Cathay
by Ezra Pound
'Cathay ' Summary
Pound worked on the poems in Cathay during the period he made a move from imagism to vorticism. Pound critic Zhaoming Qian calls "The River Merchant's Wife: A Letter", "The Jewell Stairs' Grievance" and "The Exile's Letter" "imagist and vorticist masterpieces".
The opening poem, "Song of the Bowmen of Shu", shows the dominant themes of separation and loneliness, especially the loneliness of the soldier. This is evident also in "Lament of the Frontier Guard", and is perhaps suggestive of Pound's great distress at the loss of life during World War One. Pound used imagery to convey inarticulate emotions in the poems. For example, in "The Jewel Stairs Grievance" a woman waits impatiently; yet her impatience is never directly mentioned and is instead subtly suggested and conveyed through the poem's images. Eventually Pound would use Fenollosa's work as a starting point for what he called the ideogrammic method.
Book Details
Author
Ezra Pound
United States
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an expatriate American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. His works include R...
More on Ezra PoundListen/Download Audiobook
- Select Speed
Related books
Flower-Patch Among the Hills by Flora Klickmann
Tucked away in the hills of the Wye Valley, there is a little flower-patch where anything is possible. "Flower-Patch Among the Hills" is a collectio...
Aladdin, Or, The Wonderful Lamp (A Dramatic Poem, in Two Parts) by Adam Oehlenschläger
It is a retelling of the classic tale of Aladdin and his magical lamp, which has captured the imagination of readers for generations. The book was fi...
Fancy by Lewis Carroll
It is a whimsical and imaginative story that takes the reader on a journey through a fantastical world. Written by the famous author of "Alice's Adven...
Lockerbie Street by James Whitcomb Riley
The poem takes place on Lockerbie Street, a quiet and peaceful neighborhood where the speaker lived as a child. Through the poem, the speaker reminisc...
A Collection of Ballads by Andrew Lang
A Collection of Ballads is a treasury of classic and lesser-known ballads from around the world. It is a must-have for anyone who loves poetry and sto...
The Georgics: A Poem of the Land by Virgil
A poem by the Latin poet Virgil, the second of his three known works. "Georgic" means "to work the land," and on such matters of labour Virgil dwells...
On the Nature of Things by Lucretius
De rerum natura is a first-century BC didactic poem by the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius with the goal of explaining Epicurean philosophy to a...
Ion by Plato (Πλάτων)
In Plato's Ion Socrates discusses with the titular character, a professional rhapsode who also lectures on Homer, the question of whether the rhapsode...
Sappho: A New Rendering by Sappho
"Sappho: A New Rendering" is a book that contains a new translation of the poetry of Sappho, the ancient Greek poet who lived on the island of Lesbos...
Reviews for Cathay
No reviews posted or approved, yet...