The Whispers Of Ezra Pound (And Other Madmen)

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The Whispers Of Ezra Pound (And Other Madmen)
September 03, 2009

Hello Poets and Poetry Lovers

Ezra Pound was the man. A 20th century renaissance man. Not a renaissance man in the usual sense (though he may have been that too), but a renaissance man in the sense that he started a 20th century renaissance that has come to be called Modernism. We can debate whether that is good or not, but it happened and that's a fact.

This month I added a new member to the World Class Poetry staff. Jack Peachum is a bit of a renaissance man of poetry himself. He's widely published, both his poetry and his essays, in the print world and we're glad to have him writing for us here at World Class Poetry. In the last month he's written three pages for us and he's churning out more as we speak. I'm proud to present those pages to you this month in Hyperbole - by the way, one of those pages is on Ezra Pound!

Oh, I hope you'll enjoy the book review of "Whispers of Madmen".

On a sad note, the World Class Poetry Blog is down for maintenance. We hope you haven't missed us too bad, but it's been down for most of the month. Sorry for the inconvenience. We are working to get the site back up as soon as possible and we will come back better than ever. I've got some great things planned for the poetry blog, including a complete redesign.

And now, without further ado (didn't Shakespeare say that?), I give you Ezra Pound and other madmen.

Ezra Pound - Modernism's (Mad) Man Of Action
Schools and Movements
American Life In Poetry - Baby Wrens' Voices
Poetry Book Review: Whispers Of Madmen
Dinkle Dorkle And Other Nut Cases
Poetry Book Of The Month
Classified Ads
Are You Subscribed?
World Class Poetry Networking

Ezra Pound - Modernism's (Mad) Man Of Action

By Jack Peachum

Ezra Pound was an American-born expatriate poet, intellectual and critic, largely responsible for the emergence of Modernism in the early 20th Century. He served as editor of many important literary journals. Notorious for the difficulty of his writings, Pound spent much of his life in Italy where he embraced Fascism and the brutal dictatorship of Benito Mussolini.

Schools And Movements

Who Were The Imagists?

Imagism was a short-lived poetic movement centered in London at the dawn of the 20th century. It signaled the birth of Modernism and its effects are felt in all British and American poetry since that time.

Finish The Essay On Imagism

Were The Symbolist's Dandies Or What?

The literary movement known as Symbolism began in France in the mid-19th Century and lasted until, roughly, the dawn of the 20th Century. It is generally regarded as a bridge between Romanticism and Modernism/Surrealism.

Finish Reading About The Symbolists

American Life In Poetry:
Column 232

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

I’ve built many wren houses since my wife and I moved to the country 25 years ago. It’s a good thing to do in the winter. At one point I had so many extra that in the spring I set up at a local farmers’ market and sold them for five dollars apiece. I say all this to assert that I am an authority at listening to the so small voices that Thomas R. Smith captures in this poem. Smith lives in Wisconsin.

Baby Wrens' Voices

I am a student of wrens.
When the mother bird returns
to her brood, beak squirming
with winged breakfast, a shrill
clamor rises like jingling
from tiny, high-pitched bells.
Who’d have guessed such a small
house contained so many voices?
The sound they make is the pure sound
of life’s hunger. Who hangs our house
in the world’s branches, and listens
when we sing from our hunger?
Because I love best those songs
that shake the house of the singer,
I am a student of wrens.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2005 by Thomas R. Smith, whose most recent book of poetry is Waking Before Dawn, Red Dragonfly Press, 2007. Poem reprinted from the chapbook Kinnickinnic, Parallel Press, 2008, by permission of Thomas R. Smith and the publisher. The poem first appeared in There is No Other Way to Speak, the 2005 “winter book” of the Minnesota Center for Book Arts, ed., Bill Holm. Introduction copyright © 2009 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

Poetry Book Review:
Whispers Of Madmen

Few collaborative poetry books are capable of producing a stunning read, but Whispers of Madmen by Matt Fontana and R.G. Bell is one that I would recommend.

Both Bell and Fontana are established minor poets and graduates of The Citadel in South Carolina. Bell went on to receive a masters degree in creative writing from the University of Dallas. Whispers of Madmen is their first book of poems, together and individually.

Read the rest of the review

Dinkle Dorkle And Other Nut Cases

OK, enough of the serious business. Ezra Pound is cool and all, but he didn't have a Twitter account. I do. And I use it ruthlessly.

My latest collection of Twitter poems (I've been putting out a chapbook a month since June) is titled "Dinkle Dorkle And Other Nut Cases". Yes, it really is titled that and once you read the poems, you'll know why.

In 140 characters or less each, I've managed to put together 30 goofy poems and I think you'll love them. The chapbook is free. With the World Class Poetry Toolbar. I don't know why you don't have it yet. It's the coolest toolbar on the planet. Just for poets.

In addition to "Dinkle Dorkle And Other Nut Cases", you'll get these chapbooks (not all of them are Twitter poems and not all of them are by me):

Hardwood by Gary B. Fitzgerald
Softwood by Gary B. Fitzgerald
Going Dutch
Twitter Poems
Twitpoems
Twitter Haiku And Other Small Gems by Gene Myers
Irreverent Twits
The Heart Of A Sailor by M. Kei

And there's more to come!

In addition to digital poetry chapbooks, you get .pdf broadsides and access to poetry blogs and journals that you can read online. You can even listen to the radio right from the poetry toolbar and keep up with the latest news. It's a virtual coffee shop of poetic gold. Plus, we're constantly updating it to bring you the best and the latest poetry offerings from every corner of the Web.

Download the poetry toolbar now. It's free. And safe from any malware. Totally cool.

Poetry Book Of The Month

Whispers of Madmen by Matt Fontana and R.G. Bell was a sheer delight to read. You'll have to read my review. But if you want to skip the formalities and just get right down to ordering, well, I can make it easy for you.

You can get Whispers Of Madmen straight from Amazon and you'll love the book. Not since Coleridge's and Wordsworth's Lyrical Ballads has there been a collaboration as good. But don't just take my word for it. See it for yourself.

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My Forever
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Joyful In Discovery
Announcing the launching of poetry website joyfulindiscovery.com. This website is devoted to a selection of poems written by published Jamaican poet RLC McFarlane who has been creating beautiful verse for over 50 years. We hope you enjoy them as much as he has enjoyed writing them.
Call For Submissions
Call for Submission for African American female poets. Guidelines: http://akiliamina.com/1_11_Anthology.html
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