The Pound Reaction. Liberalism and Lyricism in Midcentury American Literature

The Pound Reaction.Liberalism and Lyricism in Midcentury American Literature, is not actually a Pound monograph.Better said, it is one -but not only that.Indeed, taking Pound's case as its starting point, it aims at much more than just re-reading Poundʼs poetryeven though this would have already been a major and applaudable task.But Grossʼs ambition is much higher: his study sets as a goal the examination of the Bildung of a whole cultural context, the formation of the post-war Zeitgeist in American literary studies.More precisely, his book tries to answer not a single question ("What does Pound's poetry look like if re-read now?"), but a whole set of questions, which the author explicitly asks early on his study:The questions I ask are: How did postwar writers understand Poundʼs politics in relation to his poetics?Where did they place Pound in relation to existing cultural and legal institutions?Where was he located in the shifting political and cultural alliances of the Cold War?Where did midcentury writers locate themselves in relation to the arguments, institutions, and politics of the postwar cultural landscape?(36)

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