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Guide to Kulchur
Prose work by Ezra Pound, published in 1938. A brilliant but fragmentary work, it consists of a series of apparently unrelated essays reflecting his thoughts on various aspects of culture and history.
379 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1952
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About the author
Ezra Pound
507 books1,016 followersEzra 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.
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.
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March 24, 2022
8/10.
O Ezra Pound, that well-read man, anti-modern yet modernist, hater of usury, dweller in the land of the fasces. This book is three-fourths wise literary criticism and one-fourth tirade against usury. Unlike most books, there is no way I can summarize it in a review.
Pound gives us a guide to Culture, not a guide through Culture. Be warned, O weak-willed, pampered, miseducated modern! If you do not know the Western canon nor have knowledge of the great authors' names, you will be lost in a hurricane. If you have not heard the sweet sounds of concertos; have not read of Achilles' wrath; if you do not know the general cultural currents of the West, you will gain nothing out of this book. Pound, like any good father, has high expectations for his literary children. He expects us to have the education of a gentleman and to know Greek, Latin, Chinese, German, and a bit of French. Or, perhaps, to surmise the roots of words. But almost none of us have this education. As the aristocracy declined, education certainly went to the masses. But the education became mass education. The Faustian image of perfection — of God Himself — was replaced by the image of mediocrity ("equality") as an ideal. Literacy increased greatly . . . if one defines it as writing your name. But true cultural literacy went down horrendously. Even I, having read tens of times more books than my peers, feel like I am drowning in Pound's writing. His literacy and knowledge is overwhelming. Assuredly I (and all of us reverers of the West) have much work to do.
So, in summary, what is this book? A wise elder's explanation of Western literature, music, history, philosophy, and all other aspects of culture. The wheat is separated from the chaff by a man who knows much more than I. And unlike the monetarily-tied academics of today, Pound is not afraid to express his opinion. He hates finance and usury, and despises their impact in England. He especially hates their ever-growing influence on art and literature. We see this today with many of the "philanthropic foundations" (cough cough, Soros) giving massive sums of money for "cultural enrichment". But if you take anything out of life, it is this: who pays the piper, plays the tune. Who pays the piper today? Who pays the newscasters? The journalists? Hollywood studios? Representatives of Congress? It is the same financiers. And until the institutions are loosened from them, the ongoing revolutions of materialism and degeneracy will continue to swallow our culture and heritage whole.
O Ezra Pound, that well-read man, anti-modern yet modernist, hater of usury, dweller in the land of the fasces. This book is three-fourths wise literary criticism and one-fourth tirade against usury. Unlike most books, there is no way I can summarize it in a review.
Pound gives us a guide to Culture, not a guide through Culture. Be warned, O weak-willed, pampered, miseducated modern! If you do not know the Western canon nor have knowledge of the great authors' names, you will be lost in a hurricane. If you have not heard the sweet sounds of concertos; have not read of Achilles' wrath; if you do not know the general cultural currents of the West, you will gain nothing out of this book. Pound, like any good father, has high expectations for his literary children. He expects us to have the education of a gentleman and to know Greek, Latin, Chinese, German, and a bit of French. Or, perhaps, to surmise the roots of words. But almost none of us have this education. As the aristocracy declined, education certainly went to the masses. But the education became mass education. The Faustian image of perfection — of God Himself — was replaced by the image of mediocrity ("equality") as an ideal. Literacy increased greatly . . . if one defines it as writing your name. But true cultural literacy went down horrendously. Even I, having read tens of times more books than my peers, feel like I am drowning in Pound's writing. His literacy and knowledge is overwhelming. Assuredly I (and all of us reverers of the West) have much work to do.
So, in summary, what is this book? A wise elder's explanation of Western literature, music, history, philosophy, and all other aspects of culture. The wheat is separated from the chaff by a man who knows much more than I. And unlike the monetarily-tied academics of today, Pound is not afraid to express his opinion. He hates finance and usury, and despises their impact in England. He especially hates their ever-growing influence on art and literature. We see this today with many of the "philanthropic foundations" (cough cough, Soros) giving massive sums of money for "cultural enrichment". But if you take anything out of life, it is this: who pays the piper, plays the tune. Who pays the piper today? Who pays the newscasters? The journalists? Hollywood studios? Representatives of Congress? It is the same financiers. And until the institutions are loosened from them, the ongoing revolutions of materialism and degeneracy will continue to swallow our culture and heritage whole.
March 4, 2009
Invariably infuriating and yet strangely seductive, this is Pound's chaotically organized curriculum of necessary culture. It's a bizarre collection of rants, Chinese characters, prejudices, top ten lists, sentence fragments, obsessions, weird abbreviations, and conscious iconoclasm. Pound gives a thumbs down to Aristotle and Swinburne; St. Ambrose and Froebenius a thumbs up. Brancusi, Gaudier, and Confucius are Gods, and Mussolini gets more than a few words of praise (Pound wrote most of the text in the late 30s in Italy--seems he was carried away with the Black Shirts a mite bit too much).
The text's key themes (obsessions) are: (1) the Necessity of Paideuma, and (2) the Evil of Usury. Paideuma is a rather academic term having something to do with the intricacies of creating a culture (or whatever). When considering a paideuma, Pound felt it necessary to develop a proper terminology, which is strange considering his own seemingly slapdash manner of laying out GTK. But far more prominent is Pound's visceral, all-consuming hatred of usury, money-lending, credit disfunction, modern economic forms. This latter obsession springs up on every page, every problem, every bad composer or flawed critic is reduced to a failure to observe the importance of a moral monetary policy. Absolutely crazy.
On Education:
On the Catholic Church:
On Usury:
The text's key themes (obsessions) are: (1) the Necessity of Paideuma, and (2) the Evil of Usury. Paideuma is a rather academic term having something to do with the intricacies of creating a culture (or whatever). When considering a paideuma, Pound felt it necessary to develop a proper terminology, which is strange considering his own seemingly slapdash manner of laying out GTK. But far more prominent is Pound's visceral, all-consuming hatred of usury, money-lending, credit disfunction, modern economic forms. This latter obsession springs up on every page, every problem, every bad composer or flawed critic is reduced to a failure to observe the importance of a moral monetary policy. Absolutely crazy.
On Education:
[I:]t does not matter a two-penny damn whether you load up your memory with the chronological sequence of what has happened, or the names of protagonists, or authors of books, or generals and leading political spouters, so long as you understand the process now going on, or the processes biological, social, economic now going on, enveloping you as individual, in a social order, and quite unlikely to be very 'new' in themselves however fresh or stale to the participant.
On the Catholic Church:
Given a free hand with the Saints and Fathers one could construct a decent philosophy, not merely a philosophism. This much I believe. Given Erigena, given St. Ambrose and St. Antonino, plus time, patience and genius you cd. erect inside the fabric something modern man cd. believe.Not far off here.
On Usury:
The one history we have NOT on the new-stands is the history of Usura. Salmasius ... wrote De Modo Usurarum... This treats of terminology and of usurer's habits, and of laws regulating his process. But the history of where such and such tyrant, dupe, idiot, bewigged pustulent Bourbon, bewigged pietist diseased Stuart got his money and how, from Caesar's time...to our own is not clearly written. Who paid for such and such wars, what save poverty prevented so and so making more wars, with more splendid equipment? Malatesta and the late condottieri, their mouths watering over the designs, in Valturio, of war engines, tanks, superior catapults, as damn'd froust now letches after a Vickers' advertisement or a farm boy over automobile ads.He is right here--I would love to read such a history.
August 4, 2010
Difficult to immediately say, but Pound dissects certain fractions in thought about economics, music, literature and history placing them against classical Chinese and Greek philosophy. Ezra suffuses all this with his own wit calling philosophers such as Aristotle "Arry" throughout and observes his distaste with a distilled acerbic snarl. His views on money are very interesting especially in relation to Aristotle's view of it being a matter of custom and easily altered or rendered useless at will.
Primarily I think Pound set out to cover two quite over-casting levels of mental firmament with this text: one is that ideas only work when they are put into action and the other is that the value of knowledge is not in the facts but in the processes involved through-out history.
This was a fairly challenging read for me, and I laughed when Pound talked of not liking authors that required of him to have a dictionary handy whilst reading.
I think that with a basic knowledge of literature and history, you will enjoy this work, and if you have curiosity or interest in the analects you will draw much from Pound's work. Pace yourself through it, remembering that Pound was as much an anti-academic as was Shaw, and certain vibrancy of ideas are particular to that person, not necessarily a mimesis of other's ideas.
Primarily I think Pound set out to cover two quite over-casting levels of mental firmament with this text: one is that ideas only work when they are put into action and the other is that the value of knowledge is not in the facts but in the processes involved through-out history.
This was a fairly challenging read for me, and I laughed when Pound talked of not liking authors that required of him to have a dictionary handy whilst reading.
I think that with a basic knowledge of literature and history, you will enjoy this work, and if you have curiosity or interest in the analects you will draw much from Pound's work. Pace yourself through it, remembering that Pound was as much an anti-academic as was Shaw, and certain vibrancy of ideas are particular to that person, not necessarily a mimesis of other's ideas.
February 9, 2018
Pound was arrested for treason in 1945 and declared mentally unfit to stand trial; this book was written in 1937. It reads like someone who will be declared mentally unfit, and there are also disquieting hints about how the totalitarian state is going to fix things. Hindsight.
Despite being unintelligible often, Pound is passionate and interesting and will make you think differently about the history, goal, and continuation of Western civilization. He may also convince you that you need to get your hands on Hardy's collected poems.
Despite being unintelligible often, Pound is passionate and interesting and will make you think differently about the history, goal, and continuation of Western civilization. He may also convince you that you need to get your hands on Hardy's collected poems.
November 3, 2009
Much of Pound's prose should be considered indispensable if you want to become a decent person. 'An ABC of Reading,' and the essays gathered in 'Literary Essays of Ezra Pound' are brilliant, and some of his social criticism works too, although you might want to take small bites of his 'Selected Prose' rather than swallowing it whole; start with the stuff from before the 1930's, and you'll be quite enlightened I think.
But 'Guide to Kulchur' is more or less straight decadence. If you already know what Pound thought about economics, poetry, music, architecture, politics and philosophy, you'll be able to grab a few interesting sentences. But it's infuriating and often deathly dull, which is quite an achievement considering how fiery he is. Pound's ideogrammic method - a throwing together of apparently different items - is meant to communicate knowledge more clearly than is sometimes possible with linear prose. The emphasis here, for Pound, was always on *clarity*. But GTK is not clear. At times it reads less like an honest attempt to say something, and more like a 370 page long name-drop: Brancusi, Picabia, Gaudier, Cocteau, Mussolini... yeah, I met 'em all. And anyone I didn't meet, not worth meeting.
The ideogram here is not clear, and we know from Pound's earlier works that it could have been: the effect of monetary policy on art or kulchur is ridiculous in GTK; in earlier essays it's quite convincing. The relation between language and politics is completely opaque in GTK, in earlier essays it's fascinating. The exposition of Confucian thought is incomprehensible here, in earlier essays, or Pound's translations, eccentrically brilliant.
One thing we might be thankful for: the absurdity of GTK and the writings which followed it might have helped convince the powers that be that Pound was, indeed, insane while living in Italy, and thus have saved his life. According to the laws of the time, he certainly deserved to be executed as a traitor. But nobody could read this guff and believe that old Billyum was serious. That's a major failing for a serious man.
Read
May 11, 2021I won’t be stanning for this guy anytime soon.
December 30, 2020
Pound at his mussoliniest gives a stream of conscious about his personal views. probably best as an introduction to the thought running through the cantos
October 27, 2020
I read this book over the course of 5 days, on each of which I came away with a different impression - the final was great. For me it all (or mostly) came together in chapter 54; 53 chapters of moderate to severe confusion is a lot, though it was never a miserable slog, like some books that even have the advantage of being shorter and more coherent. Perhaps it would have been more easily intelligible if divided into distinct essays on the several topics (i.e. just one, if lengthy, passage on usury instead of slipping into an economic rhapsody every 5 pages or so) but then it may have lost some significance, the current uniting everything that eventually becomes visible being suppressed. Also, it seems that Pound didn't really know where he was going with the work, not enough to make such a delineation - we are told near the beginning that it's to be 200 pages, then about 200 and 120 pages later he pronounces himself out of paper, then writes another chapter, then an epilogue, then a recapitulation, and finally about 8 documents of sundry natures are appended. However, none of it is tiresome in the least, and I can't say he would have been better off omitting anything (at all, in the whole book).
The book is probably most didactic as an exemplification of Pound's mind: hinted at early, among other ways, by "culture is when you can't remember the name" or something like that; the name has vanished and the idea has sunk, or risen (p. 328), to the level of "residue."
The book is probably most didactic as an exemplification of Pound's mind: hinted at early, among other ways, by "culture is when you can't remember the name" or something like that; the name has vanished and the idea has sunk, or risen (p. 328), to the level of "residue."
August 22, 2020
This was perhaps the second hardest book I have ever read, the hardest being Joyce's Ulysses. (Of course Finnegans Wake is THE hardest book in the English language, or any damn language for that matter, but that is for true madmen and I'm not one of them...not quite yet).
Even though I felt like I was understanding and following Pound only about 50% of the time (if that), I still really loved this book. Pound is the rare example of a poet who can actually write decent prose. Many poets I have read over these years from Corso to Zukofsky, are fine at their main craft - poesy/poetry - but as soon as they turn their efforts to prose, it is immediately apparent why they are not prose writers. Pound, on the other hand, perhaps through force of writing so many essays over the years, has managed to form his own inimitable, idiosyncratic prose. What I love most about Pound's prose is his biting tongue-in-cheek humour, which is intelligent, unexpected (always comes out of left field somewhere) and often scathing in its sardonic irony. For a quick example, in one of the final comments called 'Villon and Comment' Pound writes, "You can’t make opera by taking a mass of words made to be declaimed from a stage and just shoving the pitch up and down."
Here in Guide to Kulchur Pound lets loose with all he believes and knows. This book is hard to pinpoint. In some ways, it is a textbook in which Pound the teacher and agent provocateur takes no prisoners and tells you his thoughts, straight up, on everything from Confucius, to economics (Gesell and Douglas in particular) to his thoughts on painting, art, literature and certain famous figures throughout history such as Dante, Homer and 'Arry (Pound's nickname for Aristotle). He likes to tease Aristotle's tendency to talk of general platitudes and nothing too concrete: "Arry has, and quite unconcealedly and frankly, a good deal of trouble in finding a verbal manifestation that won’t fit tennis playing as well as contemplation." (And Therefore Tending)
Like all great writers, what Pound writes has universal applicability in its appeal and message. When Pound writes, "The value of a nation’s money will, in the long run, depend also on what the nation spends its money FOR." he could be talking about any number of superpowers today who continue to spend ridiculous amount of taxpayer's money on the military.
This book is not for the faint of heart. Pound generally speaking either excites or inspires on the one hand or on the other, annoys or perplexes. However, one must give him at least this: if you are an alert reader, he is rarely if ever boring. He believed in "education by provocation" as James Laughlin put it so well in an essay on the great poet. He liked to tell people what to read, what to write, sometimes even what to THINK and sometimes his friends like William Carlos Williams just told him to 'take a hike' but younger poems whom he sometimes took under his wing would follow up on what he would ask them to do or study. Pound had such a broad mind - he wasn't only interested in furthering his own career. He was interested in improving society, and thereby, the world as a whole. Elevating it to a higher state and one of his strategies for doing this was to 'educate' or 'headucate' in his own provocative and sometimes controversial manner.
He was a man of many contradictions - while many may focus on his unfortunate embrace of Fascism during the 30s and 40s many will overlook his later rejection of it and may not be aware of his extremely kind and generous side, always trying to help his friends get published, sometimes even sending them money to help them pay the bills or even put food on the table for their family. Without his help, Joyce, Hemingway, Eliot and others would have struggled a lot more than they did. This was also another great contribution he made to the world of letters.
This book, I believe, will 'reveal itself' more and more in years to come. A few years back there was a book published called 'A Companion to Guide to Kulchur' by Anderson Araujo. Last year in Salamanca (Spain) I was fortunate enough to hear Mr. Araujo speak at the EPIC Conference. I now want to read his book to help me open more locks to doors that are hidden and contained within this book.
This book was very, very difficult - perhaps the most difficult book I have read by Pound so far but I loved it. This type of high-level esoteric academic discussion is bizarrely addictive, I find. It reminds me of something that Brion Gysin once said about how powerful academic works of art, whether it be literature, music or painting had an almost erotic spell over him. I wouldn't go so far as to say that Guide to Kulchur turned me on in that respect but it was certainly quite a titillating and breath-taking ride at times. Buy the ticket from the carnie, Meester Pound and take the plunge.
Even though I felt like I was understanding and following Pound only about 50% of the time (if that), I still really loved this book. Pound is the rare example of a poet who can actually write decent prose. Many poets I have read over these years from Corso to Zukofsky, are fine at their main craft - poesy/poetry - but as soon as they turn their efforts to prose, it is immediately apparent why they are not prose writers. Pound, on the other hand, perhaps through force of writing so many essays over the years, has managed to form his own inimitable, idiosyncratic prose. What I love most about Pound's prose is his biting tongue-in-cheek humour, which is intelligent, unexpected (always comes out of left field somewhere) and often scathing in its sardonic irony. For a quick example, in one of the final comments called 'Villon and Comment' Pound writes, "You can’t make opera by taking a mass of words made to be declaimed from a stage and just shoving the pitch up and down."
Here in Guide to Kulchur Pound lets loose with all he believes and knows. This book is hard to pinpoint. In some ways, it is a textbook in which Pound the teacher and agent provocateur takes no prisoners and tells you his thoughts, straight up, on everything from Confucius, to economics (Gesell and Douglas in particular) to his thoughts on painting, art, literature and certain famous figures throughout history such as Dante, Homer and 'Arry (Pound's nickname for Aristotle). He likes to tease Aristotle's tendency to talk of general platitudes and nothing too concrete: "Arry has, and quite unconcealedly and frankly, a good deal of trouble in finding a verbal manifestation that won’t fit tennis playing as well as contemplation." (And Therefore Tending)
Like all great writers, what Pound writes has universal applicability in its appeal and message. When Pound writes, "The value of a nation’s money will, in the long run, depend also on what the nation spends its money FOR." he could be talking about any number of superpowers today who continue to spend ridiculous amount of taxpayer's money on the military.
This book is not for the faint of heart. Pound generally speaking either excites or inspires on the one hand or on the other, annoys or perplexes. However, one must give him at least this: if you are an alert reader, he is rarely if ever boring. He believed in "education by provocation" as James Laughlin put it so well in an essay on the great poet. He liked to tell people what to read, what to write, sometimes even what to THINK and sometimes his friends like William Carlos Williams just told him to 'take a hike' but younger poems whom he sometimes took under his wing would follow up on what he would ask them to do or study. Pound had such a broad mind - he wasn't only interested in furthering his own career. He was interested in improving society, and thereby, the world as a whole. Elevating it to a higher state and one of his strategies for doing this was to 'educate' or 'headucate' in his own provocative and sometimes controversial manner.
He was a man of many contradictions - while many may focus on his unfortunate embrace of Fascism during the 30s and 40s many will overlook his later rejection of it and may not be aware of his extremely kind and generous side, always trying to help his friends get published, sometimes even sending them money to help them pay the bills or even put food on the table for their family. Without his help, Joyce, Hemingway, Eliot and others would have struggled a lot more than they did. This was also another great contribution he made to the world of letters.
This book, I believe, will 'reveal itself' more and more in years to come. A few years back there was a book published called 'A Companion to Guide to Kulchur' by Anderson Araujo. Last year in Salamanca (Spain) I was fortunate enough to hear Mr. Araujo speak at the EPIC Conference. I now want to read his book to help me open more locks to doors that are hidden and contained within this book.
This book was very, very difficult - perhaps the most difficult book I have read by Pound so far but I loved it. This type of high-level esoteric academic discussion is bizarrely addictive, I find. It reminds me of something that Brion Gysin once said about how powerful academic works of art, whether it be literature, music or painting had an almost erotic spell over him. I wouldn't go so far as to say that Guide to Kulchur turned me on in that respect but it was certainly quite a titillating and breath-taking ride at times. Buy the ticket from the carnie, Meester Pound and take the plunge.
September 10, 2023
Even though I only understood 50% of this book, the only question I have is: who will write the Guide to Usura?
October 29, 2011
¿En qué se parece la poesía al modo en que los bancos de nuestro capitalismo generan dinero? Pues en que los dos, como dijese Yeats en un poema, surgen de una «bocanada de aire», o sea de la nada. El chiste —por llamarlo así— es de Richard Sieburth, experto en la obra de Ezra Pound (1885-1972). Y Ezra Pound, precisamente por su jerarquía de intereses, es, justo hoy, un autor de obligado rescate o relectura. Advirtamos que aquí, en los Cantos, se encuentra el poeta comentando una burbuja inmobiliaria: «Con usura no tiene el hombre casa de buena piedra». Como destacado del modernismo y la Generación Perdida, Pound conoció en Europa la I Guerra Mundial y las consecuencias del crash, lo que le movió a una especie de cruzada personal contra banqueros y financieros y a considerar la economía como una disciplina central a la hora de comprender la historia y la actualidad —aunque sus ideas económicas hayan pasado bastante desapercibidas entre los expertos—. Para el poeta fueron los banqueros los responsables de la ruina de occidente, la civilización, la cultura y el arte (Victor Perkis). Con todo, a Pound terminarían condenándolo enunciados como éste, recogido en su ensayo «What Is Money For»: «La usura es el cáncer del mundo, el cual sólo el escapelo del fascismo puede extirpar.» Otro caso más de intelectual fascinado por la entonces vanguardia política del fascismo.
Libro aún más provocador ahora que en el momento de su publicación, en 1939, Guía de la Kultura es la correspondencia al español de Guide to Kulchur, donde, tal como se explica en la presentación, «llamarlo provocativamente Kulchur tiene su explicación filosófica y política: Pound quería referirse al concepto alemán de Cultura (Kultur) pero para diferenciarlo del tradicional que utiliza la élite (irremediablmente lastrado de connotaciones clasistas, nacionalistas y raciales), lo escribe según la pronunciación», anulando así la indicación del concepto Cultur en inglés. Hace bien, además, Capitán Swing en preparar la edición de esta Guía con el prólogo generoso del filósofo Nicolás G. Varela, pues es éste un libro inconscientemente enmarañado, cuando no opaco y a ratos impenetrable. De una parte, el texto aparece inundado de citas eruditas, cuando no de partituras o ideogramas (mención aparte merecería la atracción de Pound por la literatura china); de otra, el poeta no pudo resistirse al conocimiento enciclopédico, y con este libro aspiró a reunir lo trascendente, aquello que sobrevive al olvido. Su propuesta, aunque acabase con resultados casi más bien contrarios, era perpetrar un texto de divulgación, «tratando de suministrar al lector medio unas pocas herramientas para hacer frente a la heteróclita masa de información no digerida con que se le abruma diaria y mensualmente». Lo que es igual, Pound, como siempre ha ocurrido desde que los medios de información empezaron a plantear graves dolores de cabeza a los pensadores, se proclamaba integrante de una elite iluminadora, gesto que con el tiempo entraría cada vez más en declive.
O dicho de otro modo, un supuesto que ha ido adoptando el estatuto de verdad indiscutible es la imposibilidad de la literatura como herramienta pedagógica, asociada en el imaginario popular a épocas anteriores al siglo XX, en donde los libros servirían como medio de dominio entre las clases culturalmente privilegiadas y aquellas que no lo eran. Naturalmente, esta hipótesis —por la que el ensayo sería no más que un soporte de reflexión, apenas un perímetro conceptual, cuya lectura ha de ser siempre completada por el interlocutor— se sostiene sobre la ilusión de una democracia en donde todos sus ciudadanos comparten bagajes culturales, y sobre la devaluación del concepto intelectual como guía. Pero Pound, que a ratos sonará propagandista y descabellado, ha vuelto para recordarnos cuáles son nuestras obligaciones intelectuales en tiempos de crisis.
Libro aún más provocador ahora que en el momento de su publicación, en 1939, Guía de la Kultura es la correspondencia al español de Guide to Kulchur, donde, tal como se explica en la presentación, «llamarlo provocativamente Kulchur tiene su explicación filosófica y política: Pound quería referirse al concepto alemán de Cultura (Kultur) pero para diferenciarlo del tradicional que utiliza la élite (irremediablmente lastrado de connotaciones clasistas, nacionalistas y raciales), lo escribe según la pronunciación», anulando así la indicación del concepto Cultur en inglés. Hace bien, además, Capitán Swing en preparar la edición de esta Guía con el prólogo generoso del filósofo Nicolás G. Varela, pues es éste un libro inconscientemente enmarañado, cuando no opaco y a ratos impenetrable. De una parte, el texto aparece inundado de citas eruditas, cuando no de partituras o ideogramas (mención aparte merecería la atracción de Pound por la literatura china); de otra, el poeta no pudo resistirse al conocimiento enciclopédico, y con este libro aspiró a reunir lo trascendente, aquello que sobrevive al olvido. Su propuesta, aunque acabase con resultados casi más bien contrarios, era perpetrar un texto de divulgación, «tratando de suministrar al lector medio unas pocas herramientas para hacer frente a la heteróclita masa de información no digerida con que se le abruma diaria y mensualmente». Lo que es igual, Pound, como siempre ha ocurrido desde que los medios de información empezaron a plantear graves dolores de cabeza a los pensadores, se proclamaba integrante de una elite iluminadora, gesto que con el tiempo entraría cada vez más en declive.
O dicho de otro modo, un supuesto que ha ido adoptando el estatuto de verdad indiscutible es la imposibilidad de la literatura como herramienta pedagógica, asociada en el imaginario popular a épocas anteriores al siglo XX, en donde los libros servirían como medio de dominio entre las clases culturalmente privilegiadas y aquellas que no lo eran. Naturalmente, esta hipótesis —por la que el ensayo sería no más que un soporte de reflexión, apenas un perímetro conceptual, cuya lectura ha de ser siempre completada por el interlocutor— se sostiene sobre la ilusión de una democracia en donde todos sus ciudadanos comparten bagajes culturales, y sobre la devaluación del concepto intelectual como guía. Pero Pound, que a ratos sonará propagandista y descabellado, ha vuelto para recordarnos cuáles son nuestras obligaciones intelectuales en tiempos de crisis.
June 28, 2019
A bunch of random thoughts that made it difficult to both read and want to finish. Halfway thru, I felt that this must be one of the books where people who want to appear to be cool will rave about it even though it is gobblidegook and pointless.
March 24, 2011
Insane and erratic. Wtf.
August 10, 2022
Ezra Pound’s “Guide to Kulchur” is from 1938, by which time, sadly, the tackiness and vacuity of western commercial culture had disgusted one of my favorite poets and iconoclasts (cf “Hugh Selwyn Mauberly”, “In A Station Of The Metro”, and the Vorticist magazine “Blast”, just for starters) and made him a reactionary…a fan of Mussolini and an anti-semite.
He rails against usury early on (and throughout) and one gets his subtext, especially given the place (Fascist Italy, he was living in Rapallo) and era; 2/3 of the way in (once he’s warmed you up?) he starts talking about ’Hebrews’. Sigh. I expect he saw a renaissance and a future in Fascism, as he well might have in 1937-8. Ugly then, and hard to forgive in retrospect.
(Update: his anti-semitism seems to have been an earlier fixation of his than I’d realized, based on the excellent biography I’m now reading; it’s present in his 1910s correspondence with John Quinn and others, and it’s a pity. Great art from a generally terrible person, I do encounter that a lot. He sounds like a fascinating ‘character’ to encounter during his London sojourn, but rather obnoxious as well.)
His fixation on money and usury in this ostensibly cultural guide feels somewhat personal: though I haven’t read a biography of Pound (I should! Sounds interesting) (update: currently reading “Ezra Pound: The Solitary Volcano” by John Tytell) I wonder if he was dunned by creditors and lenders often and that lies behind a lot of it. But given his gratuitous use of the ‘n-word’ elsewhere as well, there is no excusing him.
But he WAS a genius and there are many priceless lines. Here’s one:
“…the Old Testament is most certainly in the main a record of revolting barbarism and turgid poesy.”
Mmm Hmm. There are a good number of priceless and insightful lines which are just as contrarian, thought-provoking, and incisive.
Plus there’s loads of interesting esoteric “kultur” ranging from the Analects of Confucius to Medieval Provençal poetry, Neoplatonism to Vorticism. Clearly for Pound the ne plus ultra of culture and ethics may be found in the “Analects” and “Odes” of Confucius; I’ve read neither so if I’ve derived a benefit from this book, it will be that I now want to read the “Analects”. Pound does make an admirable case for re-examining the Western Canon as taught, disposing of some western ‘classics’ without much merit and broadening it to include works like those of Confucius. He then spends a lot of time in a close reading of Aristotle’s (or ‘Arry’s’, as he puts it in typically irreverent style) “Ethics” dismissing much of it as waffling nonsense. His proposed essential curriculum is very limited and diverse: a foundation, a starting point. Beyond Confucius and some obscurities (Frobenius, anyone??), “The Odyssey” figures; so does the US Constitution.
There’s also a bit of the sheet music for his Opera (?) “Villon” which I’ve never heard of but which is clearly based on the French Renaissance poet who was deliciously disreputable and an inspiration to Jarry and other heroes of mine…so that’s interesting and I will want to hear that too. (Looking on YouTube it seems to be there in its entirety and excerpt). And maybe it’s time to also look into Villon’s poetry some more!
(Update: there’s a good recording of “Le Testament de Villon” on YouTube (just one I think) and it is magnificent, like a late Medieval “Beggar’s Opera” with modernist touches. I recommend checking it out if that description tempts.)
So it’s still edifying, despite the unfortunate political squibs and casual bigotry. I expected the edification but not the latter, going in.
NB: there’s also a bit of Classical Greek cited in the text without translation. Understood that in 1938 most with a good liberal education would have some Greek; but as that’s no longer the case translation in the footnotes would be welcome in future editions if they haven’t yet been added. (My copy is vintage). Nevertheless one generally can follow Pound’s argument even when he isn’t parsing the Greek or questioning a translation. Pound was certainly an intellectual elitist, and disparaging of the general public’s capacity in that department, so he didn’t try and edify the hoi polloi with translation in footnotes.
Another quotation which, ironically, I might apply to Pound’s “Guide To Kultur”, from which it’s taken:
“A hodge-podge of astute comment and utter bosh, material for a sottisier, but above all subversive, morally bad.”
He rails against usury early on (and throughout) and one gets his subtext, especially given the place (Fascist Italy, he was living in Rapallo) and era; 2/3 of the way in (once he’s warmed you up?) he starts talking about ’Hebrews’. Sigh. I expect he saw a renaissance and a future in Fascism, as he well might have in 1937-8. Ugly then, and hard to forgive in retrospect.
(Update: his anti-semitism seems to have been an earlier fixation of his than I’d realized, based on the excellent biography I’m now reading; it’s present in his 1910s correspondence with John Quinn and others, and it’s a pity. Great art from a generally terrible person, I do encounter that a lot. He sounds like a fascinating ‘character’ to encounter during his London sojourn, but rather obnoxious as well.)
His fixation on money and usury in this ostensibly cultural guide feels somewhat personal: though I haven’t read a biography of Pound (I should! Sounds interesting) (update: currently reading “Ezra Pound: The Solitary Volcano” by John Tytell) I wonder if he was dunned by creditors and lenders often and that lies behind a lot of it. But given his gratuitous use of the ‘n-word’ elsewhere as well, there is no excusing him.
But he WAS a genius and there are many priceless lines. Here’s one:
“…the Old Testament is most certainly in the main a record of revolting barbarism and turgid poesy.”
Mmm Hmm. There are a good number of priceless and insightful lines which are just as contrarian, thought-provoking, and incisive.
Plus there’s loads of interesting esoteric “kultur” ranging from the Analects of Confucius to Medieval Provençal poetry, Neoplatonism to Vorticism. Clearly for Pound the ne plus ultra of culture and ethics may be found in the “Analects” and “Odes” of Confucius; I’ve read neither so if I’ve derived a benefit from this book, it will be that I now want to read the “Analects”. Pound does make an admirable case for re-examining the Western Canon as taught, disposing of some western ‘classics’ without much merit and broadening it to include works like those of Confucius. He then spends a lot of time in a close reading of Aristotle’s (or ‘Arry’s’, as he puts it in typically irreverent style) “Ethics” dismissing much of it as waffling nonsense. His proposed essential curriculum is very limited and diverse: a foundation, a starting point. Beyond Confucius and some obscurities (Frobenius, anyone??), “The Odyssey” figures; so does the US Constitution.
There’s also a bit of the sheet music for his Opera (?) “Villon” which I’ve never heard of but which is clearly based on the French Renaissance poet who was deliciously disreputable and an inspiration to Jarry and other heroes of mine…so that’s interesting and I will want to hear that too. (Looking on YouTube it seems to be there in its entirety and excerpt). And maybe it’s time to also look into Villon’s poetry some more!
(Update: there’s a good recording of “Le Testament de Villon” on YouTube (just one I think) and it is magnificent, like a late Medieval “Beggar’s Opera” with modernist touches. I recommend checking it out if that description tempts.)
So it’s still edifying, despite the unfortunate political squibs and casual bigotry. I expected the edification but not the latter, going in.
NB: there’s also a bit of Classical Greek cited in the text without translation. Understood that in 1938 most with a good liberal education would have some Greek; but as that’s no longer the case translation in the footnotes would be welcome in future editions if they haven’t yet been added. (My copy is vintage). Nevertheless one generally can follow Pound’s argument even when he isn’t parsing the Greek or questioning a translation. Pound was certainly an intellectual elitist, and disparaging of the general public’s capacity in that department, so he didn’t try and edify the hoi polloi with translation in footnotes.
Another quotation which, ironically, I might apply to Pound’s “Guide To Kultur”, from which it’s taken:
“A hodge-podge of astute comment and utter bosh, material for a sottisier, but above all subversive, morally bad.”
July 4, 2025
"Culture is what is left after a man has forgotten all he was supposed to learn". Ezra Pound does not write like any other poet because he thinks like no one else. "Mind leaping like dolphins". This stimulating and often perplexing guide to thinking, reading, and writing is organized much like THE CANTOS. No progression from cause to effect or enumeration of great books and ideas but one thought in one age in one country leaping into another. Pound's greatest achievement in this short treatise is to show the bankruptcy of the Greek teachers of the West, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, in grasping simple ideas of art and morality, which for Pound are one and the same. "Garbage" he calls "Harry-Stots" ETHICS. Away with Greek and Christian systems of morality! The sacred East, the China of Confucius, provides us ethics without heaven and hell, sky God or afterlife. Pound insists on THE ANALECTS of Confucius, "Kung" and THE ODES OF CHINA poetry collection gathered by Kung for a first-rate ethical education. All history since Gibbon has been a waste, Pound continues, for "there is no history without economics". Pound's recommendations for understanding politics and "the money question" starts with Brook Adams, THE LAW OF CIVILIZATION AND DECAY. And, what of his native America? "No one can comprehend the United States without reading the JEFFERSON-ADAMS CORRESPONDENCE". Eccentric, perhaps? Yet a far surer guide to getting an education in culture-"Kulchur" than a dozen college courses.
August 30, 2022
Don’t let the title fool you. You will not find herein any sort of”guide” to “kulchur” or anything else. What you will find is Ezra Pound’s very personal ramblings over topics ranging from musical performance to economics. Pound is widely read, and his pronouncements cover the range of history from ancient times (including Confucius, whom he adores, and Aristotle, whom he excoriates) right down to 1937, the date of authorship. Several threads run through the book. One is usury, which Pound detests, and on which he feels qualified to expostulate since he fancies himself an expert on economics and the theory of money. Another is the primacy of poetry as a human endeavor, particularly, of course, Pound’s own poetry, for the sake of which he abandoned all concern for the liberty of the individual (other individuals, that is) and embraced the fascist state.
May 22, 2022
Pretty good book, but very strange. It would probably be a good thing to have on hand throughout one's life, so you can take the time to actually read all of the various sources Pound references (if one cared to do so). Without consulting those external sources, this book can often be opaque, as Pound will simply refer to a chapter and line out of Aristotle or Confucius and then provide his commentary. Two things really stood out to me, if only because Pound repeats them so much: Confucius apparently has all the answers one could ever want, and everything cultural, political, or social can be reduced in part to issues about money and the issuance of money and debt by the state. The fact that the aptly named Pound is so obsessed with money is really remarkable.
September 2, 2024
Lots of gems in here. But it comes at you fast helter skelter. Take a break after each page, read the companion by Araujo and then seek out Confucius, John Scotus Eriugena, Iamblichus, Porphyry, St Ambrose, Frobenius, Kitasono Katue, Frederick Soddy, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Gemistus Plethon and the others to get a real education at Ezuversity. Read them and understand. It will take some time.
To the high air, to the stratosphere, to the imperial
calm, to the empyrean, to the baily of the four towers
the NOUS, the ineffable crystal: …
To the high air, to the stratosphere, to the imperial
calm, to the empyrean, to the baily of the four towers
the NOUS, the ineffable crystal: …
June 18, 2022
Readable. At times brilliant. Somewhat scattered. I’ve been convinced to read Confucius. Though I’ve read it twice, I don’t enough Greek to comment on Pound’s critique of Nicomachean Ethics. His claim that Aristotle would have said money is based on use/demand rather than the common modern translation “value” is interesting.
Wouldn’t recommend to anyone not already versed in Pound’s other writing (“Personae” or his translation of “Women of Trachis” would serve better)
Wouldn’t recommend to anyone not already versed in Pound’s other writing (“Personae” or his translation of “Women of Trachis” would serve better)
May 17, 2023
One of the most potently disorganised manifestoes (art + politics) I have come across; the sections concerning how it's significant what U.S. Senators are reading, and the poetic logic therein, are brilliant. But the endless analyses of Aristotle, or 'Arry', as Pound calls him, are not.
December 16, 2018
The definite conclusion of this book in paraphrase: " Although we've gotten through all of this criticism, we have to admit plato must be seen as... at-least somewhat right"
February 20, 2025
Some great stuff, some not so great stuff. You probably take out what you put in , and I put in very little.
November 6, 2025
pessima traduzione e testo pieno zeppo di refusi
November 9, 2011
really unfortunate that pound digressed into this non-sense politricking after his internment. obviously he was made crazy, but he was on the precipice before that. either way, what began earning a good deal of my highlighter quickly earned little, then none, the further things went down the monetary slope. tragic. the most tragic part of all is how impossible it is to not transpose his late life bullshit back over the fruitful periods of his youth. i just wanted it to be over. if you are looking for insights into pound's writing or influences or rationales before he went crazy, this is not a good source at all. in fact, go opposite in what seems to be all cases pound, and rely on outside sources rather than the actual writer, which is backwards to usual, of course, but imperative in his case. other than his letters. those are real wizzbangers.
August 24, 2015
Synthetic proto-fascist cultural treatise/prose poem/rant. I have to admit I kind of liked it, though I didn't have the patience to read it very carefully. It literally seems like he's going insane at this point, and the paranoid ranting about usury and monetary systems, in 1938, is deeply distressing - and yet there is something just brilliant about his writing and sympathetic about his struggle to reboot tired assumptions about "kulchur."
November 3, 2007
This book is a litle confusing but really funny, albeit unintentionally. Basically Ezra Pound is just telling you what is and what is not worth your time culture-wise, in his opinion, and his opinion is always very very strong.
May 9, 2015
Переведенный на русский кусок, который называется Zweck, и который я нихуя не понял. Либо перевод был дерьмовый, либо я дерьмовый, либо Эзра дерьмовый. Одно из трех. Я ставлю на первое, что еще остается. Пусть это останется здесь как напоминание.
July 27, 2007
Not bad, but nowhere near what it should have been, considering...
January 4, 2009
My favorite Pound. Excellent read along with the 20-30 and 40-50 Cantos, or all of them. (snicker)
Read
July 7, 2010I'm slowly making my way through this'r. But it's awesome.
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