Ezra Pound In A Station Of The Metro Analysis

Ezra Pound’s upbringing is certainly the simplest thing about him. Born in Hailey, Idaho to Isabel and Homer Pound in 1885. He was educated in the rural area of Philadelphia beginning in 1889. Pound was raised in a relatively normal middle-class home and as an only child had extremely high expectations for himself. One of his unrealistic goals at the age of fifteen was “that by thirty he would know more about poetry than any man living”. He kept himself busy, taking on multiple challenges throughout his life. He attended six different schools, received his bachelor’s degree in 1905, did a fellowship in research at the National Library in Madrid and the British Museum, and earned his M.A. in Romance languages. After failing a class in literary

In Pound’s early life, he was known to jump frequently from one project to the next, always having to excel at everything he set his mind to. He always thought of himself as “the only student who was making any attempt to understand” (Levenson) in school. He “was an enthusiastic popularizer as well as a savant” (Alexander), qualities that are both revealed in his work. Just as lightning strikes, Ezra Pound’s words are gone in an instant. The length of this poem is extremely significant in the message Pound is trying to convey. It is short and fast, just as the subway moves, with the rapid opening and closing of the sliding doors, only giving fleeting images of the beautiful faces inside. His seemingly simplistic two-line poem holds a complex meaning underneath the surface. In a Station of the Metro in Paris, Ezra Pound spots “one beautiful face, then another, and another”, (Pavlovski) leaving him momentarily at a loss for words. The faces blend together before him, like the colors of a painting. Each face represents a different thing Pound has wished to pursue, there are so many that they begin to blur together. He describes these beautiful faces as mesmerizing “petals on a wet, black bough” (408-2). Just like a child that goes flower picking, he desires to pick the most alluring one. Caught in his line of sight is the art of poetry. He is centered in the midst of this tornado of faces, and as if time has slowed, he comes to the realization that he must write about this experience. This poem is the beginning of his era, with him writing of “a language in color” (Pavlovski). With this, he crafts a whole new way to communicate with his