Only serious Poundians will want to delve into this selection from
the poet's correspondence with his protege and publisher, James
Laughlin. As dense and difficult as Pound's poetry, his letters
indulge his penchant for odd punctuation, excessive wordplay,
intentional misspellings, and typographical high jinks. From almost
three thousand items of correspondence between Pound and Laughlin,
Gordon pieces together bits of nearly four hundred letters to form
a somewhat cohesive narrative. But the going is tough, relieved
only by the editor's prose and annotations. But even here, Gordon
is given to Poundian eccentricity, leaving some things hopelessly
obscure and elaborating on the ridiculously obvious. Laughlin's
relations with Pound (1885-1972) begin in 1933, when the young
Harvard student (1914-) seeks out his idol, and eventually studies
with him informally in Italy at "Ezruversity. "Pound smartly steers
the aspiring poet toward publishing - and thus was born New
Directions, home to Pound as well as Pound's friends, whom Laughlin
promoted with enthusiasm and generosity. Laughlin stuck with his
mentor through the difficult war years, when Pound's cranky
politics and anti-Semitism made him persona non grata in American
literary circles. Laughlin never gives in to Pound's dumb social
ideas, but he does mimic his goofy epistolary style. Among Pound's
better puns and epithets are "Bitch and Bugle" for Hound and Horn,
"hippopoetess" for Amy Lowell, and "Nude Erections" for New
Directions. But repeated over and over, these tend to wear thin,
much like Pound's nonliterary opinions. The latest in a series of
volumes of letters between Laughlin and his authors - others
include Kenneth Rexroth, Delmore Schwartz, and William Carlos
Williams - this is surely the most dizzying. (Kirkus Reviews)
Even before establishing New Directions, James Laughlin had
encountered and studied with one of the greatest poets of this
century: Ezra Pound. These selected letters capture the spirit of
their growing relationship from pupil-teacher to publisher-author.
In his idiosyncratic prose, Pound's correspondence summons up both
the man as he was actually known and the literary figure.
Literature, music, friends, and politics fill his pages. And even
when Laughlin's and Pound's politics totally diverged during World
War II, Pound's respect for Laughlin remained intact. Also of great
interest are the years spent by Pound at St. Elizabeths and his
observations while there. These letters give insight into the state
of Pound's mind and the supposition of his insanity. Ezra Pound and
James Laughlin: Selected Letters is a modernist source book -
essential reading for anyone interested in tracing the real
development of twentieth-century literature.
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