ORO E LAVORO

First edition, first printing. Original stapled paper covers with titles in black to the front cover. 23 pp. A better than very good copy, the binding square and firm, mildly toned to the top and stapled edge, very lightly rubbed and creased at the extremities, with various small stains and spots to the covers and endpapers. The contents are clean throughout, and without previous owners' inscriptions or stamps. Not price-clipped ('Lire Una' to the lower right corner of the rear cover. A well preserved example of this fragile pamphlet.

A scarce example of the true first edition of Ezra Pound's Money Pamphlet 'Oro e Lavoro' (Gallup A52a), evidenced by "Sumptibus G. Danè" on verso of title-page. An American poet, critic, and major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, Ezra Pound (1885-1972) drew international attention for his involvement in the Fascist movement in Italy and the Salò Republic during World War II. Having moved to the Italian seaside town of Rapallo in 1924, Pound became well-known among the local population for his eccentric Western fashion, loud personality, and for his vocal support of Benito Mussolini, whom he met in 1933. Throughout the 1930s and 40s, Pound's attention and interests increasingly turned towards economic theory and he became decidedly more politically active, with much of his literary output during this period condemning the concept of "usury", or finance capitalism, as the cause for World War I and declaring that the Jews were to blame. At the time of writing 'Oro e Lavoro', Pound's anti-Semitic economic theories were being publicised across hundreds of radio broadcasts for the fascist public service radio station EIAR and for the German puppet state of the Salò Republic (referred to in this volume as the "Republic of Utopia", a term Pound frequently espoused across his writings and broadcasts during this period). The content of these broadcasts vehemently promoted the adoption of C. H. Douglas' theory of 'social credit' and denigrated Winston Churchill, President F. D. Roosevelt and his family, and the Rothschild family for their contributions to the perceived "usurocracy". This extremist pro-fascist propaganda ultimately led to the US District Court for the District of Columbia's indicting Pound in absentia for treason on 26th July 1943. 'Oro e Lavoro' was subsequently published in Spring 1944 by Tipografia Moderna Canessa, a stationery shop in Rapallo, approximately one year before Pound's arrest in May 1945 by armed partisans of the Italian Resistance. The pamphlet was reprinted with additional content, and the bonus material was ultimately published in the individual pamphlets 'An Introduction to the Economic nature of the United States [Introduzione alla natura economica degli S. U. A.]' (Gallup A53a), and 'America, Roosevelt and the Causes of the Present War [L'America, Roosevelt e le cause della guerra presente]' (Gallup A51a). The exact number of 'Oro e Lavoro' pamphlets published is unknown, as the printing was scrapped by the Canessas after World War II for safety reasons. The first edition in English was published in 1951 under the title 'Gold and Labour', translated by Peter Russell and subsquently re-titled 'Gold and Work' upon the insistence of Pound himself. (Donald Gallup "A Bibliography of Ezra Pound", 1969: Rupert Hart-Davies; Massimo Bacigalupo "Ezra Pound and Friends", 2008: Università di Genova).