Ezra Pound

Salutation the Third

Salutation the Third - meaning Summary

Attack on Literary Establishment

Pound's Salutation The Third is a defiant manifesto against conservative literary gatekeepers, ridiculing reviewers and institutions that suppress innovation. He vows to reject the cult of genius tied to self-destruction and refuses to perform madness or martyrdom to placate critics. The poem mixes invective and dark humor, celebrating new writing, promising endurance against censorship and hypocrisy, and offering a final, contemptuous gesture toward those who police taste.

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Let us deride the smugness of 'The Times': GUFFAW! So much for the gagged reviewers, It will pay them when the worms are wriggling in their vitals; These are they who objected to newness, Here are their tomb-stones. They supported the gag and the ring: A little BLACK Box contains them. So shall you be also, You slut-bellied obstructionist, You sworn foe to free speech and good letters, You fungus, you continuous gangrene. Come, let us on with the new deal, Let us be done with pandars and jobbery, Let us spit upon those who pat the big-bellies for profit, Let us go out in the air a bit. Or perhaps I will die at thirty? Perhaps you will have the pleasure of defiling my pauper's grave; I wish you joy, I proffer you all my assistance. It has been your habit for long to do away with good writers, You either drive them mad, or else you blink at their suicides, Or else you condone their drugs, and talk of insanity and genius, But I will not go mad to please you, I will not flatter you with an early death, Oh, no, I will stick it out, Feel your hates wriggling about my feet As a pleasant tickle, to be observed with derision, Though many move with suspicion, Afraid to say that they hate you; The taste of my boot ? Here is the taste of my boot, Caress it, lick off the blacking.

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