In the case of the Spanish civil war in which all sides behaved like bastards there's no avoiding the fact that Guernica kind of confers the Order of Bastardry on the Francoviles.
(A quatrain from my redoubled sonnet chain about Auden (and Eliot). This is Auden:
In Spain he blundered uselessly around,
rejected as a militant, consigned
to propaganda radio, till it was found
he spoke no Spanish. Laughter is unkind.
______
Surely Campbell, in attitude though not in style, was in some sense a follower of Futurism which was the mode of the time in Italy? All balls and bluster and poems praising blood-roses. A macho militarism which didn't necessarily oblige actual physical action, although in Italy and Spain there was a lot of uniform wearing and polished leather. LIke ballroom dancing we all know what that leads to.
He had a great sweep to his phrases and he could evoke landscape and nature. The zebra poem is fantastic.
[This message has been edited by Janet Kenny (edited June 04, 2008).]
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