_The Observer_ says:--"It is something, after all, intangible and
indescribable that makes the real poetry. Criticism and praise alike
give no idea of it Everyone who pretends to know it when he sees it,
should read and keep this little book."
_The Bookman_:--"No new book of poems for years past has had such a
freshness of inspiration, such a strongly individual note, or been more
alive with undoubtable promise."
_The Daily Chronicle_:--" All his poems are like this, from beginning to
end, and in every way, his own, and in a world of his own. For brusque
intensity of effect we can hardly compare them to any other work. It is
the old miracle that cannot be defined, nothing more than a subtle
entanglement of words, so that they rise out of their graves and sing."
From a 3 1/2 page detailed critique, by Mr. Edward Thomas, in _The
English Review_.--"He has ... hardly any of the superficial good
qualities of modern versifiers;... He has not the current melancholy or
resignation or unwillingness to live; nor the kind of feeling for nature
that runs to minute description and decorative metaphor. He cannot be
usefully compared with any living writers;... full of personality and
with such power to express it, that from the first to the last lines of
most of his poems he holds us steadily in his own pure, grave,
passionate world.... The beauty of it ('In praise of Ysolt') is the
beauty of passion, sincerity and intensity, not of beautiful words and
images and suggestions;... the thought dominates the words and is
greater than they are. Here ('Idyl for Glaucus') the effect is full of
human passion and natural magic, without any of the phrases which a
reader of modern verse would expect in the treatment of such a subject.
This admirable poet...."
_The Oxford Magazine_:--"This is a most exciting book of poems."
_The Evening Standard_:--"A queer little book which will irritate many
readers."
_The Morning Post_:--" Mr. Ezra Pound ... immediately compels our
admiration by his fearlessness and lack of self-consciousness."
_The Isis_(Oxford):--"This book has about it the breath of the open
air,... physically and intellectually the verse seems to reproduce the
personality with a brief fulness and adequacy. It is only in flexible,
lithe measures, such as those which Coventry Patmore chose in his
'Unknown Eros,' and Mr. Pound chooses here that a fully suitable form
for the recital of spiritual experience is to be found. Mr. Pound has a
true and invariable feeling for the measures he employs ... this
wonderful little book...."
_The Daily Telegraph_:--"A poet with individuality.... Thread of true
beauty.... lifts it out of the ruck of those many volumes, the writers
or which toe the line of poetic convention, and please for no more than
a single reading."
_Mr. Punch_, concerning a certain Mr. Ezekiel Ton:--"By far the newest
poet going, whatever other advertisements may say;" and announced as
"the most remarkable thing in poetry since Robert Browning," says:--"He
has succeeded where all others have failed, in evolving a blend of the
imagery of the unfettered west, the vocabulary of Wardour Street, and
the sinister abandon of Borgaic Italy."
Mr. Scott-James, in _The Daily News_:--"At first the whole thing may
seem to be mere madness and rhetoric, a vain exhibition of force and
passion without beauty. But, as we read on, these curious metres of his
seem to have a law and order of their own; the brute force of Mr.
Pound's imagination seems to impart some quality of infectious beauty to
his words.... With Mr. Pound there is no eking out of thin sentiment
with a melody or a song. He writes out of an exuberance of incontinently
struggling ideas and passionate convictions.... He plunges straight into
the heart of his theme, and suggests virility in action combined with
fierceness, eagerness, and tenderness.... he has individuality, passion,
force, and an acquaintance with things that are profoundly moving." Mr.
Scott-James begins his half-column review of Mr. Pound's book with a
remark that he would "Like much more space in which to discuss his
work," and also notes a certain use of spondee and dactyl which "Comes
in strangely and, as we first read it, with the appearance of discord,
but afterwards seems to gain a curious and distinctive vigour."