Selected Poems (1949)
A62
Editions
a. First edition
EZRA POUND | SELECTED POEMS | The New Classics Series [New York, New Directions, James Laughlin] 80 viii, 184 pp. front. (port.) 18.3 x 12.5 cm. Red cloth boards lettered in black down the spine; end-papers. White dust-jacket printed in black, grey, red, and mauve. Published 7 October 1949 at $1.50 as “The New Classics Series, 22”; 3400 copies printed. On verso of title-leaf: ... Manufactured in the United States by the Vail-Ballou Press New Directions Books are published by James Laughlin New York Office—333 Sixth Avenue [A second impression (4500 copies), not so identified, was issued in December 1950.] The frontispiece is a reproduction of a drawing of Ezra Pound by Wyndham Lewis. “This volume has been assembled to give the student the best of Pound’s verse in compact form and to provide an effective introduction for the general reader who is not familiar with the work of this great modern poet.” (Dust-jacket) Contents: Autobiography—Cino—Na Audiart—Villonaud for This Yule—The Tree—The White Stag—Sestina: Altaforte—Ballad of the Goodly Fere—Planh for the Young English King—“Blandula, tenulla, vagula”—Erat hora—The House of Splendour—The Tomb at Akr Caar—Portrait d’une femme—An Object—The Seafarer—A @era—Apparuit—A Virginal—Of Jacopo del Sellaio— The Return—Tenzone—The Garret—The Garden—Salutation—The Spring— A Pact—Dance Figure—April—The Rest—Les Millwin—A Song of the Degrees—Ité—Salvationists—Arides—Amitiés—Meditatio—Coda—The Coming of War: Actaeon—In a Station of the Metro—Alba—Coitus—The Encounter— Iué00@—Tame Cat—The Tea Shop—Ancient Music—The Lake Isle— Epitaphs (“Fu I”; “Li Po”)—Villanelle: The Psychological Hour—Pagani’s, November 8—Alba from “Langue d’Oc”—Near Perigord—Song of the Bowmen of Shu—The Beautiful Toile-—The River Song—The River-Merchant’s Wife: A Letter—Poem by the Bridge at Ten-Shin—The Jewel Stairs’ Grievance—Lament of the Frontier Guard—Exile’s Letter—Taking Leave of a Friend— A Ballad of the Mulberry Road—Hugh Selwyn Mauberley—from Homage to Sextus Propertius, I, IIJ-VII, Ix-X, X1]—Cantos [I-III, from IV, IX, XIII, from XIV, XV, from XVI, XVII, from XX, from XXV, from XXX, from XXXVI, XXXVIII, XLV, XLVII, XLIX, from LIT, from LXII, from LXXIV, from LXXVI, from LX XIX, from LXXX, from LXXXI, from LX XXIII] Note: The “Autobiography,” p. viii, is printed here for the first time; the poems are all reprinted from earlier books by Pound.
b. New edition ([1957])
EZRA POUND | SELECTED POEMS | A NEW EDITION | A New Directions Paperbook [New York, James Laughlin] viii, 184 pp. 18 X 10.8 cm. Stiff white paper wrappers printed in black on pages [i] and [iv]. Published 21 August 1957 at $1.15 as “New Directions Paperbook ND66”, 9993 copies printed. On verso of title-leaf: ... The publishers are grateful to Hugh 81 Kenner and Hayden Carruth for suggestions in regard to the texts in this new edition. First Published as New Directions Paperbook No. 66, 1957 Manufactured in the United States by the Vail-Ballou Press New Directions Books are published by James Laughlin New York Office—333 Sixth Avenue Contents identical, save for minor editorial changes, with those of the first edition, except for the addition on pages 179-84 of the following: from Canto XCI—from XCIII—[Note defining usury]—from Women of Trachis Notes: In this edition the “Autobiography” is retitled, “Biography.” A second impression (10,006 copies), not identified, was issued in January 1959, and a third impression (about 10,000 copies), identified on verso of title-leaf, in October 1960.
Content is now editable.