Ezra Pound

Ezra Pound (1885–1972) was an American-born poet, musician, and critic who was a major figure of the Modernist movement in early- to mid-20th century poetry. He was the driving force behind several Modernist movements, notably Imagism and Vorticism. He moved to Europe, where he became a supporter of Benito Mussolini and involved in propaganda for the Axis in World War II. He spent thirteen years in St. Elizabeth mental hospital in the United States after the war, was declared to be incurably insane. After being released, he returned to Italy where he died in the early 1970s.

As a critic, Pound helped establish the careers of some of the 20th century's most influential writers including William Butler Yeats, T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, H.D., Marianne Moore, Ernest Hemingway and D. H. Lawrence.

These are among his best known lines:

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;

Petals on a wet, black bough. "In a Station of the Metro"

Quotes

• “The bad critic criticizes the poet, not the poetry.”

Selected Bibliography

• The Cantos
• Cathay, poems in translation
• Cavalcanti, opera
• Jefferson and/or Mussolini, essays
• L'America, Roosevelt e le Cause della Guerra Presente, essays