Notes on Ezra Pound (3): Epic and/or Propaganda

1—Poetry and/or Propaganda

David Barnes, “Fascist Aesthetics: Ezra Pound’s Cultural Negotiations in 1930s Italy,” Journal of Modern Literature, 34.1 (autumn 2010), pp. 20–1:

For the purposes of this article, it suffices to say that there is some critical debate as to whether or not the two “Italian Cantos,” 72 and 73, represent an attempt at Fascist propagandizing by Pound. Patricia Cockram takes this view, seeing the Italian Cantos as esthetic [sic] failures on Pound’s part, driven by political and economic desperation (535). Bacigalupo, however, views these Cantos as both a return “to the ‘visionary’ structure attempted…in the ‘Three Cantos’ of 1917, and an anticipation of the autobiographical Pisan Cantos” (“The Poet at War” 71). Bacigalupo argues that the poems should not be seen as aberrations, but as crucial staging posts in the development of Pound’s writing.

Barnes’ references: Massimo Bacigalupo, “Ezra Pound’s Cantos 72 and 73: An Annotated Translation,” Paideuma, 20 (1991), pp. 10–41; Patricia Cockram, “Collapse and Recall: Ezra Pound’s Italian Cantos,” Journal of Modern Literature, 23.3–4 (summer 2000), pp. 535–44.

Notes on Ezra Pound (2): “eternal war” and “Sagetrieb”

(My intention in the following is mainly to collect citations, drawing together a few threads through Pound’s Cantos on “the eternal war between light and mud.”)

 

1—Fango

In Canto 72, an “I” (Pound?), says to Marinetti’s unquiet spirit (who is eager to return to life and to war—“seule hygiène du monde”): “Lascia a me la parola. | Lascia a me ch’io mi spieghi, | ch’io faccia il canto della guerra eterna | Fra luce e fango” (which E.P. translates as “leave the talking to me. | And let me explain, | sing of the eternal war | between light and mud”).

The briefest of allusions at the incipit of Canto 87 suggests who the combatants in this eternal war are: “…between the usurer and any man who | wants to do a good job | (perenne).”

That this is indeed an allusion to the “guerra eterna” is confirmed in the following Canto 88, of which a passage begins, “Bellum perenne,” which goes on to cite a few significant dates (1694, 1750, 1878) in this apparently economic war. Then again a page later, in a very delicate epic allusion: “one, eight, seven, eight, | Mencius on tithing, | PERENNE. | Cano perenne.” “Arma virumque cano” (Aen., 1.1): eternal war, eternal song (see §3, infra).

Notes on Ezra Pound (1): “clear demarcation” and “the diffidence that faltered”

1—A passion for the clean line

If Pound was an anti-militarist, he wasn’t a pacifist. In the luminous opening lines of Canto 30, the Futurist doctrine of “war—the world’s only hygiene” is put into Artemis’ mouth (see Marinetti, “Fondation et Manifeste du Futurisme” [1909]).

“Pity spareth so many an evil thing.” Artemis–Diana is mistress of the hunt and of the moon, which bewitched E.P., in later Cantos especially. “Now if no fayre creature followeth me | […] It is on account that Pity forbideth them slaye.” The hunt is a test of virtù. Its ruthlessness is necessary for the triumph of the strong over the weak, beauty over “foulnesse,” form over matter.

“All things are made foul in this season, | This is the reason, none may seek purity | Having for foulnesse pity | And things growne awry.” Artemis represents this creative-destructive principle (creative destruction): removing the dross [see addendum]. The same is exemplified in that most Apollonian of arts, sculpture.

Canto 45 descants upon the same principle (or its perversion, subversion, rather): “with usura the line grows thick | with usura is no clear demarcation […] Usura rusteth the chisel.” Pound’s is a passion for the clean line; and this is itself a clean line running thru his poetic innovations (following on from Hulme’s classicism and “the forgotten school of 1909”) to his Fascism with Chinese characteristics. The nub of it: the struggle against shoddiness and obscurity of that purity of form begotten of mastery (virtù). (Or, as Canto 72 has it, “la guerra eterna | Fra luce e fango” [the unending war between light and mud]. This in the context of a neo-Ghibelline, pro-Fascist harangue. Aesthetics and politics are one, here.)

“Conservative Revolution” in England—a Sketch

“Conservative Revolution” is a phrase unfamiliar to English politics (as self-identification) or to English scholarship (as well-defined category in the history of political thought).

C.R. in Germany originated as a self-identification (Dietz [b], n. 33 to chap. 1, pp. 215–6) tied up in a self-perception of “German uniqueness” (Sonderweg) (Mohler [b], part 2). That C.R. in Germany is as disputed—from without, in scholarship—as the nation’s “special path” (Klemperer) is a sign of the category’s potency.

Since C.R., rather than a narrowly- and contingently-delimited movement or ideology, is an “attitude” (Mohler [b], p. 229)—a setting oneself against “the Ideas of 1789” on the one hand, and the timidity of mere conservatism on the other—it ought to obtain, in potency if not in act, beyond Germany’s borders.

Dugin explores C.R. in Russia; Veneziani in Italy. Mohler (a) makes some suggestions re. France.

The possibility of C.R. in England was suggested first by Hoeres, then by Dietz (a). Hoeres suggests T. E. Hulme as a figure significantly analogous to German Conservative Revolutionists. Dietz (a) suggests that “neoconservative” Conservative Party circles around Douglas Jerrold and Charles Petrie might constitute an analogue to the Jungkonservativen (see Mohler [b], part 5.2).

Dietz revises his position slightly in (b), detailing “Neo-Tory” goings-on in and around the Conservative Party between the Wars. “Neo-Toryism,” in Dietz’s outline, is regrettably unknown by English politics (as self-identification) and scholarship (as well-defined and potent category). His analogies are worth developing; but he leaves valid analogies unmade. I’ll just sketch both here.