Ezra Pound

Canzoni & Ripostes; Whereto are appended the Complete Poetical Works of T.E. Hulme, has been considered important throughout the human history, and so that this work is never forgotten we have made efforts in its preservation by republishing this book in a modern format for present and future generations. This whole book has been reformatted, retyped and designed. These books are not made of scanned copies of their original work and hence the text is clear and readable.

Ezra Pound makes his Penguin Classics debut with this unique selection of his early poems and prose, edited with an introductory essay and notes by Pound expert Ira Nadel. The poetry includes such early masterpieces as "The Seafarer," "Homage to Sextus Propertius," "Hugh Selwyn Mauberley," and the first eight of Pound's incomparable "Cantos." The prose includes a series of articles and critical pieces, with essays on Imagism, Vorticism, Joyce, and the well-known "Chinese Written Character as a Medium for Poetry."First time in Penguin ClassicsIncludes generous selections of Pound's poetry, as well as an assortment of prose

Ezra Pound was born in 1885 in Hailey, Idaho. He came to Europe in 1908 and settled in London, where he became a central figure in the literary and artistic world, befriended by Yeats and a supporter of Eliot and Joyce, among others. In 1920 he moved to Paris, and later to Rapallo in Italy. During the Second World War he made a series of propagandist broadcasts over Radio Rome, for which he was later tried in the United States and subsequently committed to a hospital for the insane. After thirteen years, he was released and returned to Italy; dying in Venice in 1972.

Provides the complete text of Pound's epic poem including a translation of Pound's Italian canto LXXII, Canto LXXIII, and a 1966 fragment concluding the work

Eliot wrote in his introduction: I hope that this volume will demonstrate that Pound's literary criticism is the most important contemporary criticism of its kind…perhaps the kind we can least afford to do without…the refreshment, the revitalization and `making new' of literature in our time.

This selection from the Cantos was made by Ezra Pound himself in 1965. It is intended to indicate main elements in the long poem--his personal epic--with which he was engaged for more than fifty years. His choice includes, of course, a number of the Cantos most admired by critics and anthologists, such as Canto XIII ("Kung Confucius] walked by the dynastic temple..."), Canto XLV ("With usura hath no man a house of good stone...") and the passage from The Pisan Cantos (LXXXI) beginning "What thou lovest well remains / the rest is dross," and so the book is an ideal introduction for newcomers to the great work. But it has, too, particular interest for the already initiated reader and the specialist, in its revelation, through Pound's own selection of 'main elements, ' of the relative importance which he himself placed on various motifs as they figure in the architecture of the whole poem.

The contemporary significance and permanent value of Pound's criticism are revealed in these collected essays and reviews

Ezra Pound is destined to rank as one of the great translators of all time. Ranging through many languages, he chose for translation writers whose work marked a significant turning point in the development of world literature, or key poems which exemplify what is most vital in a given period or genre. This new enlarged edition, devoted chiefly to poetry, includes some forty pages of previously uncollected material. Anglo-Saxon: The Seafarer. Chinese: (Cathay) Rihaku (Li Po). Bunno, Mei Sheng, T'ao Yuan Ming. Egyptian: Conversations in Courtship. French: du Bellay, de Boufflers, D'Orl ans, Lalorgue, Lubicz-Milosz, Rimbaud, Tailhade. Prose: de Gourmont. Hindi: Kabir. Italian: Cavalcanti, St. Francis, Guinicelli, Leopardi, Montanari, Orlandi. Japanese Noh Plays: 15 plays with Fenollosa's commentary. Latin: Catullus, Horace, Navagero, Rutilius. Proven al: Bertrand de Born, Cercalmon, Daniel, Folquet de Romans, Li Viniers, Ventadorn.

The verse and criticism which he produced during the early years of the twentieth century very largely determined the directions of creative writing in our time; virtually every major poet in England and America today has acknowledged his help or influence. Pound's lyric genius, his superb technique, and his fresh insight into literary problems make him one of the small company of men who through the centuries have kept poetry alive--one of the great innovators. This book offers a compact yet representative selection of Ezra Pound's poems and translations. The span covered is Pound's entire writing career, from his early lyrics and the translations of Proven al songs to his English version of Sophocles' Trachiniae. Included are parts of his best known works--the Chinese translations, the sequence called Hugh Selwyn Mauberly, the Homage to Sextus Propertius. The Cantos, Pound's major epic, are presented in generous selections, chosen to emphasize the main themes of the whole poem.