ABSTRACT
Ezra Pound essays on James Joyce form a theory of the novel that developed alongside all manner of pieces across many periodicals. During that time, the world experienced massive upheavals, not least of which were World War I and, immediately after it, the stunning popularization of Albert Einstein's relativity theories. Pound's evolving theory of the novel therefore serves as a marker for the radical changes in aesthetics and ethics that occurred during the period. The difficulty of publishing Joyce's Portrait and Wyndham Lewis Tarr for their 'obscenity' led Pound to formulate his theory of the 'firm' novel specifically under the aegis of science. As Ulysses began to emerge in The Little Review, it confirmed for Pound the association of the realist novel with a scientific moral duty. The publication of Ulysses as a book in February 1922 prompted Pound to focus his theory of the novel from the previous several years into a treatment of the mythic method.
