The Pisan Cantos

The Cantos #74-84

by Ezra Pound, Richard Sieburth (Editor)

At last, a definitive, paperback edition of Ezra Pound's finest work. Ezra Pound's The Pisan Cantos was written in 1945, while the poet was being held in an American military detention center near Pisa, Italy, as a result of his pro-Fascist wartime broadcasts to America on Radio Rome. Imprisoned for some weeks in a wire cage open to the elements, Pound suffered a nervous collapse from the physical and emotional strain. Out of the agony of his own inferno came the eleven cantos that became the sixth book of his modernist epic, The Cantos , themselves conceived as a Divine Comedy for our time. The Pisan Cantos were published in 1948 by New Directions and in the following year were awarded the Bollingen Prize for poetry by the Library of Congress. The honor came amid violent controversy, for the dark cloud of treason still hung over Pound, incarcerated in St. Elizabeths Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Yet there is no doubt that The Pisan Cantos displays some of his finest and most affecting writing, marking an elegaic turn to the personal while synthesizing the philosophical and economic political themes of his previous cantos. They are now being published for the first time as a separate paperback, in a fully annotated edition prepared by Richard Sieburth, who also contributes a thoroughgoing introduction, making Pound's master-work fully accessible to students and general readers.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, The United States Of America, American, Fiction, Literature

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1949

About the author

Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet, critic and intellectual who was a major figure of the Modernist movement in early-to-mid 20th century poetry.

Pound's The Cantos contains music and bears a title that could be translated as The Songs—although it never is. Pound's ear was tuned to the motz et sons of troubadour poetry where, as musicologist John Stevens has noted, "melody and poem existed in a state of the closest symbiosis, obeying the same laws and striving in their different media for the same sound-ideal - armonia."

In his essays, Pound wrote of rhythm as "the hardest quality of a man's style to counterfeit." He challenged young poets to train their ear with translation work to learn how the choice of words and the movement of the words combined. But having translated texts from 10 different languages into English, Pound found that translation did not always serve the poetry: "The grand bogies for young men who want really to learn strophe writing are Catullus and François Villon. I personally have been reduced to setting them to music as I cannot translate them." While he habitually wrote out verse rhythms as musical lines, Pound did not set his own poetry to music.

Reviews

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Has a more exasperating book of poetry ever been written? Unlike the Pound in his earlier Cantos, Ez gets his head out of his political ass--most probably because "Ben and la Clara" have been hung. Ezra's political calculation have proven to be as astute as his nostalgic craving for state financing, so we all may be rid of usury--hey, the Athenian state financed the building of the fleet!
Pound brilliance and years of study do not and will never adhere. The tragedy is not in the "peasant's bent shoulders" but in Pound's own. If the naval battle of Salamis seems a far-fetched connection to usury and Mussolini, perhaps less than relevant, well, it’s no surprise.
But the beauty of this book is in watching the grand battle between Pound's political and philosophical obsessions, the shades of the dead moving among his many memories, and finally, most importantly, the wondrous way the moment intrudes in his writing: "Where I lie let the thyme rise / and basilicum / let the herbs rise in April abundant" 82. 106-08.
Thank the gods for his enlightened moments when he brings us back to earth, and most importantly, compassion. The first several books of the Pisan Cantos are of less interest to me because Pound still hasn't gotten out of his head. Then in Canto 80, we get the first inklings when, the tubercular shade of Aubrey Beardsley tells Yeats that beauty is difficult.
The Canto builds to his brilliant mea culpa: "What though lovest well remains / the rest is dross" 81. 134-35. And so in turn, in the next section of the poem vanity is pulled down: "Here error is in the not done, all in the diffidence that faltered . . ." 81. 173-74.
I have to get to work, but the last two Cantos, 83 & 84 have some spectacular moments. Pound is idiosyncratic, annoying and obtuse. Sometimes he is insane. Other times he's a madman raving at the injustices of the world, which is not the same. If you want to read something modern that carries on Pound's tradition in a beautiful yet sensible way, read Pictures from Brueghel by the wonderful William Carlos William. But if you are dedicated to the chase, you ignore Pound at your peril.

[木漏れ日]

Reading Ezra pound is like listening to Olivier Messiaen: I haven’t the faintest idea what’s going on, but I love it.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps the most insightful view of the malaise which overtook the world in the first half of the 20th century. Pound's attempt to liken Europe after WWI and during WWII as a hell like Dante's Inferno creates an intensity and a viewpoint which has not been matched in the last 60 years.

[Mat · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only reason I decided to dock a star from this book is because of how bloody difficult it was.

Pound continues to both fascinate and frustrate me. However, when he is good, he is really on the money. The Pisan Cantos is probably the most well-known and celebrated and controversial section of Pound's masterpiece epic, The Cantos, but many scholars would also argue that it's one of his best. My personal favorites were Canto 79 (the lynx Canto), Canto 81 (the most famous one with the well-known "pull down thy vanity" section) and Canto 83.

Arrested at the end of WWII by Italian partisans (partigiani), Pound was suddenly forcibly removed from his house and put into captivity at the US Military's Detention Training Center (DTC) in Pisa, where he wrote these famous cantos. Pound was put in a 'death cell' or what he also calls a 'gorilla cage' completely open and exposed to the elements, and a bright light shining on his cell at night. Eventually Pound had a nervous breakdown when like Odysseus his raft broke and the waters went over him.

Pound was arrested for his radio broadcasts conducted while Mussolini was still in power. He was openly fascist in his political views but what probably got him in really hot water was his criticism of the American financial system and his scathing attacks on people like FDR.

When The Pisan Cantos, finally published in the late 1940s went on to win the very first ever Bollinger Prize, it caused a great amount of protest, outcry and downright indignation.
How could a fascist or traitor be awarded such a prize for literature? many people said.

Well do you judge a poet on his controversial political beliefs or just on the quality of his poetry? Some say the two can never be separated, that they are invariably intertwined.
I disagree. I am not a fascist, in fact I probably lie at the opposite end of Pound's political spectrum. Nonetheless, I did enjoy this book for the most part. It was not easy, I struggled, as most people do when they read Pound, with his incredibly dense esoteric references to Confucius, Homer, Plato, Dante, Cavalcanti, Yeats and the list goes on and to make it even more difficult quotes famous writers, poets and philosophers in their original language, which means sometimes ancient Greek, Latin, Provencal, Chinese, French, medieval French, German and so on.

However, this edition by Richard Sieburth contains excellent endnotes, which admittedly are not exhaustive (i.e. they do not explain everything in the book) but they enable the patient reader to navigate the wild rapids of Pound's modernist poetry, which includes references, quotes, a large number of proper nouns (mostly people Pound knew or read), and other explanations of the text.

While I admire Pound's poetry and writing and high level of esoteric knowledge, it annoys me how he makes the text deliberately difficult for the average reader, which is probably why he is often considered as pretentious. And this assessment is not exactly wrong I would say. However, as one Yale professor said, the reason he doesn't offer us any references or notes himself is probably because he wants us to sit in the library and experience the same joy that he did uncovering various pieces of information, decoding ancient texts and coming to our own explications.

This book is not for the faint of heart. It demands patience and commitment. But if you decide to read it, you will come out the other side a changed person, as is the case with any great art and it becomes addictive. You will then want to pick it up again.....some day.....once you have recovered from the initial reading experience.

Ezra Pound - there is nobody quite like him in all of literature. Headstrong, hardworking, extremely prolific, extremely foolish (to borrow a word WCW was wont to use to describe him) in his political views but also someone you MUST one day confront if you are serious about discussing modern or modernist literature.

[AC · Rating 5 out of 5]

The 5-stars is for the meticulous and informed edition (including detailed notes and commentary). As to the content, I find poetry difficult and often tedious, and this text was particularly difficult. I can't say I understood much of it. Obviously, it requires far more time and effort than I have at present.

[Holly Raymond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Would like to give two extra stars, if possible, for reading Sam Schild's used copy, which is filled with good notes and has many of the ideograms filled out to resemble funny faces in hats.

[Julia Florence]

what the hell was this

[Tristan]

I am not going to rate this book because I feel unqualified to give it a rating, not because it is a classic, but because I feel that my opinion of it as an experience and as a poem are not closely tied and the second largely unformed.

As a reading experience, The Pisan Cantos were, on the whole, extremely difficult and rather unpleasant. I found the Notes section of this edition to be necessary and frustrating. The poem has a note every few lines or so for the entire span of 10 cantos, necessary if I am supposed to understand the large quantities of Greek, Latin, Chinese, Italian, and Spanish (off the top of my head) (although I do speak Spanish, so that wasn't a problem for me personally) scattered throughout the poem. These notes were not flagged in the poem--so I missed them for the first 600 lines or so and had to be looking back and forth constantly to make sure I didn't miss one, instead of receiving an indication in the poem that here would be a good place to go to the notes, which would have interrupted my reading experience much less. Furthermore, I have discovered that endnotes are a remarkably unfriendly formatting decision when the notes are this numerous and important. They could have been footnotes, or in the margins, or in a separate companion volume and been infinitely easier to use than flipping back and forth between the poem and the notes constantly. With regards to reading the poem itself, The Pisan Cantos had some bits that I really liked, but I mostly found it unpleasantly disorienting (unlike the pleasant disorientation of Trilogy: The Walls Do Not Fall / Tribute to the Angels / The Flowering of the Rod or The Waste Land) and found the fascist undertones (or maybe overtones) to be disconcerting as well.
The reason I am withholding judgement on the poem, as a read, is that I think that reading it with someone, either in a class or a book club or just a reading partner, so that I could talk about various elements of the poem as we went and possibly benefit from other people having a separate perspective on the piece would improve my reading experience more than average. If I could have talked about why Canto 75 contains a piece of sheet music, or discussed how Pound's autobiographical turn might shape the references to myth and to literature (even possibly just having someone in the room familiar with some of the cited work that I don't know) would have allowed me to get much more out of Pound's sideways and pointed poem.

[C]

I wanted to simultaneously rate this book 1 star and 5 stars. Though the poem is, at its heart, a narrative about deep personal crisis, it requires too much from its reader. On both the biographical and allusionistic (not a word. whatever.) planes, the poem is incredibly oblique. If you're willing to give up the time (or, in my case, are forced to for class credit), I think the poem can be incredibly rewarding. Struggling with Pound's audience, his anti-semitism, his language of crisis, etc. was enlightening. But, in the end, Pound's goals for poetry are quite different than my own. I can appreciate this poem, but I will never like it.

[HM · Rating 4 out of 5]

'yet say this to the Possum: a bang, not a whimper,
with a bang not with a whimper,
To build the city of Dioce whose terraces are the colour of stars.'

--------------------------------------------
I have tried to write Paradise

Do not move
Let the wind speak
that is paradise.

Let the Gods forgive what I
have made
Let those I love try to forgive
what I have made.
::
کوشیدم فردوس را رقم زنم

همان جا بایست
بگذار باد سخن گوید
که فردوس است.

بگذار خدایان ببخشایند کردارم را
بگذار معشوقگانم کوشند که بخشند کردارم را
------------------------------------------------

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Since I've been reading T.S. Eliot lately, Pound has been on my mind also. I read The Pisan Cantos (I think) a year ago, and three stars is still about right. Pound, unlike Eliot, uses his learning and personal experience in such a way that, if you don't know what he knows or know what's happened to him, you're pretty much lost. Being lost, of course, can be beautiful; it can also be a pain in the butt if you want to get somewhere. Pound, as the rating suggests, is both beautiful and a pain in the butt.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Montage, Collage, ein halbes Dutzend Kultursprachen, freies Versmaß und ein verstörendes Sammelsurium an Allusionen und Intertextualität. Schwierig zu folgen, keine leichte Kost, aber ergreifend.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

ATTN: Lieutenant Colonel John L. Steele
7103rd Disciplinary Training Company
United States Army, Metato, Italy
June 15, 1945

Re: Ezra Weston Loomis Pound

After a thorough examination of Ezra Weston Loomis Pound’s mental state, it is my professional opinion that while the patient displays “no paranoia, delusions nor hallucinations” and there is “no evidence of psychosis, neurosis or psychopathy,” his “prolonged exposure in present environment may precipitate a mental breakdown, of which premonitory symptoms are discernible” (XIV). It is my recommendation that the prisoner be moved immediately to more suitable quarters and a “transfer to the United States or to an institution in this theatre with more adequate facilities for care” (XIV) be considered. I am basing my conclusion of the patient’s current mental state on several complicated factors that I ask you to consider.

First, the patient is highly intelligent and imaginative. The patient has granted me access to his journal which, though at first I found to be nearly incomprehensible, has provided valuable insight into his mind after a close and careful reading. For example, the patient is fluent in numerous languages, including ancient Greek, has a strong grasp of Chinese ideograms, and is able to maintain coherence of thought while abruptly switching from one language to the next. In one section of his Cantos, as he calls this journal, he writes of “a sort of dwarf morning-glory / that knots in the grass,” which he follows with the medical term for psychological injury, “sequelae” (37-38). The patient believes he has suffered great psychological trauma and is thus using this passage to express his pain through the image of a small, beautiful flower, which may represent himself, being tangled in a field of grass, which may be significant as he has been detained in cramped, exposed conditions. He goes on to write, in French, “Le paradis n'est pas artificiel” (paradise is not artificial) (38) which in my opinion is his way of expressing that he still has a hope for the future and that his happiness is attainable. He also seems to recognize that he is suffering tremendous psychological stress when he writes “States of mind are inexplicable to us” (38) but then follows, in ancient Greek, with “dakruon” (tears, or weeping) repeated three times as if he is painfully aware how his present psychological state is affecting him emotionally.

Second, the patient is a highly empathetic individual as evidenced in these Cantos with astute observations of idiomatic speech, such as his mimicry of the black prisoners, one of which he transcribes as saying “Hey Snag, what’s in the bibl’ ? / what are the books of the bibl’ ? / Name ‘em! Don’t bullshit me!” (51), but also of his more obscure observations of birds sitting on electrical wires which he interprets and transcribes as musical notation, “with 8 birds on a wire / or rather on 3 wires” (63). Far from turning inward and morose, the patient is keenly aware of every sensation and stimulation around him, but like a SCR-300 used by our Signal Corps which is somehow tuned to every open channel, the patient’s mind seems to be like a new Signal Corps Private who is frantically trying to transpose everything coming in over that SCR-300 receiver faithfully but due to the sheer volume of information is experiencing enormous stress in trying to keep up. If I may be as bold as to sound poetic, it is as if the patient were tuned into the radio broadcast of all human civilization across all time and space and wants to make sense of it all not only for himself, but for everyone alive.

Lastly, the patient retains a firm sense of self in that he expresses very strong opinions about Jews, the economy, and has even requested a meeting with President Truman concerning the state of the Japanese campaign. While this may sound alarming and does seem to reek of arrogance and the grandiose, his opinions remain consistent, strangely coherent, and while often reprehensible and perhaps even treasonous, do not seem to, so far, present an imminent threat to himself or others. Therefore, it is my professional opinion that Ezra Weston Loomis Pound is not insane, he is just an incredibly talented poet. These two conditions are easily confused.

[Paolo Musano · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ho letto recensioni molto severe di questo libro di Ezra Pound. È comprensibile. Non è un poeta semplice. I riferimenti alla storia, all'arte e all'economia sono sterminati. Bisogna avere solide basi per coglierli. Ma non mancano momenti di rara bellezza lirica, aperti a tutti, che spesso si manifestano all'improvviso, come un satori giapponese (un'illuminazione improvvisa). Indimenticabile è la seconda parte del Canto LXXXI:

Quello che veramente ami rimane, / il resto è scorie / Quello che veramente ami non ti sarà strappato / Quello che veramente ami è la tua vera eredità.

Quello di Pound era uno spirito tormentato e i Cantos possono essere visti anche come il tentativo di ricomposizione di un'anima, lacerata, ferita e ridotta in frammenti che si sono sparsi ovunque. Ognuno di questi frammenti, ogni verso, rimanda al tutto, all'opera complessiva, e viceversa. È come se i versi di Pound fossero dei frattali.

Quello che dovrebbero sapere tutto coloro si accingono a leggere questi versi è che furono scritti in circostanze tragiche. Nel 1945 Pound, mentre traduceva Confucio nella sua casa a Rapallo, fu arrestato dagli americani. Venne accusato di alto tradimento (per una presunta propaganda antiamericana durante un programma in una radio fascista) e recluso nel campo di concentramento di Coltano, una frazione di Pisa. Venne messo in una gabbia all'aperto, chiamata "cella della morte", che misurava un metro e ottanta per due metri. Il fondo era in calcestruzzo e le sbarre di acciaio con una rete spinata. Pound, allora sessantenne, era scalzo e aveva a disposizione solo due coperte per proteggersi dal freddo. I suoi carcerieri gli permisero di portare con sé un libro di Confucio e un dizionario cinese.

Fu in quelle condizioni disumane, appeso in una gabbia all'aperto, con qualche coperta per proteggersi dal sole e dalle intemperie che Pound scrisse i "Canti pisani". Dopo tre settimane, tuttavia, ebbe un crollo nervoso e venne trasferito in infermeria e poi reimpatriato in America. Lì, per evitare la pena di morte, passò tredici anni in un manicomio a Washington. Dopo gli appelli degli intellettuali di tutto il mondo, venne rilasciato. Quindi decise di tornare in Italia, che amava molto.

Il poeta trascorse i suoi ultimi anni a Venezia e fu proprio lì che venne intervistato nel 1967 da Pier Paolo Pasolini, suo grande ammiratore. Pound rispose alle domande in italiano e commentò assieme a Pasolini alcuni versi dei "Canti pisani".

[Archfiend Prototype · Rating 4 out of 5]

The nexus between memory and the prison environment is profound especially in this set of Pound’s Cantos. Pound exhibits the notable connection between his mental state and the human fear of forgetting. Having lost all hope, Mussolini’s Pound is a struggling soul who is full of sorrow and pain, in a hell that is dovetailed in the opening of the canto itself. Of course, in his own experience and subjection, he is justified in his sorrows. The death of Mussolini is also the death of Pound’s literary freedoms, and perhaps even his life. When he deteriorates in the “nekuia” that is his prison cell, he struggles to remember and invoke the thoughts and inspirations he has. Pound writes to preserve the experiences and recollections of his mind.

Pound, too, expresses a reproval of his previous actions, highlighting the impact the writer’s incarceration had on the journey of ideas within his cantos. The Pisan hero suffers not from what is wrought by the gods, but from his own actions. Where he once remained unaffected by Circe’s magic in the earlier cantos, he now lays in her swine-sty.

The languages of the world also become imbued in his work. Chinese ideograms, for instance, contour the otherwise concrete English poetic form to transform the medium of poetry on a global scale. Pound employs the cí dá concept of Confucius, “辭 達”, meaning to make the expression of words clear and understandable.

“ in part on what is pressed under it
the mould must hold what is poured into it
in
discourse
what matters is
to get it across e poi basta”

Through this polyglot approach, Pound’s engagement with the past and commitment to applying it into his modern epic reveal their extraordinary nature as living remnants of language from centuries ago. In this context, they become a window into the representation of communication, and by applying them into what he views as a modern poem containing history, he transcends the temporal boundaries of poetry.

Memory emerges to profoundly display the fear of forgetting as well as the barren milieu of prison. Pound explores the deterioration of his mental health through his works, making poignant the struggle to remember his motivations and inspirations.

[Laura Giangamboni]

The Pisan Cantos di Ezra Pound è stato scritto nel 1945, mentre il poeta era detenuto in un centro di detenzione militare americano vicino a Pisa, in Italia, a seguito delle sue trasmissioni filo-fasciste in tempo di guerra in America su Radio Roma. Imprigionato per alcune settimane in una gabbia metallica aperta alle intemperie, Pound subì un collasso nervoso per la tensione fisica ed emotiva. Dall'agonia del suo stesso inferno uscirono gli undici canti che divennero il sesto libro della sua epopea modernista, I Cantos , essi stessi concepiti come una Divina Commedia per il nostro tempo.

I Pisan Cantos furono pubblicati nel 1948 da New Directions e l'anno successivo ricevettero il Bollingen Prize per la poesia dalla Library of Congress. L'onore è arrivato in mezzo a violente polemiche, poiché la nuvola oscura del tradimento aleggiava ancora su Pound, incarcerato nell'ospedale per pazzi criminali di St. Elizabeth. Eppure non c'è dubbio che The Pisan Cantos mostra alcuni dei suoi scritti più belli e toccanti, segnando una svolta elegaica verso il personale mentre sintetizza i temi politici filosofici ed economici dei suoi canti precedenti. Ora vengono pubblicati per la prima volta come tascabile separato, in un'edizione completamente annotata preparata da Richard Sieburth, che contribuisce anche con un'introduzione approfondita, rendendo il capolavoro di Pound completamente accessibile agli studenti e ai lettori in generale.

[Orgadena · Rating 3 out of 5]

Branches

Minds, Branches, Ants.
Golden.
Dawn, Air.
In, the Bower.
“Grass-blades, Grass-blades.”

Of Mozart – Peā – Ant’s, forefoot.

Its flower.

Mountain – Cloud – Tellus (of Gods).

Half-parasite.

The Doors, Years – 23, Lights – Four.

By thee.
~

[Thomas]

I’m not even going to attempt to rate this one...

[Robert Borter · Rating 5 out of 5]

See my comments on the Cantos in general. When faced by his madness and that of the world he resorts to some beautiful poetry.

[Annika]

Pfft I don't even know what to rate this, even after class discussion. Just one of those things where you know that it is really good in what it is, but can't really grasp anything that's going on. So many layers in this poem, and then to think that it's only a small part of the larger cantos work. I can only imagine the work and passion pound has put in this to complete it.

[GONZA · Rating 3 out of 5]

Canti Pisani

Quello che veramente ami rimane,
il resto è scorie
Quello che veramente ami non ti sarà strappato
Quello che veramente ami è la tua vera eredità
Il mondo a chi appartiene, a me, a loro
o a nessuno?
Prima venne il visibile, quindi il palpabile
Elisio, sebbene fosse nelle dimore d'inferno,
Quello che veramente ami e' la tua vera eredita'
La formica e' un centauro nel suo mondo di draghi.
Strappa da te la vanità, non fu l'uomo
A creare il coraggio, o l'ordine, o la grazia,
Strappa da te la vanità, ti dico strappala
Impara dal mondo verde quale sia il tuo luogo
Nella misura dell'invenzione, o nella vera abilità dell'artefice,
Strappa da te la vanità,
Paquin strappala!
Il casco verde ha vinto la tua eleganza.
"Dominati, e gli altri ti sopporteranno"
Strappa da te la vanità
Sei un cane bastonato sotto la grandine,
Una pica rigonfia in uno spasimo di sole,
Metà nero metà bianco
Né distingui un'ala da una coda
Strappa da te la vanità
Come son meschini i tuoi rancori
Nutriti di falsità.
Strappa da te la vanità,
Avido di distruggere, avaro di carità,
Strappa da te la vanità,
Ti dico strappala.
Ma avere fatto in luogo di non avere fatto
questa non è vanità Avere, con discrezione, bussato
Perché un Blunt aprisse
Aver raccolto dal vento una tradizione viva
o da un bell'occhio antico la fiamma inviolata
Questa non è vanità.
Qui l'errore è in ciò che non si è fatto, nella diffidenza che fece esitare.

[Michelle Llewellyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was one of those school assignment books-only read it cause I had to and couldn't even make it past the first few pages. The class was English Literary History Emergence of Modernism. If my professor hadn't explained the back story of Ezra Pound-his imprisonment in the camp which lead to his going insane, his close relationships with other modernist writers (TS Eliot, Gertrude Stein) and his love of communism and buddism-I wouldn't have understood a single word of The Pisan Cantos. Oh wait, I still don't.

[Kit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a review, but just a note that the intro essay is indispensable, end notes are illuminating, and the cover photo is of the exposed outdoor cell where Pound was...impounded for a few weeks, during which tome he began these poems. Also, he writes about one of his fellow prisoners being hanged at one point, and it's the father of Emmett Till....

[Conrad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Composed while held in a cage by American GI’s for his support of Mussolini, this compilation represents some of the most incredible and incomprehensible Imagist poetry ever. Slipping effortlessly between English, Chinese, Greek, German, French, Spanish, and often Italian, Pound paints a surrealist, allusion-infested psychedelic view of the world. Hey Snag, wot are the books ov the bibl’?

[Andrew Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stupefyingly infuriating, but brilliant, demented poetry that's so obscurely allusive it may as well be written in another language - oh! and most of it is. Cheers, Ezra - we'll all pop off and learn Chinese shall we?

[Jeanne]

I knew I'd never really liked Pound, but when i searched my thousands of books to find The Cantos, I found only a paltry dog-eared Selected Cantos, 119 pages. $1.95 when I bought it.

think I'll spring for this new edition and start off with what's in the Selected.

[Tom Walsh · Rating 2 out of 5]

special because he wrote them in outdoor prison container in Italy. They won the one (and only) Bollinger Prize. The notes, as an appendix, are very valuable. Tom

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful poetry of exile that teaches you how to read it as you go along.

[Michael Ledezma · Rating 3 out of 5]

It helps to know French, Italian, and Chinese characters. Just go with it, for it will take you places. Sardonic and dryly pessimistic at times, with crescendos and overflowing lyricism at others.

[Melanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

EW.
Miserable.
I respect Pound's art, but he is one of the only modernists whose work I find impossible to connect with in some way, shape, or form.