Ezra Pound/American Odyssey (1983) by Lawrence Pitkethly
Sunday, May 27, 1984, 7:30 pm
Poets on Film: Ezra Pound
Ezra Pound/American Odyssey, 1983, 90 min., directed by Lawrence Pitkethly
Tonight is the West Coast premier of the first film made about the poet Ezra Pound since his death in Venice in 1972. Produced by the New York Center for Visual History in collaboration with Channel 4, U.K., the film was shot in Italy, France, England and the U.S. It traces the career of Pound as poet, critic, musician, essayist and modernist. It also attempts to deal with Pound’s controversial political and economic activities during World War II. Featured are interviews with Pound’s lifelong companion, Olga Rudge; his daughter, Mary de Rachewiltz; English poet Basil Bunting; James Laughlin, who studied with Pound in Rapallo and started his publishing company, New Directions, at Pound’s suggestion; Pound’s secretary, John Drummond; a G.I. assigned to guard Pound in the prison camp at Pisa; and critics Alfred Kazin and Hugh Kenner.