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The Cantos of Ezra Pound (New Directions Paperbook) Paperback – June 17, 1996

by Ezra Pound (Author)

45 customer reviews

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The Cantos of Ezra Pound is the most important epic poem of the twentieth century.

Delmore Schwartz said about The Cantos: "They are one of the touchstones of modern poetry." William Carlos WIlliams said "[Pound] discloses history by its odor, by the feel of it―in the words; fuses it with the words, present and past, to MAKE his Cantos. Make them."

Since the 1969 revised edition, the Italian Cantos LXXII and LXXIII (as well as a 1966 fragment concluding the work) have been added. Now appearing for the first time is Pound's recently found Eglish translation of Italian Canto LXXII.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

“Pound's Cantos is a modern classic that everybody has to know.”
- John Crowe Ransom

About the Author

New Directions has been the primary publisher of Ezra Pound in the U.S. since the founding of the press when James Laughlin published New Directions in Prose and Poetry 1936. That year Pound was fifty-one. In Laughlin’s first letter to Pound, he wrote: “Expect, please, no fireworks. I am bourgeois-born (Pittsburgh); have never missed a meal. . . . But full of ‘noble caring’ for something as inconceivable as the future of decent letters in the US.” Little did Pound know that into the twenty-first century the fireworks would keep exploding as readers continue to find his books relevant and meaningful.

Product details

Series: New Directions Paperbook
Paperback: 896 pages
Publisher: New Directions; Reprint edition (June 17, 1996)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 9780811213264
ISBN-13: 978-0811213264
ASIN: 0811213269
Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 1.5 x 8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 45 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #277,122 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1306 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > Regional & Cultural > United States
- #36202 in Books > Literature & Fiction > United States

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45 customer reviews

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Michael E. Nader

"What thou loves best is thy true heritage

November 12, 2014

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Here---ta-da!---in all its profound mastery of idiom, phrasing, imagery, history, rant, rancid anti-semitism, beauty of line, and well seasoned with tag lines in Latin, Greek, French, Italian, German, and Chinese ideograms is the magnum opus of 20th century modernist poetry. Even the achingly beauty of Pound's incoherence at the end will stir the heart. He couldn't find it in himself how to end this rambling, chaotic, crass, gorgeous, limpid, challenging boa constrictor of a poem that contains everything Pound read and believed, even his "wrecks and errors." He tells us, "What thou loves best is thy true heritage." Eventually we get his message
after this survey of history: "To be men, not destroyers." A monumental poem.

8 people found this helpful

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Robert Duncanson

The Master of Masters

June 4, 2014

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

I think the honorific came from Eliot who , when I was in college, was just coming to be comprehensible for the general reader. All that means is an artist sees what's going on while it is going but we muddle along and catch on about 30 or 40 years later.

Some of Pound's poetry is beautiful and accessible---River Merchant's Wife and his Sestina--for two.

But the Cantos are still a tough read for any reader.

I think that the Cantos are like Finnegan's Wake --something to be read with helps and probably studied in a grad seminar.

Finnegan can be undertaken thanks to the Skeleton Key..

For the Cantos, I relied on Cookson's Guide.

I don't know if there are seminars out there on the Cantos or the Wake; so I guess we can muddle on and hope the next generation catches up.

5 people found this helpful

Comment

Difficult, Confusing, and Worth It

October 24, 2012

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Look, The Cantos is incredibly difficult. If you don't like difficult literature, it won't be for you. That doesn't mean it's a "failed work" or that because it includes other languages than English it's not English literature. What can be said, however, is that Pound does a remarkable job of letting The Cantos translate themselves. That is, what is written in Chinese or Italian in one canto may often be restated in English twenty or thirty cantos away. If the work is read as a whole it coheres. Now, this coherence requires the reader to keep a great amount of information in his head and, indeed, The Cantos would benefit greatly from an annotated, cross-referenced edition, but if you are willing to put in the work, you will be richly rewarded.

8 people found this helpful

Comment

I mean, it’s the cantos

September 18, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Read the headline.

Comment

Dwight L. Cramer

Good reading copy

June 7, 2009

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

This is a well constructed book of reasonable size and as such offers a good reading copy of The Cantos. The typeface is sensible and clear. It is a copy that can be stuck in a suitcase or satchel. Since it is hardbound, it is not lightweight or really intended for travel, but it is not a lavish collector's volume, so if it gets knocked about, so what?

I'm not going to comment on Pound's Cantos, his poetry generally or his role in 20th century literature. If you want an expert opinion, find yourself a copy of Hugh Kenner's The Pound Era. Pound himself was a complex man who left complex tracks. The Cantos certainly remain worth reading (IMHO, they are aging well, and reading them against the backdrop of the current financial nonsense is entertaining, but perhaps I entertain easily?).

8 people found this helpful

Comment

ReunitedWithAnOldFriend

September 20, 2012

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

Book arrived as advertised: brand new. And I had the joy of rereading Pound's Cantos cover to cover again. Only this time, with the benefit of having learned Spanish, French, Latin, Greek and Italian. A seminal revelation in Western culture, breathtaking poetry, amusing insights into the myriad figures of 20th century art -- from Beardsley and Whistler to Yeats and Eliot. You cannot understand the events in Western art and civilization without reading this book thoroughly.

4 people found this helpful

Comment

A Must For The Educated Man

April 29, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

There is really not much that can be said about the Cantos that has already been said, whether deserved or not.This edition includes so cantos an fragments which have not been in print and the book itself is model of printing which makes the experience more endearing.

One person found this helpful

Comment

November 13, 2006

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

The Cantos are great in what they do for the writer. "Elitism" is the nickname the idiot gives to the question. The Cantos include everything (yes, even Pounds' barbarisms). Man alive! Must I agree with the Bible to read it?

9 people found this helpful

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