Ezra Pound's theory of "particulars"?...

[mathb]

Hi everyone.

This is my first post here. I'm a french-canadian, I live in Quebec. I'm a translator (english-french-russian). I'm actually translating the notebooks of a renowned canadian poet named Louis Dudek. Don't know if anybody here knows him. Anyway, he's been accointed with Ezra Pound, in his early years, and quite often refers to him in his works. Since my knowledge of Pound's writings is very poor, I was wondering if some of you could help me understand this passage where Dudek talks about Ezra Pound's "'mind' stuck on a goofy theory of 'particulars'", in the following extract:

"Whether the entire modern movement was an enlightened movement - that is the most disturbing question of all.

Thus Yeats: 'What's freedom Muck in the yard,' [in his Fascist poems]. And 'Good strong blows are delights to the mind. -' Or Ezra Pound: 'The yidd is a stimulant' etc. [in a poem]. They were hardly enlightened. Yeats' 'mind' absorbed in spiritualism and belief in fairies and ghosts; Pound's 'mind' stuck on a goofy theory of 'particulars,' 'usury,' and racist hatred; Eliot's 'mind', hyper-reactionary in politics and religion, Anglo-Catholic, monarchical, rightist - hardly enlightened, all of them."


In fact, what interests me the most here is the meaning of the word "particulars" in this context. I know the word has many meanings, but I can't decide on an equivalent in french, in that precise case. Could it come from some "philosophical terminology" or idiom that could be traced throughout some literary or philosophical tradition?

thanks in advance for your help...

cb

[Virgil]

Welcome Mathb. I know of Pound's theory of imagism but I'm afraid I've never heard of a theory of particulars. Perhaps that was Dudek's characterization of one of Pound ideas. Sorry I can't help.

[JCamilo]

From the imaginism manifesto
"4. To present an image. We are not a school of painters, but we believe that poetry should render particulars exactly and not deal in vague generalities, however magnificent and sonorous. It is for this reason that we oppose the cosmic poet, who seems to us to shirk the real difficulties of his art. "

I could not find much more...

[Virgil]

From the imaginism manifesto
"4. To present an image. We are not a school of painters, but we believe that poetry should render particulars exactly and not deal in vague generalities, however magnificent and sonorous. It is for this reason that we oppose the cosmic poet, who seems to us to shirk the real difficulties of his art. "

I could not find much more...

Very good, JC. So it's related to his imagism.

[AuntShecky]

I always thought the "particulars" were akin to the "scrupulous meanness" found in the writing of James Joyce, not so much the usual connotation of "mean" as cruel, but the attention to tiny details, i.e., getting them
accurate --
or am I, as I have been so very often, wrong?

[AuntShecky]

Well, I was half-right (in that the word "scrupulous meanness") referred to style; half-wrong in that I thought
it meant an attention to detail. From :

us.penguinclassics.com/static/cs/us/10/nf/teache

Here is the passage from the intro to Dubliners
:

["Frequently named as the best short stories of the twentieth century, the stories of Dubliners are told in a pared-down language and using a minimal palette of words, images, and emotions; what Joyce described as 'a style of scrupulous meanness.' Although the narrative represents Joyce at his most accessible, the stories contain no real plot to speak of, little action, and certainly no climax or resolution of a typical sort – aspects which shocked and baffled many of his contemporaries.]"


Just as critics were initially "baffled" by Pound's "imagist" works, perhaps.

[JCamilo]

However, hard is to imagine why precision of details can be called "goofy", I suppose in someway Pound meant something more specific in his mind... something that in the end may sound close-minded because it seems what Dudek is talking about in his critic...

Anyways, that passage of Dudek sounds as ignorant and prejudicious as one can get. I mean, that is like calling Voltaire not enlighted because he had anti-semithic views once or while. Pound is in many aspects a clear-thinker, rather rational; Yeats is obviously a mystic person and T.S.Elliot a typical intelectual-snob that knew a lot about books. (And forget that modernist would include Joyce, Borges, Kafka, Paul Valéry, etc... people that seemed to be thinking a lot).

[quasimodo1]

To Mathb: You might find this paper usefull in your study of "particulars" in poetry...http://www.erin.toronto.edu/~dwhite/490/edwards1.htm ...quasi

[mathb]

I want to thank you everyone for your very helpful answers. Will look at this a little closer tonight after work.
Surely, I think that in many aspects, Dudek can get very frustrating to read... especially when he bluntly expresses these kinds of judgments... Well, my job is not to agree or disagree with him, isn't it... ;)
But anyway, that's partly why I felt I needed to be precautious with these "particulars"... (sometimes it can mean "details", sometimes "elements", sometimes "facts"... it can get pretty confusing... or it's just me being not that good with handling that terminology...)
I will surely read the article you gave me, quasimodo1. thank you.

[AuntShecky]

We like Pound and admire his works, but late in life the
"rational" part left him. We know from his biography about his internment in a U. S. army camp in Italy (for treason) and also his confinement as a mentally ill patient
in St. Elizabeth's hospital in Washington, D.C.

[Virgil]

I like many of Pound's works too, but he was a racist and an anti-semite way before he supposedly lost his mind. There is some question as to whether he really was insane or whether the insanity defense spared his life from the death penalty. His racism and anti-semitism is quite repulsive. There was no couching it in images or suggestions, but actual outright declarative statements, echoing Nazi propaganda. It has stained his reputation and may he rot in hell for it.

[JCamilo]

There is a danger, specially among such elitist thinkers and writers such as Pound or Carlyle because there is a thin line between accepting and defending an elite and abusing of it.
For example, Jorge Luis Borges was a racist too, but he was not as politically rooted like Pound. The danger is mixing both, us readers reading that Pound defense of culture is false because his racism.

[Virgil]

I had not heard that about Borges. I have not been exposed to a lot of his writing. In what way was he a racist?

[JCamilo]

Against black people. He had comments how africa never produced anything worthwhile that lasted like Europe did and some stories about how he once received a student in his house and when she left, he asked to the maid how she looked and when he learn she was dark-skinned complained that he wasted his time.
And that is Borges, humanistic to an extreme (his prejudice never took form of action and seemed to be a trait of aristocratic Borges), it reflected a usual prejudice in argentina.

[quasimodo1]

I am not an apologist for Pound or his real and alleged bigotries. However I do not think the man never lost his mind but rather became a political embarasment to the powers that were. I have been to St. Elizbeth's Hospitol in DC, doing the "good work" of the roman catholic church and have since learned something of the history of the place...which is, for anyone who has been inside, very ominous and intimidating. During Pound's day, it was used as a "gulag" of last resort like when a person had standing in the literary world and could not easily just be imprisoned or done away with. They were the times where they tried men's souls, and usually found them guilty. quasi

[AuntShecky]

I would not attempt to apologize for anyone's anti-Semitism, still tragically very much alive among individuals and among political groups in certain countries.
Along with racism, anti-Semitism is the particularly vile form of bigotry that is responsible for the deaths of millions of people in the world. The previous posters are absolutely correct in labeling Pound as an anti-Semite; Pound inherited the nasty, garden-variety, anti-European anti-Semitism from his upbringing in Idaho, but it did not become virulent until later in his life.

He had developed -- and perhaps became obsessed with --a really wacko system of economic theory in which "credit capitalism" was to him the source of all that was wrong in the world. His famous poem about "Usury" addresses that; still, some of his points may have have validity: some of the economic practices in the West in our present era -- exorbitant interest rates and the like are examples of usury. With those strange ideas though, Pound began to look upon fascism favorably.


In Italy, Pound became inexplicably enamored with Mussolini, and his Toyoko Rose-like ranting on the radio during WW II brought him the charge of treason. When he was incarcerated in the U.S. Army prison camp in Pisa, he wrote the very famous Pisan Cantos, some lines of which might betray a kind of apologia. Other lines and passages in those cantos are oddly moving.

Because of Pound's close association with T.S. Eliot -- in fact The Waste Land is dedicated to Pound -- some have felt that Pound's anti-Semitism was contagious and thus critics have tried to extrapolate anti-Semitic lines from that poem.
I think this is a bit specious in Eliot's case; I don't see the poem so much as anti-Semitic as pro-Christian (not that the two great World religions--despite what Ann Coulter said-- are that much at odds with each other.) In any event, at one point T. S. Eliot pulled back from his association with Pound; he said of Pound that he was "objectively modern" and "objectionably antiquarian" at the same time."

Pound's confinement in St. Elizabeth's Hospital resulted from his unfitness to stand trial; perhaps, the first famous
"insanity defense." But Pound did not die in Washington.
He returned to Italy in 1958, where he died in 1972.

It is impossible to read Ezra Pound without remembering the extremely disturbing quality of his psyche. But in the converse of what we had been taught to "hate the sin and love the sinner" it is possible to hate the poet (or the cruel aspect of the poet's theories) and love his poems.
For there definitely are contributions, most notably in Pound's revolutionary changes to poetic diction and idiom.

[Virgil]

I would not attempt to apologize for anyone's anti-Semitism, still tragically very much alive among individuals and among political groups in certain countries.
Along with racism, anti-Semitism is the particularly vile form of bigotry that is responsible for the deaths of millions of people in the world. The previous posters are absolutely correct in labeling Pound as an anti-Semite; Pound inherited the nasty, garden-variety, anti-European anti-Semitism from his upbringing in Idaho, but it did not become virulent until later in his life.

There's much I agree with what you say in your entire post Aunt, but that last sentence here suggests a certain level of prejudice on your part. First of the people of idaho in the 19th century was probably completely didfferent than any perception you have of Idaho today. Second Pound if I recall his biography correctly moved to Philadelphia (the city of "brotherly love") at the age of three, so Philly is as much to blame as Idaho if you think locale has anything to do with it. Third, that blanket statement about Idaho is prejudice in itself.


Because of Pound's close association with T.S. Eliot -- in fact The Waste Land is dedicated to Pound -- some have felt that Pound's anti-Semitism was contagious and thus critics have tried to extrapolate anti-Semitic lines from that poem.
I think this is a bit specious in Eliot's case; I don't see the poem so much as anti-Semitic as pro-Christian (not that the two great World religions--despite what Ann Coulter said-- are that much at odds with each other.) In any event, at one point T. S. Eliot pulled back from his association with Pound; he said of Pound that he was "objectively modern" and "objectionably antiquarian" at the same time."
No I think Eliot was anti-semitic on his own. There have been several studies of Eliot's anti-semitism. This site summarizes it well: http://www.uwm.edu/~gjay/Julius.html. There are links to Eliot's poems where suggestions of his anti-semitism are highlighted. He was not like Pound in that his poetry overtly stating his racist and anti-semitic views. But there are enough biographical details that clearly identifies him in his personal views to be such. It probably wasn't so uncommon in his day, and since it is not part of his core ideas, so he tends to get a pass. It does occaisionally seep into his work.


Pound's confinement in St. Elizabeth's Hospital resulted from his unfitness to stand trial; perhaps, the first famous
"insanity defense."
He was quite sane enough to write his most brilliant cantos (the Pisan Cantos) while he was incarcerated. The insanity defense was a glossing over. His treason did not involve military deaths or manuevers, so they were looking for an out not to execute him.


It is impossible to read Ezra Pound without remembering the extremely disturbing quality of his psyche. But in the converse of what we had been taught to "hate the sin and love the sinner" it is possible to hate the poet (or the cruel aspect of the poet's theories) and love his poems.
For there definitely are contributions, most notably in Pound's revolutionary changes to poetic diction and idiom.
I agree. I'm a big fan of both Pound and Eliot's poetry.

[JCamilo]

I agree about T.S.Eliot anti-semitism. The difference is that like many intelectuals at that time, he kept his noise burried in the books and unlike Pound, didn't messed with politics (which was Pound mistake).
Anyways, I think eventually Pound lost his health, if not his mind, and there is an obvious level of sympathy of the court trying not to push his case to hard, to avoid to condemn him for doing something many americans did before Pearl Habor (which was supporting facism, in a way or another).
If not by his poetry (good enough), Pound contribution for the publishing of Ulisses should be enough to warrant respect for his literary capacities.

[AuntShecky]

Pound may have influenced the decision to publish Ulysses but most of the credit should go to Random House. (I don't know if Bennett Cerf was the publisher at the time, but there was a court case with a judge who eventually ruled in favor of publishing the book.)
I will go to the website about Eliot's alleged anti-Semitism
and see if it's true what they say about Tommy. (It shouldn't affect the quality of the poem, though. As a rule we should separate the artist from the work unless it is explicitly autobiographical. Remember: it's the "how" and not the "what."
Re: Idaho. I have nothing against the state, then as now.
Except maybe I'm embarrassed for Sen. Craig. I tried to compress the sentence and should have put the state in a different place. But just as in the song by Oscar Hammerstein II, when it comes to prejudice, "You have to be Taught?" Remember that song? It's from South Pacific.
RE: The Pisan Cantos. Practically speaking, one doesn't necessarily have to be "sane" in order to produce a coherent work of art. If you are a believer in the "left brain/right brain" theory, the right or sensible part of the c. cortex could be haywire while the left brain can go ahead and create the work. For instance, van Gogh was deeply depressed when he did those great paintings. And I think Jackson Pollack's paintings are absolutely gorgeous, but if you've seen that movie w. Ed Harris in the title role, you know that Jackson was missing a couple of
marbles.
Not that your old Auntie is playing w. a full deck herself.
"Everybody's insane--
except thee and me,
and I'm not quite sure
about thee."

[Virgil]

I'm sure you're not prejudice against Idahoans. Just the way you phrased it struck me that way. Peace on that.

Senator Craig thing cracks me up. I'm now paranoid about going into a bathroom stall. Of course i do at work since i'm there over nine hours and i have to, but if someone is in the next stall i make sure my feet are way away from the edge and keep them from moving. If the guy next door starts moving his feet, i wonder if he's playing footsie or suggesting something. :lol: