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Pound's Progress: the Vortextual Evolution of Imagism and Its Poetic

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Pound's Progress: the Vortextual Evolution of Imagism and Its Poetic Duquesne University Duquesne Scholarship Collection Electronic Theses and Dissertations Summer 2014 Pound's Progress: The orV textual Evolution of Imagism and Its Poetic Image Justin Kishbaugh Follow this and additional works at: https://dsc.duq.edu/etd Recommended Citation Kishbaugh, J. (2014). Pound's Progress: The orV textual Evolution of Imagism and Its Poetic Image (Doctoral dissertation, Duquesne University). Retrieved from https://dsc.duq.edu/etd/752 This Immediate Access is brought to you for free and open access by Duquesne Scholarship Collection. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Duquesne Scholarship Collection. For more information, please contact [email protected]. POUND’S PROGRESS: THE VORTEXTUAL EVOLUTION OF IMAGISM AND ITS POETIC IMAGE A Dissertation Submitted to the McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts Duquesne University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy By Justin Robert Kishbaugh August 2014 Copyright by Justin Robert Kishbaugh 2014 POUND’S PROGRESS: THE VORTEXTUAL EVOLUTION OF IMAGISM AND ITS POETIC IMAGE By Justin Kishbaugh Approved June 16, 2014 ________________________________ ________________________________ Linda A. Kinnahan, Ph. D. Elizabeth Savage, Ph. D. Professor of English Professor of English (Committee Chair) (Committee Member) ________________________________ Judy Suh, Ph. D. Associate Professor of English (Committee Member) ________________________________ ________________________________ James Swindal, Ph. D. Greg Barnhisel, Ph. D. Dean, McAnulty College and Graduate Chair, English Department School of Liberal Arts Associate Professor of English Professor of Philosophy iii ABSTRACT POUND’S PROGRESS: THE VORTEXTUAL EVOLUTION OF IMAGISM AND ITS POETIC IMAGE By Justin Kishbaugh August 2014 Dissertation supervised by Linda A. Kinnahan, Ph. D. Although previous Imagist scholarship considers its subject from chronological, technical, and historical viewpoints, rarely does it combine two—let alone all three—of those perspectives. Undoubtedly, each of those critical lenses contributes to the overall understanding of Imagism. Yet, by not weaving the technique and theory of Imagism into a linear account of its development, those studies tend to view those aspects of Imagism as if they were discrete and stable entities. To counteract that trend, this dissertation argues that Pound’s Imagist program—due to the ambiguity and developing definitions of several of its key terms—allowed the Imagist poets to produce a richly diverse form of Imagism that coexisted with, but was not necessarily contained by, Pound’s evolving concept of that program and its poetic Image. Specifically, by offering a chronological iv critical history of the technical and theoretical components of Pound’s concept of Imagism as they developed, this project highlights the transitive process wherein Pound’s Imagism both resulted from and created a poetic Vortex. Moreover, a close reading of the first Imagist anthology, Des Imagistes, illustrates how Pound’s super-positioned editorial arrangement of that collection allows it to function as an Imagist presentation of the varied origins, influences, and types of imagery existent within the Imagist movement. Ultimately, then, this dissertation concludes that, due to the complex interaction between the individual interpretations of the Image made by the poets featured in Des Imagistes and the writers and literary traditions that influenced them, the anthological structure of that collection offers the most accurate presentation of the admixture of poetic fecundity and editorial pruning that defines Imagism. v DEDICATION For Phyllis K. Martz and Kelly Golat vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my committee for their time and guidance. I would also like to thank Duquesne University and the English Department for accepting me into their community and helping me achieve my educational and professional goals. Additionally, I must offer special thanks to my parents, Larry and Roberta Kishbaugh, for their unwavering encouragement, support, and patronage. Linda A. Kinnahan and Elizabeth Savage also deserve special recognition for their academic and familial-like advice, instruction, and understanding. Finally, I thank Galateia Demetriou, Mike DiGennaro, Ryan Dotson, Carl Della Badia, John Segear, Kristen Phillips, Carlo Ciotoli, Brian Tierney, Nora McBurney, Heather Crawford, Tara Bergman, and all my cousins and family for looking after and taking care of me while I worked toward the completion this project. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iv Dedication .......................................................................................................................... vi Acknowledgement ............................................................................................................ vii Introduction ........................................................................................................................ ix Chapter I: Out of the Vortex: Pound’s Early Imagism and its TwoVortices .......................1 Chapter II: “Getting to the ‘Whirlpoint’: H.D., Upward, and Pound’s Evolution of the Image” ................................................................................................................................48 Chapter III: “Collection as Collage: Des Imagistes and the Arrangement of Imagism” ...91 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................134 Works Cited .....................................................................................................................164 viii Introduction In March 1913, Ezra Pound saw to it that two articles addressing the specifics of “Imagisme” found their way into that month’s issue of Poetry magazine.1 The first article, largely written by Pound, purports to relay the information gathered from an interview with an Imagiste. Pound was, of course, the Imagiste in question, but, in order to imbue the interview with a perceivable sense of authorial distance, he had fellow poet and critic F. S. Flint append his name to it. Among other bits of information, that essay, entitled “Imagisme,” recounts the “few rules” of Imagist poetry: 1. Direct treatment of the “thing,” whether subjective or objective. 2. To use absolutely no word that did not contribute to the presentation. 3. As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in the sequence of the metronome. (199) Following those tenets, the article continues by stating that the Imagists “held also a certain ‘Doctrine of the Image,’ which they had not committed to writing; they said that it did not concern the public and would provoke useless discussion” (199). From the information provided—or not provided—in that article, one gathers that the three Imagist rules and the undefined Doctrine of the Image represent the two shaping forces of Imagist poetry: sculpted formal precision and a content consisting primarily of “things.” In the second article, directly attributed to Pound and entitled, “A Few Don’ts by and Imagiste,” Pound offers his, now famous, definition of an “Image” as “that which 1 When Pound first began publicizing Imagism, he spelled it with a concluding “e” to approximate the titles of the then-prolific French schools of poetry. Eventually critics and the other poets laying claim to the title Anglicized the term to Imagism. Some scholars use Pound’s initial spelling—which he, too, eventually stopped using—as a means for distinguishing Poundian Imagism from its later manifestations. For purposes of continuity and avoiding unnecessary confusion, I will use the Anglicized version of the term when referring to all stages of Imagism unless I am referring to or quoting from a specific article in which Pound was still referring to his “school” of poetry by its quasi-French spelling. ix presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time” (200).2 Following that definition, Pound includes an almost five-page list of technical proscriptions that elaborate on the poetic practices introduced in the previous essay. Although both articles claim to offer direct reports on the practices and product of Imagism, the three most important pieces of information relayed in those articles—the rules, the doctrine, and the definition of an Image—either consist of or rely heavily upon abstractions for their meaning. Thus, the very core of the poetic program that preaches the avoidance of rhetoric in favor of presenting things, ironically, rests upon open-ended terminology that requires additional information and concrete examples to attain definable significance. Further complicating one’s understanding of the specific techniques and product of Imagist poetry is that the man behind the creation and initial publicizing of the movement—Ezra Pound—continued to update and adjust his understanding of Imagism as he synthesized his theories and practices with those of his many influences. Moreover, Pound also chose to include within his Imagist movement a group of poets who were either entirely unfamiliar with, or could claim only a partial understanding of, his Imagist agenda and its constituent elements. Therefore, in order to come to any complete understanding of the root constituents and
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