Oro e Lavoro (1944)
A52
Editions
a. First edition
ORO E LAVORO | alla memoria | di| AURELIO Basi | RAPALLO | | EZRA POUND [Rapallo, Tip. Moderna (Canessa)] 22, [2] pp. 23-9 X 16-9 cm. Wire-stitched. Published Spring 1944 at L. 1; number of copies unknown. Imprint on page [24]: Rapallo Tip. Moderna (Canessa) 1944-XXII ... On verso of title-leaf: . . . Sumptibus G. Dané Note: Reprinted, with L’America, Roosevelt e le cause della guerra presente—A51a— and Jntroduzione alla natura economica degli S. U. A—As53a—as ... Lavoro ed usura: tre saggi ([1954])—A68.
b. First edition in English, first (suppressed) impression (1951 [ée. 1952])
GOLD AND LABOUR | 1st English Edition | by | rzra pounp | PETER RUSSELL | 114b Queens Gate, London, S. W.7 | 1951 [ze. 1952] 16 pp. 21.2 X 13.7 cm. Stiff cream paper wrappers printed in red and black on page [iJ and in black on pages [ii-iv]; wire-stitched. (Title on page [1] of wrapper: GOLD AND WORK) Published 13 January 1952 at 2s. 6d. as “Money Pamphlets by £, No. 2”; 1000 copies printed (most of which were destroyed by the printers). On verso of titledeaf: Title of original work: Oro e lavoro ... first published at Rapallo in 1944 The present translation is by John Drummond ... Imprint at foot of page [i] of wrapper: Printed at the Ditchling Press, Sussex After the text but not the wrappers had been printed, the publisher received a letter from the author insisting that “Work” and not “Labour” was the correct and unambiguous translation of “lavoro.” The title was therefore printed on the front cover in accordance with Ezra Pound’s emendation. On 14 January 1952, the day after the delivery of the first impression to the publisher, the printers asked to take back and destroy all copies because they feared that two phrases in the text as printed might be considered libellous. (These were a reference to Churchill, Roosevelt, and Baruch in lines 40-41 of page 11, and an uncomplimentary description of Philip Gibbs in line 6 on page 14.) Some copies had already been distributed (the publisher thinks “about 20,” but the actual number—most of them sent apparently to the United States— would appear to have been considerably larger); the rest were destroyed and a new impression was made from the same setting of type, but with the offending passages omitted. 69
c. First edition in English, second impression (1951 [ie. 1952])
GOLD AND work | 1st English edition | by | EZRA POUND | PETER RUSSELL | 114b Queens Gate, London, S. W.7 | 1951 [ie. 1952]
16 pp. 20.5 x 13.8 cm. Binding and series as in the first impression.
Published late January 1952 at 2s. Gd.; 1000 copies printed from the same setting of type as the first impression and identical with it except that half of line 40 and all of line 41 on page 11, and the beginning of line 6 on page 14 have been omitted, resulting in obvious (and unexplained) gaps in the lines cited.
Note: This English translation by John Drummond was reprinted, with revisions, as “The Enemy Is Ignorance,” in Impact (1960)—A78—pp. 98-117, and, without those revisions, as “Gold and Work” in Selected Prose 1909-1965 ([1973])—A93a—pp. 306-21 (336-51 in A93b).
Artefacts
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