ABSTRACT
In February 1937 Pound entered into correspondence with Morley of Faber & Faber about a new prose book. It would be well, thought Morley and his colleagues, if instead of writing another short work like ABC of Reading Pound published his ideas on literature and culture at some length. Pound's first thought was to call the book The New Learning, but from the beginning Morley saw it more as a ‘guide’, and so it was given the title Guide to Kulchur. In a letter to Morley in February Pound described it as ‘Wot Ez knows, all of it, fer 7 and sax pence’. He would, he explained, introduce certain contrasts between the Orient and the Occident and would also mention the racial elements in culture. He predicted that these aspects might not please Eliot (called ‘Possum’): ‘An how you gwine ter keep deh Possum in his feedbox when I brings in deh Chinas and blackmen?? He won't laak fer to see no Chinas and blackmen in a bukk about Kulchur.’
