Ezra Pound\'s Fascist Aesthetic

32



Ezra L. Pound. "#16 England." Radio Speeches of World War II, edit. Leonard W. Doob. (Westport, Conn. Greenwood Press, 1978).
Robert Casillo, "Anti-Semitism, Castration, and Usury in Ezra Pound," Criticism 25 (Summer 1983): 239-240.
Casillo, "Anti-Semitism." 245.
Casillo, "Anti-Semitism," 251.
Alexander De Grande, "Women Under Italian Fascism," The Historical Journal 19 (1976): 947.
Robert Casillo, The Genealogy of Demons, (Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1988), 4.
Casillo, Genealogy, 4-5.
Casillo, Genealogy, 5.
Casillo, Genealogy, 6.
Casillo, Genealogy, 7.
Ibid.
Casillo, Genealogy, 207.
Andrew Parker, "Ezra Pound and the 'Economy of Anti-Semitism'," Boundary 2 11 (Fall 1982-Winter 1983): 104.
Parker, "Ezra Pound," 109.
Parker, "Ezra Pound," 108.
Parker was in particular responding to Casillo, mentioned previously, as he was the prominent writer on the topic at the time. Casillo never questioned the Pound's anti-Semitism and in fact dedicated most of his book to the ways in which anti-Semitism is shown in Pound's work.
Stephen Harnett, "The Ideologies and Semiotics of Fascism: Analyzing Pound's Cantos 12-15," Boundary 2 20 (Spring 1991): 66.
Leon Surrette, Pound in Purgatory: From Economic Radicalism to Anti-Semitism, (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 1.
Surette, Pound in Purgatory, 6.
In Jefferson And/Or Mussolini, Pound calls Hitler an "almost, pathetic hysteric" and called Nazi fascism "a parody, a sickly and unpleasant parody of Fascism." A. David Moody, Ezra Pound: Poet, A Portrait of the Man and His Work, (OUP Oxford, 2014), 236.
Bill Freind, "'Why do you want to put your ideas in order?': Re-Thinking the Politics of Ezra Pound," Journal of Modern Literature 23 (Summer 2000): 545.
Corporatism is the sociopolitical organization of a society based around certain interest groups, such as agriculture of labor. This does not mean that corporations are in power; the word simply comes from the Latin corpus, meaning body. Corporatism was seen as an alternative to socialism as it emphasized social justice but not the abolition of private property.
Freind, "Re-Thinking," 546.
Ibid.
Freind, "Re-Thinking," 547.
David Barnes, "Fascist Aesthetics," Journal of Modern Literature 24 (Fall 2010): 19.
Ibid.
Barnes, "Fasicst Aesthetics," 20.
Barnes, "Fascist Aesthetics," 21.
The rape story is an archetype employed especially in classic literature. In this case, the rape story is how men regain their masculinity after being "castrated" by modernization. By raping and impregnating the woman, he is demonstrating his virility and taking back the masculinity that he lost when he was "circumcised." Sharon Stockton, The Economics of Fantasy: Rape in Twentieth Century Literature (Columbus, Ohio: Ohio State University Press, 2006), 3.
Stockton, Economics of Fantasy, 8.
Ibid.
Matthew Feldman, Ezra Pound's Fascist Propaganda, 1935-45 (New York: Palgrave, 2013), 1.
Ezra Pound, The Cantos of Ezra Pound (New York: New Directions Books, 1970), 229.
Ibid.
Pound, Cantos, 248.
Pound, Cantos, 435
Ezra Pound, Social Credit: An Impact (London: Faber, 1935), 6.
Kate O'Connor, Lost Generation, (University of Oxford), accessed December 11th, 2015, https://writersinspire.org/content/lost-generation.
Pound, Cantos, 432.
Pound, Cantos, 437.
Ezra Pound, Radio Speeches, #4.
Pound, Cantos, 238.
Pound, Cantos, 247.
Pound, Cantos, 432.
Pound, Cantos, 238.
Pound, Social Credit, 6.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #16.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #35.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #37.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #51.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #37.
Patrick Myers, "Daily Life Under Mussolini," accessed 12/11/2015, http://users.dickinson.edu/~osborne/myers/mussolini_life.htm.
Ezra Pound, Jefferson And/Or Mussolini: L'idea Statale Fascism As I Have Seen It (London: Stanley Nott, 1935), 112.
Ibid.
Pound, Jefferson, 113.
Pound, Jefferson, 128.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #30.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #37.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #51.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #68.
Pound, Social Credit, 5.
Pound, Cantos, 468.
Anti-clerics are those who oppose the clergy. Reasons for this opposition vary from alleged abuse of power, attempting to influence the political system, and improper handling of money, including in Pound's case, accusations of usury.
Pound, Jefferson, 31.
Pound, Jefferson, 26.
Pound, Jefferson, 39.
Pound, Cantos, 202.
Pound, Jefferson, 98.
Pound, Jefferson, 39.
Pound, Jefferson, 49.
Pound, Jefferson, 50.
Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nationale (Voluntary Militia for National Security), the paramilitary wing of the National Fascist Party. They were called "Blackshirts" because of the black uniform they wore.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #20.
Pound, Radio Speeches, #27.
American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise, "Anti-Semitism In the United States: Henry Ford Invents A Jewish Conspiracy," accessed December 11th, 2015, https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/ford1.html.
Pound, Jefferson, 85.
Pound, Jefferson, 127.
Pound, Cantos, 468.







Ezra Pound's Fascist Aesthetic







Victoria Heeter








History 49091
Dr. Adams
December 11th, 2015
On March 15th 1942, Ezra Pound sat down in front of a microphone to record one of his most inflammatory radio broadcasts during World War II. "Your enemy is not Germany, your enemy is money on loan," he claimed. He spoke to the Allied powers in this broadcast, but mostly England, which he'd become most disillusioned with during the 1920s. What he was saying was that the enemy was not the Axis powers, but the Jews: "You let the Jew in and the Jew rotted your empire, and you yourselves out-Jewed the Jew." This series of radio broadcasts paid for and produced by the Italian government marked the transition for Pound from an opposition to Jewry based on economic beliefs to one of racial anti-Semitism.
Benito Mussolini became Prime Minister of Italy in 1922 when he effectively consolidated power in his March on Rome in October. He transformed Italian society from one of a traditional, rural country into a modern, industrial power that would eventually fight the Allies in World War II. The thing that attracted people like Pound to Mussolini was his ability to so quickly change the state of the country after the devastating impact World War I had on all of Europe. Although Italy was not the country most affected by the war, it dealt with many of the same economic and social problems as France and Germany. His ability to organize and lead excited the population of Italy during the 1920s and many people, including Pound, made the pilgrimage to Italy for the chance to be part of history and to experience the new, modern ideology of Fascism first hand.
What attracted Pound to this ideology was not only its economic and political platforms, but the way in which Fascism transformed Italian culture and society into something that was modern, but at the same time traditional. This is what is so confusing about analyzing Fascism. It seems almost schizophrenic to want to mesh the modern with traditional values, but Fascists were able to reconcile modern technology and industry with traditional Italian beliefs. While Italy was constructing new cities and producing consumer goods that people wanted such as the radio, traditional roles were also being encouraged. Having large families and attending church was encouraged during this period as a way to create a more tightly knit community and to cultivate national pride. Agriculture and rural life was also encouraged. This paper will argue that while Pound was interested in the economic and political changes promised under Fascism, it was ultimately the cultural and societal aspects, such as his racial anti-Semitism, the destructive impact of World War I on the psychology of Europeans, and Pound's obsession with traditional Greek, Roman, and Chinese societies that attracted him most to Fascism as opposed to other conservative ideologies.
This paper focuses primarily on Pound, but he was not the only literary figure attracted to Fascism. His fellow poet and close friend, T.S. Eliot, also found himself leaning toward more authoritarian ideologies. Although he never made the leap that Pound did in moving to Italy and pledging his loyalty to the Fascist government, he did become a British citizen because he was sick of the gaudy American lifestyle. Like Pound, people accused Eliot of being an anti-Semite, but this is hard to prove as he did not produce any documents that explicitly referenced Jews. In this way, Pound can almost be seen as a more extreme version of Eliot. It is important for comparison reasons to note that Pound was not the only Modernist author who can be seen making this transition toward authoritarian ideologies.
Before analyzing this topic, one must consider the work done relating to Pound first. Robert Casillo was one of the first authors to write extensively on this topic. In his 1983 article, "Anti-Semitism, Castration and Usury in Ezra Pound," Casillo analyzed Pound's Cantos for evidence of anti-Semitism. The Cantos are a challenging work to analyze given the fact that they were written over a period of almost 30 years, from 1924 to 1948. Pound's writing style and political beliefs may very well have changed during this time period and Casillo kept this in mind when writing his article. Casillo started the article by asserting that he did not believe Pound's anti-Semitism was something he "picked up" from others to use in his work, but was a real personal belief that manifested in his language and the way he thought about fascism and the world around him. The interesting thing about Casillo's article is that he analyzed The Cantos from a literary as well as a political perspective. He concluded that Pound put a lot of subtle metaphors about Jews into The Cantos. One of the things Pound wrote about frequently was circumcision. He seemed to have an obsession with circumcision, believing that circumcised Jews had been "mutilated" or "castrated." Pound also had an obsession with the male form itself, making many references to the phallus, comparing it to the sun. His references to light are scattered throughout The Cantos and usually juxtaposed with the Jew who hates light. Therefore, in his thinking, Jews do not procreate because they do not like the sun. For many Fascists, procreation was extremely important for sustaining their nation. This was not a uniquely Italian phenomenon though. Other Fascist movements around Europe employed procreation rhetoric in an attempt to build back up their nations to greatness in an era where birth control was becoming more popular and women were venturing outside of traditional household roles. After the war, the population had been devastated by deaths of young men and birth rates were falling due to the previous factors. For Italian fascists, sustaining the population was of utmost importance and they even gave away incentives to get families to grow, including more vacation days for working fathers and awards given to women who had a certain amount of children. Pound seemed to be using the campaign for increased birth rates as propaganda against Jews, who in his mind, spent too much time trying to make money or working on their personal gains.
In his book, The Genealogy of Demons, Casillo attempted to relate fascism to Pound's technique and language by analyzing his works, especially The Cantos. Casillo determined from his analysis that Pound went through four stages of anti-Semitism. The first stage originated in his youth where he acquired an anti-Semitic view from his environment in suburban Philadelphia. The second stage began when Pound returned to America in 1910 after spending two years in England. This stage was characterized by internal hostility and contempt toward the mass Jewish immigration happening in America at the time. The third stage started in the 1920s when Pound became interested in politics. This stage was characterized by open hostility and verbal violence toward Jews. Pound began to associate Judaism with international finance, war profiteering, and usury, which he wrote about extensively. Pound's admiration of Mussolini was most obvious at this stage especially in his book Jefferson and/or Mussolini. It is interesting to note that in this book Pound dismisses Hitler as an "almost pathetic hysteric" and made it clear that he preferred Italian fascism over Hitler's brand. Pound had no use for Hitler and tried desperately to distance Mussolini from Hitler even though the political alliance between Italy and Germany was becoming more obvious by the day. The fourth stage represented an interesting change for Pound. His infamous 1940's radio broadcasts were filled with biological racism toward Jews, strikingly similar to what Nazi propaganda was portraying. Pound uses words such as "bed bugs" and "vermin" to describe Jews and calls for "a racial solution" to the Jewish problem. Although he still claimed Hitler was a fanatic, Pound's ideas during this period started to resemble Nazi ideology. Throughout the book, Casillo took the reader through these stages and attempted to prove that Pound did not simply use anti-Semitic language in his work as a literary technique to appeal to the sentiment at the time, but that he was in fact a raging anti-Semite in addition to having Fascist ideological views. For Casillo, the phenomenon of projection, or finding a scapegoat for one's fears and anxieties, was always a central component of unravelling the mystery of Pound's anti-Semitism. Much like the Nazis, Pound was desperate to find a scapegoat for his fears about the future of the world and his place in modern society. Fascism was not just a political or economic view for Pound, but a way of life that people could turn to for stability in an ever changing modern world.
In 1982, Andrew Parker wrote "Ezra Pound and the 'Economy' of Anti-Semitism," which discussed anti-Semitism in the context of usury. Anti-Semites have long claimed that Jews are associated with usury and base their anti-Semitism solely on that assumption. He too agreed with the large pool of scholars that the relationship between Pound's ideas and his literary work should be addressed. However, he added to this his belief that Pound was not in fact an anti-Semite, but that he simply hated usury, which anyone was capable of taking part in. Pound's ideas of economics are drawn from Aristotle, who condemned usury and Pound addressed the issue multiple times in The Cantos. To take this view, one would have to ignore the countless times Pound said negative things about Jews either through metaphor in his literature or literally in writings and radio broadcasts. Most writers on the topic believe that Pound was an anti-Semite so Parker went against the grain and forged his own idea. With this in mind, Parker believed that Pound may have been a Fascist who hated usury, but those criteria don't always lead one to becoming an anti-Semite. While I do agree that Fascism does not automatically mean someone is anti-Semitic, it is clear that Pound harbored a deep hate for Jews, so I do not fully agree with Parker's work. Because Parker's background comes from literary analysis and critical theory, it is possible that the conclusion he came to does not integrate the historical context of what was happening around Pound and instead focuses too much of a reading of Pound's work independent of his political actions and ideas.
In his 1993 article "The Ideologies and Semiotics of Fascism," Stephen Hartnett proposed a reevaluation of the words "fascism" and "ideology." By looking at the history of the rise of Fascism and the causes (such as WWI and failing parliamentary systems), we gain a better understanding of why Pound and others were so enamored with the Italian fascists. Because of the disillusionment stemming from the Great War and the loss of much of his generation to trench warfare, Pound and many other Modernist poets turned to Fascism or other far-right political ideologies in an attempt to cull their anxieties about modernization. I believe Harnett got closer to answering the question of why Pound was attracted to this ideology more fully than previous scholars, but I still believe there needs to be a fuller evaluation of Pound's more romantic attractions to Fascism, such as the comparison many made of Mussolini as a modern Caesar. Harnett and others got stuck on the political and economic aspects of Fascism and didn't discuss the cultural impact of Fascist reform, which attracted many artists.
In his 1999 book Pound in Purgatory: From Economic Radicalism to Anti-Semitism, Leon Surette argued that Pound's anti-Semitism was based on economics, not racial beliefs. Surette acknowledged that Fascism is not inherently anti-Semitic, although anti-Semitism is the most easily identified trait of the most famous fascist regime, Nazi Germany. Realizing this, Surette came to the conclusion that although Pound clearly was an anti-Semite, his belief was based on fear of the "international Jewish conspiracy" and the fear that Jewish usury was ruining the economy and not motivated by biological racism. However, if one concludes that Pound's denunciations of Jews based on race in his radio broadcasts are genuine, this seems to be false. As noted before, Pound himself used the phrase "racial solution," appropriating the language of the Nazis. Pound did not support the Nazi regime, but he obviously did not object to putting Jews into a racial category. Surette argued that because Pound was being paid to do these broadcasts by the Italian government that he did not produce them willingly, but doesn't explain why the Fascists would choose a random expatriate American poet to speak on the war and political issues. Therefore, this idea seems farfetched. Again, this author seems to miss the point of Fascism as a cultural idea by focusing solely on political and economic aspects, ignoring artistic contributions. It is also clearly wrong based on the fact that Pound himself was recorded saying racist things about Jews.
In his 2000 article "'Why do you want to put your ideas in order?': Re-Thinking the Politics of Ezra Pound," Bill Freind made the argument that Pound was not a Fascist, but a corporatist. Yet, Mussolini himself was a corporatist, so that does not explain why Pound could not have been both. The line between corporatism and Fascism can sometimes be blurry, as both groups want to influence society in (what they believe to be) a positive way. He talked extensively about the importance of the peasants and factory workers who suffered under usury, which benefited banks and helped the rich get richer. Although he was not anti-business, Pound disliked non-productive capitalism, that which did not produce products of value or use, such as investment banking. Freind also noted that Pound was fond of Mussolini both as a man and a leader but that in itself does not make him a Fascist. I would disagree however, because Pound was not only a fan of Mussolini, but also of Italian culture during this era, which was full of Fascist organizations, art, and propaganda. It seems hard to believe that Pound could have been so enamored with Italian culture without critiquing the involvement of the regime, unless he was a Fascist himself and approved of what the regime was doing to mold culture and public thought. Instead of classifying Pound as a Fascist, Freind considered him to subscribe to a particularly "totalitarian form of the cult of personality." This seems to just be his way of describing Fascism in other words. Freind also argued that because Pound tended to diverge from typical Fascist thought and form his own opinions about certain things that he couldn't have been a Fascist. He never explained what he thinks of as "typical Fascist thought," perhaps because Fascism does not have a coherent political platform that is consistent among all subscribers of the ideology. Just because Pound did not subscribe to every single thing Mussolini said about Italian fascism does not mean he could not have been a Fascist. Not only did Friend not discuss Pound's attraction to Fascist culture, he outright denied that he was even a Fascist at all.
In his 2010 article "Fascist Aesthetics," David Barnes examines the engagement Pound had with the Fascist regime of Italy, a matter he claimed was far less studied than the actual nature of Pound's fascism. Among the documents the author cited is correspondence between Pound and those representing the Fascist government and those outside of the government, but close to the regime, such as Mussolini's mistress, Margherita Sarfatti. Many of these documents show Pound's deep involvement with Italian culture of the 1930s, which was a very important aspect of Fascist rule. In this article, Barnes concluded that Pound's fascism was a unique blend of "spirituality, modernism and totalitarianism," an interesting conclusion considering Pound claimed to be anti-modernity. However, it must be noted that there is a difference between modernity and modern. Pound did not hate modern inventions, such as trains and radios. He welcomed technological inventions that would bring Italy back to its former glory of being a first rate country. Pound did not like the cultural impact and loss of traditional values that came hand in hand with modern technology, the society of modernity that modern technologies created. Technology changed the way of life for many people, and Pound was particularly concerned about the way technology would isolate men and take away their individuality. He claimed factory workers were no longer seen as people, but only a replaceable part of the machine that made mass produced products. He also saw the dissolution of the family unit and working women as detrimental to the Fascist cause. Like many other authors, Barnes believed that scholars tend to look at "Pound as poet and Pound as fascist" in two different categories. He attempted to bridge the gap between the two "personalities" in his article and I believe he did this well. Unlike other authors, he did not merely address the problem, but attempted to solve it himself. He cited primary sources in which Pound was approving of the Fascist regime in Italy, especially in one case in which Pound seems to approve of Fascist violence.
Sharon Stockton gives an interesting new perspective to the way Pound is studied in her 2006 book The Economics of Fantasy: Rape in Twentieth Century Literature, analyzing the rape story as a way to preserve masculinity in an economic system (capitalism) that is increasingly anti-individualistic. Due to the rise of the machine and isolation of factory work, many modernist writers became anxious about their individualism being taken away by new labor systems. For them, individuality meant masculinity and they feared being "castrated" by capitalism. As noted earlier, Pound was very concerned about castration and emasculation, but Stockton analyzed this fear from a different perspective. By using rape as a metaphor for totalitarianism, Stockton effectively demonstrated why men like Pound were attracted to Fascism. Fascist leaders were seen as great men who penetrated society and impregnated it with Fascist culture. Like the rapist who impregnated the women to give her purpose (in the Fascist mindset, women were only good for childbearing and if they were not pregnant, they had to be made pregnant), the great man (in Pound's case, Mussolini) improved society using his male virility.35 This is a very unique take on Pound's attraction to Fascism. However, it is just a start, because Stockton analyzed just one part of Pound's more spiritual or aesthetic attraction to Fascism. The loss of masculinity is an important part of what attracted Pound to Fascism, but it is not the only reason and other factors such as his biological racism against Jews and his obsession with classic Greek, Roman, and Chinese myths and figures must also be included in a well-rounded discussion of the topic. Fascism was not a one issue ideology and therefore, it is challenging to be able to synthesize all the parts of Pound that were drawn to this new political view.
In his 2013 book Ezra Pound's Fascist Propaganda, 1935-45, Matthew Feldman not only argued that Pound was a Fascist, but that the work he produced was ultimately Fascist propaganda for Britain, Italy, and even Nazi Germany. Feldman included an entire chapter on Pound's radio broadcasts, something most authors do not spend much time with. Interestingly, Feldman did not spend a lot of time focusing on Pound's poetry, just his radio broadcasts and explicitly political publications such as pamphlets and essays. He went much farther than any other author, arguing that Pound did not accidently include Fascism in his work but made a conscious effort to do so. Even authors that believed Pound was a committed Fascist did not go as far as to argue that he supported the Nazi regime, but Feldman did. Although arguably the most radical of all authors read, his arguments are solid and backed up by numerous passages from Pound's work and I find myself leaning toward his conclusion more than most of the other's. Again however, Feldman left out a part of the story by not including Pound's poetic work and like many of the other authors, chooses to focus on one aspect of Pound's political belief instead of a multitude of reasons why he found Fascism attractive. Political beliefs do not tend to be formed on the basis of a single issue and with Pound, it is clear that he believed in Fascism as an alternative form of government because of a handful of reasons, which will now be discussed.
After Pound's death in 1972, scholars of literature became interested in the nature of Pound's fascism. Most agree he was a Fascist not only in theory, but in action. However, his view on culture and society and how these manifested in his political beliefs is not focused on by many scholars. The most common study of Pound's poetry and political writings analyzes his obsession with the evils of usury, or loaning money at high rates of interest to make profit. He began to associate usury with liberal democratic countries such as France and England, claiming this practice led to the fall of both of their empires and subsequently, the culture that made these countries great. He also associated usury with Judaism and claimed France and England had let the Jews destroy their society and culture. Towards the middle of the 1930s, Pound's view on Jews became one of racial anti-Semitism, resembling that of the Nazi viewpoint. However, many scholars will not go as far to say Pound was racist against Jews, just that he hated usury which had long been associated with Jews. In theory, this would mean that if Jews stopped lending money and trying to profit off of debt, Pound would have no problem with them. This is just not true. It is quite obvious from his many writings, especially his speeches during the war, that he was a racial anti-Semite and would be regardless of the Jewish contribution to finance banking.
However, Pound's Fascism was not so one sided as to only be concerned about economics and the Jewish problem. Like many of his friends and literary Fascists, Pound was drawn to this new ideology because of the destruction of World War I. Because of the physical destruction in Western Europe, particularly France, World War I had left a deep psychological scar on an entire generation, specifically young men. World War I left around 17 million people dead and double that amount wounded. Many of these were young men from the front because of the new style of trench warfare that was bloody and drawn out, killing many through painful diseases like trench foot. Those who did survive often came home without limbs and mental illness due to the trauma they experienced firsthand. In this way, even those who did survive were not able to function in society and were seen as part of this lost generation of European men. For Pound, this was particularly devastating. Although he did not serve in the war, he spent the duration of it in Britain so he saw the devastation coming back from the front. Some of his friends were even lost in the war. Pound was among a circle of authors including T.S. Eliot, Wilfred Owen, and Rupert Brooke who used the devastation of war as a subject in many of their literary works. The psychological impact of this loss of a generation was obviously despair, but something that Modernist poets also took from it was more philosophical. Pound uses the language of virility and the male form to get across his view that Europe had been "castrated" because of the astounding loss of male life. This view also comes up later in his writings on Judaism and his opposition to circumcision. He used circumcision as a metaphor for the millions of men who died in the war.
Another widely ignored aspect of Pound's ideology manifesting in his work are his numerous references to ancient Greek, Roman, and Chinese stories and figures. Pound associated these ancient cultures with the pinnacle of civilized society and seemed to want a return to these times. He believed technology and finance capitalism had made man lazy and soft and that they needed to return to a time where men labored and produced unique things of value, instead of the mass production that he claimed made things "cheap." This aspect of his work is particularly evident when he spoke of Mussolini, whether in poetry or speeches. He often compared Mussolini to Caesar, claiming that he was the figure who would return Italy to Roman greatness and reign in Italian society. Pound also made references to Greek philosophers, poets, and architects, as he thought Greek society represented the apex of high art and culture. Interestingly, Pound also admired ancient China, specifically Confucian philosophy. Many of his beliefs on the evils of usury come from his reading of the Great Learning, one of the four books of Confucian belief.
The rest of this paper will focus on the writings of Pound himself. Because he wrote extensively on his political beliefs in both essays and literary pieces, the sources were not hard to find. It came down to being able to analyze the sources and synthesize the ideas into a cohesive argument that explained why Pound's work is viewed as Fascist. The most often cited piece is The Cantos, a large book of poetry Pound wrote over a few decades. This is the only literary work analyzed in this paper and special consideration was taken with this piece because of the varying nature of interpretations. Literature can be taken many different ways so I will explain why I believe what Pound wrote means what it does, not just that I think it means that. The next important piece is Pound's book Jefferson And/Or Mussolini. In this piece, he compared Mussolini to those he viewed as other great leaders, particularly Thomas Jefferson. This work was particularly insightful when it came to the discussion on how Pound saw Mussolini as a savior for Italy, comparing him to classic Roman and Greek archetypes. Another writing by Pound is Social Credit: An Impact, a pamphlet published on his economic beliefs. Although I chose not to focus on economics in this paper, the pamphlet was still helpful when it came to Pound's views on usury and the anti-Semitism connected with it, as Pound managed to work in a few racial jabs throughout. The final source analyzed are the series of radio broadcasts Pound produced for the Italian government throughout the war to raise morale. In the broadcasts, Pound talks about the Jewish problem quite a lot and it's obvious that at this point during the war, his views have become far more extreme.
The most obvious and most referenced topic by scholars of Pound are his opinions on usury. This word comes up throughout all of his major works. References to it in his poetry are particularly interesting because he often personified usury by making it a person, typically a woman. Canto XLV, subtitled "With Usura," starts out "with usura hath no man a house of good stone" implying that usury leads to cheap craftsmanship, a lack of "houses of good stone." "No picture is made to endure nor to live with but it is made to sell and sell quickly." This line implies that art in a society in which usury is present is produced to sell as a commodity, not to be something with meaning that will last centuries, like what he considers "good art" or traditional art from ancient times. This idea of "bad art" versus "good art" will come up later in the discussion of ancient Greek, Chinese, and Roman references found throughout his work. "Stonecutter is kept from his stone, weaver is kept from his loom" and "it ruseteth the craft and the craftsmen it gnaweth the thread in the loom." Pound is saying the craftsmen becomes separated from his art when finance capitalism and non-productive capital are let run wild. This is another idea that will come up later in the discussion of alienation in the workplace.
This idea of usury being the force that was rotting away at society is what led Pound to his anti-Semitic beliefs. In Biblical times, Christians were not allowed to profit off of the lending of money so the task of loaning was left to Jews. This is where the stereotype of Jewish bankers came from. Many people in Europe during the time of the Great Depression saw money lenders as the cause of the crash and in turn, used Jews as a scapegoat because there was already an existing stereotype. Pound was one of the many who fell into the trap of believing stereotypes about Jews. He wrote about Jews and the relationship to usury extensively, especially in The Cantos. At times, he was simply stating the fact that a lot of Jews happened to be money lenders, but at some points he used this fact to draw racist conclusions about this group of people. In Canto L, he used the words "darkness," "blankness," "corruption," "stink," "cowardice," "sores," and "filth" in just a few lines to describe this form of non-productive capitalism. Although he never stated directly these words were intended to describe Jews, it is obvious from what he had written earlier in the Cantos and in other texts that he believed usury was a specifically Jewish problem.
He also talked about corruption within the Catholic Church due to profit based money lending. Canto LXXII says "Sixtus was son of a usurer and all their gang from Peter the denier and all the followers of fattened usury… Clement was son of a banker and Leo decimo son of usurer," referring to popes Sixtus, Clement, and Leo, and the disciple Peter. The "followers of fattened usury" were followers of the Catholic Church. Pound was not the first to point fingers at the Catholic Church in this manner; Martin Luther wrote The Ninety-Five Theses on abuses within the Catholic Church, including usury. Pound also wrote in Social Credit: An Impact that usury is on par with sodomy, both of which condemned as sins. It is interesting that he claimed this on the basis of sin, a religious belief, when he was so against the Church. This could be interpreted as him subtly calling the clergy sodomites, as he had already criticized them as usurers and comparing the two would lead people to that conclusion.
The physical destruction of World War I also had an impact on Pound's view on politics. Not only had the countryside been scarred by trench warfare, but the many soldiers were killed in this war, far more than any previous war. This was due to new battlefield techniques that drew up the war and made it even more bloody. Those who did survive came home with physical disabilities such as missing limbs or deafness and many suffered from post-traumatic stress, which was called "shell shock." These physical and mental disabilities and illnesses made it extremely difficult for veterans to return to normal life as they were constantly suffering. Many committed suicide or were abandoned by their families because they were an embarrassment. Because of this phenomena, these people became known as the "lost generation" as they were often not seen by every day society, but still clearly existed. Pound saw this happening when British soldiers would return from the front and frequently compared the loss of limbs and mental stability to the loss of the male self or virility. Using destructive imagery, Pound illustrated this metaphor in the Cantos various times when he wrote about World War I. "If one begins to remember the dung war, certain facts will well up again," and he went on to talk about "guiding an experienced youth." Young, inexperienced men made up the majority of those fighting in World War I and Pound lamented their loss in his poetic work.
Those who did survive the destruction of World War I met a new society when they returned home. In his 4th radio broadcast titled "This War On Youth- On A Generation," he talked about war being waged on those under 40 by the aging population that was in power of the political system of Europe. He was referencing the fact that those who returned from war found that their elder's fear of the younger generation was forcing them to "kill them off before the IDEAS of my generation went into effect." The new political ideas of this younger generation upset the status quo and in turn Pound claimed "war, of course they want war, they want all the young gals for themselves." This fear of growing older and being replaced by the younger, more virile generation Pound identified with was on the minds of the generation who had gotten Europe into World War I. Those men in their 20's and 30's began to realize the power they had over this dying generation and Pound claimed "It is NOT necessary to have the earth ruled by senile bleeders and swindlers." While the youth wanted to see change within society, the older generations of Europe wanted things to stay the same so they could stay in power. This was one of the issues Fascism wrestled with, always claiming to be the ideology that championed youth and new ideas.
Pound also used metaphors about penetration and virility to illustrate how the Fascism revived Italy. In the Cantos, he said "Hast thou entered more deeply the mountain? The light has entered the cave. The light has gone down into the cave." Not only was he using light contrasting with darkness, he was also using a metaphor of penetration. The light is penetrating the mountain and illuminating the darkness just as Mussolini penetrated Italian society and reawakened them. On the next page, he said "in the middle of Europe in the black hole of all mental vileness… among embastardized cross-breeds." He didn't state specifically, but throughout the poem he made reference to the Jewish race of cross-breeds so it's obvious he was using the metaphor of the black hole to represent the Jews which the light must penetrate and rid Europe of. Later in the work, he referenced "the eternal war between light and mud" another reference to light. Agricultural references are in practically every line of Canto XLVII when Pound repeated "begin thy plowing" multiple times along with "think of plowing," "the bull runs blind on the sword" both agricultural and penetrative references. At points during this canto, Pound dropped the metaphors completely and said "hast thou found a nest softer than cunnus (Latin for vulva) or hast thou found better rest hast'ou a deeper planting." In a pamphlet on economics, Pound wrote "the sword… can protect us from foreign invasion." The sword represented Mussolini and was intended as a penetrative metaphor, protecting from foreign invasion. Pound also referenced penetration in his radio speeches. In speech #16, titled "England" he said that the Jews had been penetrating European society for years, a "mild penetration" and that they still "had at least the semblance of control," but that this control was being lost because Jews were taking over society and politics. It is clear that penetration is a deeply important symbol for Pound as he uses it numerous times across much of his work.
Fertility and the preservation of the race was another issue deeply important to Pound. Although he never makes it clear exactly what race he thinks of himself as, he clearly saw the Jews as a separate race that Europe must arm themselves against. The weapon he wanted European nations to use was that of increased population. In radio speech #35 "The Precarious," he claimed "England has chosen birth control instead of eugenics" and continued "contraception, killin' the native stock before it was hatched, instead of breeding a population." Pound phrased this in a way that made it clear he saw babies as tools to be crafted into weapons to fight the Jewish infiltration of society. In #37 "To Be Late (Essere In Ritardo)," he said "move toward the production of thoroughbreds," using the language of the modern assembly line to manufacture a force that could keep out the Jews. In radio speech #51 "Disbursement of Wisdom," he said "One of these days you will have to start thinking about the problem of race, BREED, preservation. I do NOT like to think of my race as going toward total extinction, NOR into absolute bondage." As the speeches went on, Pound's assertion that his "race" was in danger of being dominated by the Jew grew and he became more hysteric in his racism, grasping at anything to prove to his listeners that they must fight back against the "half breed Jew" by strengthening their own race.
Pound also found it deeply disturbing that mass production and assembly line based work was taking away the individuality of men. In Jefferson And/Or Mussolini he wrote "the idea of cooping up men and making 'em all into UNITS, unit production, denting in the individual man, reducing him to a mere amalgam." This in particular was a problem the Fascist regime tried to tackle. They passed laws to make work days shorter and breaks longer, gave more vacation days, and even did seemingly insignificant things like building gardens outside of factories for workers to enjoy their lunch in.
It is important to remember that Pound came from a literary background, so one must analyze some of the techniques he used in his work and how it related to his political views. One of the most obvious was his use of literary allusions. He drew on mostly classical themes, ranging from Greek, Roman, and Chinese myths and historical figures. One of the most influential figures in the formation of his political ideology was Confucius, from whom Pound's views on usury originated. Pound admired Confucian philosophy so much that he edited a version of the Great Learning, one of the four books in Confucian teaching, and wrote his own introduction. He admired the Chinese form of government which was a merit based system based on Confucian philosophy. Jefferson And/Or Mussolini includes a chapter on what Pound found attractive about Confucian style government. "The doctrine of Confucius is: that you bring order into your surroundings by bringing it first into yourself" is an integral quote in understanding why Pound was drawn to totalitarian style government. He also noted "private gain is not prosperity" and "hoarding is not prosperity," again tying in the idea of usury being detrimental to the nation. The chapter concludes with "for 2,500 years, whenever there has been order in China, you can look for a Confucian at the root of it." Pound even went as far to finish off his work by concluding that "the Duce will not stand with despots and the lovers of power but with the lovers of ORDER." The word "order" is important because it is capitalized, set in its own paragraph, and centered on the page because Pound clearly found it important that it be visible. In The Cantos, when talking about the failures of Western parliamentary systems, he added repeating Chinese characters, as if representing the need to infuse Chinese style government into European political systems. This idea of order came up earlier in the discussion on loss of control and destruction of Europe as a result of World War I. References to Confucian style government are also found in the radio speeches. In #30 "Blast," Pound said "The Great Learning, first book of Confucian philosophy ends: profits do not profit a nation." It is clear that the basis of Pound's opposition to usury comes from Confucian philosophy.
He also used the Chinese example as a basis for his beliefs on selective breeding and eugenics. In radio speech #37 "To Be Late (Essere In Ritardo)," Pound said "You make a race by homogeneity and by avoiding INbreeding. The wisdom of China long ago ruled out inbreedin'. The hundred names, no man to marry a woman of his own name." In speech #51 "Disbursement of Wisdom," he compares the racially homogenous population of China to silk that "no one can tear," and encourages Europe to take the same stance. In #68 "More Names," Pound claimed "The two oriental races which are not yet bekiked are the Japanese and the Chinese." In this passage, not only did Pound make his racism obvious by using a racial slur, he also praised the Chinese for protecting themselves against foreign invasion. He fails to mention how Western powers invaded China and Japan for economic gain, instead choosing to focus solely on the Jew because it was his belief that Judaism was the problem with society, not capitalist demands from the West.
Greek style art and philosophy also attracted Pound. One of the things he loved most about the Fascist regime was their attempt to restore great historical buildings and construct new ones in a traditional architectural style that was reminiscent of the greatness of famous sites of Greek society, such as the Parthenon. This is evident in The Cantos, which on many occasions, Pound included Greek gods and goddesses as characters in his narrative. These figures look down upon the world and lament upon the loss of "good art" in current society. In Social Credit: An Impact, Pound claimed that "everything has become cheap," in reference to both art and mass produced consumer products. These points also relate to the idea of usury and the relation to Jews which was discussed earlier. Pound believed that usury contributed to the creation of "bad art" or modern art which was a creation of the upper class and was contrasted with "good art" or traditional art of Greek times such as drama, philosophy, and architecture. He greatly admired the work of Sophocles and Homer, the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle, and the architecture of Iktinos and Calicrates, architects of the Parthenon. The owner of an art gallery in The Cantos comments "oh, nothing modern we couldn't sell anything modern," implying that modern art was bad and no one who knew anything about "good" art would be interested in it.
Another critical aspect of Pound's Greek obsession has to do with his religious views. Like many Fascists, he was an anti-cleric and rejected organized religion, specifically the influence of the Catholic Church on society and government. In Jefferson And/Or Mussolini however, he commented that he "believed in a more ancient and classical system with a place for Zeus and Apollo." This seems to be in line with his "return to ancient times" rhetoric with the allusions to Greek, Roman, and Chinese myths. Greek religion had a mystical quality for Pound, something he found attractive about these ancient cultures.
The last and perhaps most important allusion Pound made was to Ancient Rome. Pound uses the Great Man theory of history, which claims that the course of history is determined by certain "great men" who lead society with their personal charisma, intelligence, or political skill. On various occasions, he compared Mussolini to Julius Caesar. It was Pound's belief that Mussolini would be the savior of Italy, the way Caesar "saved" Rome. Although many might disagree that Caesar contributed positively to Roman society, his legacy appealed to Pound's authoritarian tendencies and the need he felt to be controlled by a father figure. He found this figure in Mussolini and the image portrayed in his poetry was one of a god like savior. In Canto XLI, Pound referred to Mussolini as "Boss." Pound was obviously looking for a leader who could control the country like a father and run it like a business. It is also important to note that Pound did not think just anyone could do this job. In Jefferson And/Or Mussolini, he writes "fascism is [not] possible in America without Mussolini, any more than I or any enlightened Bolshevik thinks communism is possible in America without Lenin." In this work, Pound referenced America because he was trying to draw the parallel between Thomas Jefferson, a figure he greatly admired and idealized, and Mussolini. This is not to say that Mussolini was doing all the work when it came to this cultural transformation. Pound noted that Mussolini was "reawakening the sense of responsibility" which sounds familiar to the American saying "pull yourself up by your own bootstraps." Pound saw Mussolini as an inspiration for ordinary Italians to do their part in making the country great again. "London is dead, Paris is tired," Pound wrote, "but here the place is alive" Pound was commenting on the sense of excitement he felt throughout Italian society during the early years of Mussolini's reign and described this excitement as "acrimonious." It was an excitement evident in the protests and anger of the Blackshirts and the support from people around them. The kind of excitement in Italy at this time was not a happy excitement, but a fire that burned in the hearts of Italians to return their country to its Roman glory. Abraham Lincoln was another American politician Pound idolized. In radio speech #20 "McArthur," he compared Lincoln to Rome's Cato, stating "after Cato's death there was no Republic, says some old Roman historian. Perhaps after Lincoln's death there was no United States Republic." This seems to reinforce the idea behind the Great Man theory, as Pound is saying that the greatness of the United States died with Lincoln. Henry Ford was another figure Pound idealized and admired. Ford was commonly referenced and admired within the Fascist regime because he was an innovative capitalist, but he produced products that were well made, affordable, and helped the people of his country to better their own lives. In this way, Henry Ford was far more influential than Wall Street bankers or oil tycoons and was often compared to a hero figure, like Pound did with Mussolini. Pound references Ford in his radio broadcast #27 "To Social Creditors" when he said "Henry Ford [is] IDENTIFYIN' the Hebrews as a possible source of infection." Ford was well known for his anti-Semitism as he'd written a series of articles called "The International Jew: The World's Problem" for a Michigan newspaper. Pound not only admired Ford for his industrial prowess, but also for the fact that he was anti-Semitic.
Pound was also interested in the art of Ancient Rome. In Jefferson And/Or Mussolini, he talks about the Italian Awakening, in which Italian architecture was restored to its former state. In the restauri, the Fascist regime led a countrywide campaign in which the "stucco is pried loose" and "the old ineradicable Italian skill shows in the anonymous craftsmen." "The fascist revolution was FOR the maintenance of a certain level of culture… it was NOT a refusal to surrender a great slice of cultural heritage." Culture, specifically Italian or Roman culture, was important to Pound and he believed the Fascist party also had Italian culture and art at the forefront of their minds. He employed romantic language when talking about the Fascist restoration of architecture and believed that the Italian art had simply been covered up by modern creations and needed to be stripped down to be enjoyed in its intended form. Pound craved a return to classical art when he said "stone after stone of beauty cast down and authenticities disputed by parasites." In this way, his idea had an ancient quality to it. Not only did he want to return to a more traditional culture, he wanted to go centuries back in time and relive the glory days of the Greek and Roman empires.
Throughout the research and writing of this paper, it became more and more obvious that Pound's attraction to Fascism was not simply from an economic or political standpoint. As a poet, he was drawn to more the more abstract points of Fascism, the undercurrent of excitement that was felt throughout the country as Mussolini rose to power and started reforming society in the Fascist image. Pound opposed usury not just because it undermined the economic framework of nations, but because he saw the morally decaying impact it had on society and culture. He mourned the loss of "good art" that was replaced with all things modern, what he saw as "cheap." Although Pound was interested in the economic and political changes resulting from this radical change in government, in the end, what really convinced him were the societal and cultural aspects that were not present in other conservative ideologies. Pound's racial anti-Semitism and obsession with the moral decay of usury, the destruction of World War I and the psychological impact it had on his generation, and his love of ancient Greek, Roman, and Chinese culture were the factors that pushed Pound over the edge from traditional conservatism to the authoritarian Fascism of Mussolini.
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