THE CLASSIC ANTHOLOGY DEFINED BY CONFUCIUS

by Ezra Pound ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

The politics, personality and poetry of Ezra Pound have been matters of major controversy, but no one has ever questioned his erudition. This volume, a translation of the Chinese Shuh-King, a group of 305 early odes selected by Confucius in 484 B.C. from some 3000 Chinese folk songs and chants, certainly attest to Pound's great learning. They are the culmination of forty years' study of Chinese and follow his previous translations- Cathay and Analects. These poems have been previously well translated by Legge, but Pound, of course, stamps them with his own personal gifts, his flair for directness of vision and subtlety of rhythm. His familiarity with every form and dialect of western language gives him ease and skill and flexibility. How interesting these archaic Chinese ballads of love and war are in themselves is another question. Arthur Whaley thought them too dull to include even one in his famous 170 Chinese Poems. Confucius thought no man could be considered literate without familiarity with them all..... Scholars and literateurs interested in Chinese poetry, admirers of Ezra Pound as an artist, will all be interested- but it is at best a choice and selective public.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1954

Categories: NONFICTION