Ezra Pound: Poet; A Portrait of the Man & His Work. Vol 2: The Epic Years 1921–1939

Picking up where Volume 1 ends, here Moody (emeritus, Univ. of York, UK; Thomas Stearns Eliot: Poet) delves into the middle years of the life of Ezra Pound (1885–1972) in Europe, where he continued work on his Cantos, which he envisioned as the "foundation myth of a universal civilization." As the Depression crippled the world's economy Pound became obsessed with "usury," convinced that the Jewish-dominated banking industry was to blame for the problem and that government should control capital to benefit the whole nation. Pound became devoted to Mussolini because the dictator made Italy's banks serve the people. Paradoxically, blind to Mussolini's shortcomings, the poet felt that the ruler espoused the principles of America's founding fathers and Confucius concerning responsible government. The book examines Pound's blatant anti-Semitism, based on his beliefs about the banking establishment, ideas that morphed into a general prejudice against Jews, although Pound maintained his convictions were based on economics rather than race. Moody presents his subject as a "flawed individual…caught up in the turmoil of his darkening time and struggling, often raging, against the current to be a force for enlightenment."