greenmountaineer
Literotica Guru
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Ezra Pound
Below is an excerpt from Garrison Keillor's "Writer's Almanac" about Ezra Pound.
To be honest, his poetry doesn't much appeal to me, but I think he did more to shape modern poetry, in the west at least, than anyone else.
"It was on this day in 1958 that the U.S. Government dropped its treason charges against the poet Ezra Pound.
Pound had been arrested in 1945 because of speeches he had been delivering on Italian radio, in which he praised Mussolini and fascism, and criticized American policy. He was extremely anti-Semitic, blaming the world's problem's on the Jews. He practiced each speech before he delivered it, and he used various down-home American voices for each of them — he might be folksy one broadcast, speak in a drawl the next, and in a nasal Boston accent for the third. He kept careful notes of each broadcast and his performance — for one, he wrote: "Excellent delivery last night. Voice absolutely clear and every word 'visible,' except for a few Orful KRRumpzzz! of static or atmospheric or whatever that BLITZED out a few phrases." He continued with his speeches even after the United States joined World War II in December of 1941, so it was at that point that his work became not just offensive but treasonous.
After his arrest, Pound was extradited to the United States and committed to a federal asylum, St. Elizabeth's Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Over his 13 year confinement Pound was visited by an odd combination of white supremacists who admired his politics, and distinguished American writers who admired his poetry or his history of generosity to other artists, among them Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, Thornton Wilder, Randall Jarrell, Katherine Anne Porter, and T.S. Eliot.
Ernest Hemingway wrote to his friend Archibald MacLeish, who was campaigning for Pound's release: "Thanks for sending the stats of Ezra's rantings. He is obviously crazy. I think you might prove he was crazy as far back as the latter Cantos. He deserves punishment and disgrace but what he really deserves most is ridicule. He should not be hanged and he should not be made a martyr of. He has a long history of generosity and unselfish aid to other artists and he is one of the greatest living poets. It is impossible to believe that anyone in his right mind could utter the vile, absolutely idiotic drivel he has broadcast. His friends who knew him and who watched the warping and twisting and decay of his mind and his judgement should defend him and explain him on that basis. It will be a completely unpopular but an absolutely necessary thing to do."
Writers and the media pressured the government to release Pound, and on April 14th, 1958, a motion was filed for dismissal of Pound's indictment. Among the statements was one by Robert Frost, who wrote: "None of us can bear the disgrace of our letting Ezra Pound come to his end where he is. It would leave too woeful a story in American literature." On this day in 1958, the government agreed to dismiss the indictment against Pound, and the 72-year-old poet was released. He returned to Italy, where he spent the rest of his life."
I don't think he was as crazy as apparently Hemingway thought he was. While he was at Saint Elizabeth's Hospital, Pound was interviewed by a Jewish American poet (I believe it was Howard Nemerov) during which Pound chastised himself for his "suburban anti-Semitism." At least he was remorseful. I think he was much more ego-maniacal than psychotic.
Here's a poem I wrote once about him if anyone's interested:
A Pound of Flesh
3 June 1945
Pisa, Italy
Sunburnt in my traitor cage
the occupying army made,
I cursed the family radio
World War II had listened to.
But in pellucid moments
I liked that pissant cage
where I wrote my Cantos.
And even in the outdoor loo
my guard of honor noticed
holding his proboscis
how I scribbled on the can
squatting in the Pisan sun,
making jurisprudence, noses,
and perhaps the hangman wait.
Below is an excerpt from Garrison Keillor's "Writer's Almanac" about Ezra Pound.
To be honest, his poetry doesn't much appeal to me, but I think he did more to shape modern poetry, in the west at least, than anyone else.
"It was on this day in 1958 that the U.S. Government dropped its treason charges against the poet Ezra Pound.
Pound had been arrested in 1945 because of speeches he had been delivering on Italian radio, in which he praised Mussolini and fascism, and criticized American policy. He was extremely anti-Semitic, blaming the world's problem's on the Jews. He practiced each speech before he delivered it, and he used various down-home American voices for each of them — he might be folksy one broadcast, speak in a drawl the next, and in a nasal Boston accent for the third. He kept careful notes of each broadcast and his performance — for one, he wrote: "Excellent delivery last night. Voice absolutely clear and every word 'visible,' except for a few Orful KRRumpzzz! of static or atmospheric or whatever that BLITZED out a few phrases." He continued with his speeches even after the United States joined World War II in December of 1941, so it was at that point that his work became not just offensive but treasonous.
After his arrest, Pound was extradited to the United States and committed to a federal asylum, St. Elizabeth's Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Over his 13 year confinement Pound was visited by an odd combination of white supremacists who admired his politics, and distinguished American writers who admired his poetry or his history of generosity to other artists, among them Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, Thornton Wilder, Randall Jarrell, Katherine Anne Porter, and T.S. Eliot.
Ernest Hemingway wrote to his friend Archibald MacLeish, who was campaigning for Pound's release: "Thanks for sending the stats of Ezra's rantings. He is obviously crazy. I think you might prove he was crazy as far back as the latter Cantos. He deserves punishment and disgrace but what he really deserves most is ridicule. He should not be hanged and he should not be made a martyr of. He has a long history of generosity and unselfish aid to other artists and he is one of the greatest living poets. It is impossible to believe that anyone in his right mind could utter the vile, absolutely idiotic drivel he has broadcast. His friends who knew him and who watched the warping and twisting and decay of his mind and his judgement should defend him and explain him on that basis. It will be a completely unpopular but an absolutely necessary thing to do."
Writers and the media pressured the government to release Pound, and on April 14th, 1958, a motion was filed for dismissal of Pound's indictment. Among the statements was one by Robert Frost, who wrote: "None of us can bear the disgrace of our letting Ezra Pound come to his end where he is. It would leave too woeful a story in American literature." On this day in 1958, the government agreed to dismiss the indictment against Pound, and the 72-year-old poet was released. He returned to Italy, where he spent the rest of his life."
I don't think he was as crazy as apparently Hemingway thought he was. While he was at Saint Elizabeth's Hospital, Pound was interviewed by a Jewish American poet (I believe it was Howard Nemerov) during which Pound chastised himself for his "suburban anti-Semitism." At least he was remorseful. I think he was much more ego-maniacal than psychotic.
Here's a poem I wrote once about him if anyone's interested:
A Pound of Flesh
3 June 1945
Pisa, Italy
Sunburnt in my traitor cage
the occupying army made,
I cursed the family radio
World War II had listened to.
But in pellucid moments
I liked that pissant cage
where I wrote my Cantos.
And even in the outdoor loo
my guard of honor noticed
holding his proboscis
how I scribbled on the can
squatting in the Pisan sun,
making jurisprudence, noses,
and perhaps the hangman wait.