Ezra Pound, Robert Frost, And William Carlos Williams

The four great Modernists Poets of American Literature are Ezra Pound, T. S. Elliot, Robert Frost, and William Carlos Williams. The works of Pound, whose poetry focused mainly on the desolate state of the modern world, influenced by the poems of the other three poets. Elliot, too, made the ruin of the world his primary theme Frost whose topics ranged from nature to narratives, wrote his poetry in a somewhat light manner, or with a cool, neutral outlook. Williams, although not prone to sentimentalism, also wrote his poetry in a rather neutral tone and focused on lave and social issues. Although these poets all shared some aspects of their poetry, such as the undercurrent of modernism, the differences between them were prominent and the degrees of Modernism varied. Ezra Pound, the mount influential poet of the four, was distinctively Modernist in his writings. Many of his poems, such as Hush Selwyn Mauberley and The Cantos, made references to ancient literary figures and improved on them. “His true Penelope was Flaubert… Observed the elegance of the Circe’s hair (Norton E 321) The form
of his poetry also marked him as a modernist writer as did the themes of his writings. He renovated poetry in almost every manner possible. The various forms, themes, and viewpoints expressed were all that had been previously unconventional. An example of this is his poem, Villanelle; The Physiological Hour. Like many Modernists, Pound believed tha the world was corrupt and his search for the source of the corruption led to much of his best works. (Norton E 315) T. S. Elliot, who was perhaps the most influential by Pound, was considered the epitome of high modernism. (Norton E 366) Like Pound, Eliot referenced classical works of literature, though not quite as often. “No! I am not Prince Hamlet…” (Norton E 370) Eliot seemed to rebel against Modernism itself. His poems are generally rather long, unlike the two-line In a Station of the Metro written by Pound. How poetry, along with Pound’s, revolutionized American culture and literature. The memorizing imagery that he employed in his poem The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, is clearly Modernist in nature as is the form and other conventions. Robert Frost, who is arguable the most well-known of the four, was heavily influenced by Pound as well. His poetry, however, was different in that he used more tradition forms but the content and language was utterly modernist. That mad use of modern dialogue and slang, as did Pound and Eliot, to bring an informal aspect to his poetry. His topics and themes pertained to his time period, but he differed from Pound and Eliot in that, although he did use dark themes and topics, he was not acutely pessimistic. Several of his poems were mainly about death, such as The Death of the Hired Man, Home Burial, but they were written in almost an indifferent voice. Although Frost’s poetry was not as starkly Modernist as that of Pound and Eliot, upon deeper examination, it displays a high degree of American Modernism. The Fourth Poet, William Carlos Williams, wrote poetry that differed from the other poets greatly, Although he admired and befriended Pound, Williams despised the works of Eliot and Frost.
(Norton 302-303) Williams wrote primarily about idolized and eroticized women current and the state of America. Some example of such poetry are Portrait of a Lady, Queen-Ann’s Lace, and The Dead Baby. Like Frost, Williams was not blatantly pessimistic, but was rather indifferent I his poems. The imagery used by Williams is sat once clear and deep. The apparent meaning is not always that is meant, as is demonstrated in To Elsie. To me, it seems like Williams is the most Anti-Modernist of the four. He complains about the pessimism and obscenity of Eliot and the regionalism of Frost and he seems to forget that in his criticism of other works the essence of modernism is rebellion against
tradition. Pound and Elliot are the most similar to each other as are Frost and Williams. Of these two groups, I think that Pound and Elliot are the more important because their works had the greatest impact on the literary world. Although all four poets are unmistakably Modernist, Pound and Eliot seem to be Modernists on an entirely different level.