Editing Ezra Pound (section)

===Antisemitism, social credit===
{{further|Economic antisemitism}}
Pound's [[antisemitism]] can be traced to at least 1910, when he wrote in ''Patria Mia'', his essays for the ''New Age'': "The Jew alone can retain his detestable qualities, despite climatic conditions." The sentence was removed from the 1950 edition.<ref name=Surrette1999p242>Surrette (1999), 242</ref> In 1922 he apparently disliked that so many Jews were contributing to ''[[The Dial]]'',<ref>Julius (1995), 182, citing Corrigan (1977), 466, and note 17, 479; Corrigan cites a letter from Pound to [[Jeanne Robert Foster]], 2 February 1922, Houghton Library, Harvard University.</ref> and in 1939, when he read his poetry at [[Harvard]], he was said to have included antisemitic poems in the program because he believed there were [[Jews]] in the audience.<ref>Tytell (1987), 268–269</ref>{{efn|In 1939, according to [[Samuel Putnam]], Pound refused to enter [[Frances Steloff]]'s [[Gotham Book Mart]] in New York because she was Jewish, even though she had helped to sell his work. Writing in 1947, Putnam said he heard this directly from Steloff.<ref>Putnam (1947), 158.</ref> According to Carpenter, this did not happen. He says that Steloff called it "an absolute falsehood".<ref>Carpenter (1988), 561</ref>}}

A friend of Pound's, the writer Lina Caico, wrote to him in March 1937 asking him to use his musical contacts to help a German-Jewish pianist in Berlin who did not have enough money to live on because of the [[Nuremberg Laws]]. Normally willing to help fellow artists, Pound replied (at length): "You hit a nice sore spot&nbsp;... Let her try Rothschild and some of the bastards who are murdering 10 million anglo saxons in England."<ref>Moody (2014), 242–243; Redman (1991), 177</ref> He nevertheless denied being an antisemite; he said he liked [[Spinoza]], [[Montaigne]], and [[Alexander del Mar]]. "What I am driving at", he wrote to [[Jackson Mac Low]], "is that some kike might manage to pin an antisem label on me IF he neglected the mass of my writing."<ref>Julius (1995), 184–185</ref>{{efn|Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library (2012): "Reading Pound's correspondence, researchers can delve in to his relationships with, and influence on, younger poets. Such is the case with Pound's letters to poet, composer, and performance artist Jackson Mac Low. In addition to discussing literature and politics, Pound defends himself from charges of anti-Semitism with the inflammatory remark that 'some kike might manage to pin an antisem lable on me IF he neglected the mass of my writing.{{'"}}<ref>[https://beinecke.library.yale.edu/article/ezra-pound-new-acquisitions "Ezra Pound–New Acquisitions"]. Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, 7 November 2012.</ref>}}

Pound came to believe that World War I had been caused by finance capitalism, which he called "usury",<ref name=Preda2005bp90/> and that the Jews had been to blame. He believed the solution lay in [[C. H. Douglas]]'s idea of [[social credit]].<ref name=Preda2005ap87>Preda (2005a), 87</ref> Pound several times used the term ''Leihkapital'' (loan capital), equating it with Jews.<ref>Casillo (1988), 193; Feldman (2013), 52</ref> Hitler had used the same term in ''[[Mein Kampf]]'' (1926).<ref>Feldman (2013), 52</ref>{{efn|''[[Mein Kampf]]'' was translated into English in full in 1939, but in 1931 [[Chatto & Windus]] published the book ''Hitler'', by Pound's friend [[Wyndham Lewis]], with translated fragments of ''Mein Kampf''.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=W09KAAAAIAAJ Lewis (1931)]; Kimpel and Eaves (1983), 49; Feldman (2013), 52</ref> Lewis later turned against [[fascism]].<ref name=Hitchens2008/>}} "Your enemy is Das Leihkapital," Pound wrote in a 1942 radio script aimed at the UK, "international, wandering Loan Capital. Your enemy is not Germany, your enemy is money on loan. And it would be better to be infected with typhus&nbsp;... than to be infected with this blindness which prevents you from understanding HOW you are undermined&nbsp;... The big Jew is so bound up with this Leihkapital that no one is able to unscramble that omelet."<ref>Doob (1978), 59</ref> The argument ran that without "usury" and Jews, there would be no class conflict.<ref>Casillo (1988), 193</ref>

In addition to presenting his economic ideas in hundreds of articles and in ''The Cantos'', Pound wrote more than 1,000 letters a year throughout the 1930s.<ref name=Tytell1987p254>Tytell (1987), 254; Julius (1995), 183</ref> From 1932, he wrote 180 articles for ''The New English Weekly'', a social-credit journal founded by A. R. Orage, and 60 for ''Il Mare'', a Rapallo newspaper.<ref>Tytell (1987), 227</ref> He wrote to [[Bill Bird]] that the press in Paris was controlled by the [[Comité des forges]]. He also came under the influence of [[Charles Maurras]], who led the far-right ''[[Action Française]]''.<ref>Tytell (1987), 228</ref>

In 1935, Pound wrote an essay, "What is Money For?" where he advocated for [[Silvio Gesell]]'s concept of [[Demurrage currency|free money]]. In the essay, he criticized usury and argued that "vegetable money" was necessary to put people whose livelihoods are dependent on producing food on an equal level playing field with people with already have plenty of money stored in banks.<ref name="baynham-2023">{{cite journal |url=https://www.noemamag.com/what-if-money-expired/ |title=What If Money Expired? |last=Baynham |first=Jacob |date=14 November 2023 |website=Noema Magazine |publisher=Berggruen Institute |access-date=26 April 2025}}</ref>