INSTIGATIONS OF EZRA POUND TOGETHER WITH AN ESSAY ON THE CHINESE WRITTEN CHARACTER BY ERNEST FENOLLOSA BONI AND LIVERIGHT PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 1920 TO MY FATHER HOMER L. POUND TABLE OF CONTENTS I. A STUDY IN FRENCH POETS Narration Jules Laforgue Tristan Corbière Arthur Rimbaud Remy de Gourmont De Régnier Emile Verhaeren Vielé-Griffin Stuart Merril Laurent Tailhade Francis Jammes Moréas Spire Vildrac Jules Romains Unanimisme De Bosschère's study of Elskamp Albert Mockel and "La Wallonie" II. HENRY JAMES III. REMY DE GOURMONT, a Distinction followed by notes IV. IN THE VORTEX Eliot Joyce Lewis An Historical Essayist The New Poetry Breviora PART SECOND V. OUR TETRARCHAL PRECIEUSE A divagation from Jules Laforgue VI. GENESIS, or the first book in the Bible VII. ARNAUT DANIEL VIII. TRANSLATORS OF GREEK IX. An essay on THE CHINESE WRITTEN CHARACTER by the late ERNEST FENOLLOSA, edited by Ezra Pound INSTIGATIONS I A STUDY IN FRENCH POETS The time when the intellectual affairs of America could be conducted on a monolingual basis is over. It has been irksome for long. The intellectual life of London is dependent on people who understand the French language about as well as their own. America's part in contemporary culture is based chiefly upon two men familiar with Paris: Whistler and Henry James. It is something in the nature of a national disgrace that a New Zealand paper, "The Triad," should be more alert to, and have better regular criticism of, contemporary French publications than any American periodical has yet had. I had wished to give but a brief anthology[1] of French poems, interposing no comment of my own between author and reader; confining my criticism to selection. But that plan was not feasible. I was indebted to MM. Davray and Valette for cordial semi-permissions to quote the "Mercure" publications.