PETER ROMANOW/ON OLSONNOW AT MIT

Hi

I loved the discussions on Sat. I just want to say that my slant on Maximus takes off from Olson's calling Americans, "The last first people." And my effort to get a handle on the motive behind the poem was forwarded considerably by coming across one of the first Greek poet's work (I forget who now), whose hexameters worked toward writing a foundation myth for his polis, using geography, sociology, theo-mytholoy, employments, politics to establish his place intellectually within the world. It was my AH HA moment with Maximus. I think Olson wanted really to set down an American footprint on the continent using what he knew best, Gloucester, and the men he thought most capable (most of use), the fishermen of that town and using Poundian disjunctive image-making as the stylistic entry and point of departure for his archival expostulation.

Do it again, sometime, at MIT. It was informative and fun.