Creative Steps

Simply put, your creative allies are people who want to see you become more yourself; they want to  help you on your path towards increasing creativity. These are people who recognise, acknowledge and safeguard the potential within you. A rare breed in many ways; their message is simply ‘you are unique and valuable and you have something unique to contribute’. True allies create a context in which you can behave as you’d wish and therefore go on to develop your own abilities and grow and flourish.

Ezra Pound as Creative Ally to T.S. Eliot

In the early part of the last century T.S. Eliot was an unknown poet and author. He had written some poems, most of which were simply lying unread in a drawer like so many unfinished creative manuscripts. Then he met Ezra Pound.

Click here to learn about the weight of unfinished creative plans.

In 1915 Ezra Pound was acting as overseas editor of Poetry magazine; he recommended to Harriet Monroe, the magazine’s founder, that she publish “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock“.

It was clear to Pound that Eliot had talent. Indeed, he was so convinced that Eliot was already a great poet that he refused to let Monroe liaise directly with Eliot unless she ‘insulted’ him by suggesting alterations to his work.

Ezra Pound’s belief in Eliot’s quality was cemented in 1921 when Eliot left the manuscript of The Waste Land with him; he read it and immediately considered it to be a masterpiece.

At this time Eliot was working as a clerk in Lloyd’s Bank of London and the quantity of his creative output had reduced as he was unable to dedicate sufficient time to his writing. Pound recognised this waste and decided to ‘free’ him by attempting to establish a subscription plan called ‘Bel Espirit’, in which up to thirty people would each donate fifty dollars to help support Eliot. Pound himself gave money, as did Hemmingway and Aldington and others.

Despite Pound’s endeavours he was unable to find enough subscribers to allow Eliot to quit his job and dedicate himself to poetry. However, the publicity may have helped raise Eliot’s profile and, indeed, in 1922 Eliot was awarded the $2,000 Dial prize.

All or Nothing Thinking

Eliot did not leave employment to dedicate himself wholly to poetry, but he did continue to write. In 1925, he left Lloyds to join the publishing firm Faber and Gwyer (later Faber and Faber) where he remained for the rest of his career, eventually becoming a director.

Eliot avoided the common ‘all or nothing thinking’ trap by framing success as a poet in his own way:

“My reputation in London is built upon one small volume of verse, and is kept up by printing two or three more poems in a year. The only thing that matters is that these should be perfect in their kind, so that each should be an event.”

(Eliot, T. S. “Letter to J. H. Woods, April 21 1919.” The Letters of T. S. Eliot, vol. I. Valerie Eliot, ed. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1988, p. 285.)

Your Creative Allies

On your creative journey you will meet various types of travelling companion, some of them are allies and some of them turn out to be destructive to your creativity, the most subversive of these negative characters are the shadows and the most destructive are the shape-shifters.

Recognising the allies and guides, shape shifters and shadows can be difficult, but they define your journey. Are you aware of how the people in your life are shaping your creative destiny?

Learn more about how to recognise these people and how to interact with them to help your progress your own creative journey.

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Further Instances of Pound as Creative Ally

Pound was a tireless ally to many of the creative heavyweights of his day. When W.B. Yeats introduced Ezra Pound to the early writing of James Joyce, Pound became arranged for The Egoist to print A Portrait of the Artist, both serially and in book form.

Later when Joyce was writing Ulysses, Pound attempted to give the young artist more time to dedicate to his work by sending him money and clothing at his own expense (and anonymously) and also persuading other patrons of the arts to do the same. For instance, at Pound’s persuasion, Yates successfully lobbied the Royal Literary Fund for substantial grant. Pound also got the Society of Authors to send Joyce a bursary covering at least three months of expenses.

Your Creative Allies

You may think it was easy for Ezra Pound to see that Eliot was ‘unique and valuable’ and ‘had something unique to contribute’, after all he is one of the greats, but would you be able to recognise world class?

Rather than worry or wonder who your creative allies are, why not try and be an ally to someone else? Are you able to ‘recognise, acknowledge and safeguard the potential’ within someone else? Could you be a creative coach to somebody?

It seems to me that seeing the potential in others enables you to acknowledge the potential within yourself, too.

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