ditto... I've heard this from professors more times than I'd like to remember... Billy Marshall Stoneking ----- Original Message ----- From: Lucas Klein <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Monday, August 30, 1999 5:34 PM Subject: Re: Pound Outside the Academy > At 04:35 PM 8/30/99 -0400, you wrote: > > >I dare say that this attitude is not restricted to journalists. I've heard > >much the same from English professors at major universities (or the > >variant, "who's that poet that helped Eliot with The Waste Land and later > >went insane?") > > > >The fact that Pound's carries the double curse of being "difficult" and > >being politically incorrect offers a handy excuse to anyone who doesn't > >want to read him. > > this is quite true. Most people are quick to dismiss Pound. And then > there are the poets. Last week at the Bread Loaf Writer's Conference, Alan > Shapiro said there was no more important poetic movement in the twentieth > century than Imagism, and quoted a poem of his to indicate near-perfect use > of I don't remember what, sadly. And another poet there who'll be teaching > a class on Poetics at Texas this fall told me about how he'll use Pound as > a way to introduce Chinese poetry and poetics to the class. And yesterday > I read an article in some journal or other that applauded the seriousness > of Pound's love of all poetic traditions as a model for contemporary poets, > mentioning that without him etc etc etc. I suppose Pound achieved > something of what he wanted. The artists recognize him as one of the > antennae of our race. To hell, then, with the bullet-headed many. > Journalists and a lot of professors may have a hard time with his work, but > he comes as close as I can imagine to being a poet's poet; no one who's > ever written lines down seriously would dare consider much of his work > a-tonal. > > Lucas >