"Nothing written for pay is worth printing. Only what has been written against the market"
About this Quote
Pound is picking a fight with the most ordinary force in modern culture: the paycheck. “Nothing written for pay is worth printing” lands as provocation more than policy, the kind of absolutist line that tries to shame compromise out of existence. He frames the market not as a neutral system for distributing art, but as a corrupting patron with tastes, deadlines, and a quiet veto over risk. The punch of the second sentence is in its turn: “Only what has been written against the market.” Not outside it, not indifferent to it - against it. He imagines real literature as an act of resistance, a deliberate refusal to be shaped by what sells.
The subtext is pure modernist self-mythology: the artist as disciplined insurgent, starving if necessary, allergic to the bourgeois “public.” Pound spent his career elevating difficulty, elite standards, and the idea that art should lead culture rather than serve it. This line polices the boundary between art and commerce, but it also flatters the speaker: if the market is the enemy, the writer becomes a combatant, not a worker.
Context matters because Pound’s certainty often did double duty. He attacked “commercial” writing while actively networking, editing, promoting, and building a literary economy of his own - just one organized around prestige rather than sales. The quote’s real intent isn’t to abolish money; it’s to delegitimize market validation as a measure of worth. It’s a rallying cry for autonomy, delivered with the scorched-earth confidence of someone who believed culture should be curated, not consumed.
The subtext is pure modernist self-mythology: the artist as disciplined insurgent, starving if necessary, allergic to the bourgeois “public.” Pound spent his career elevating difficulty, elite standards, and the idea that art should lead culture rather than serve it. This line polices the boundary between art and commerce, but it also flatters the speaker: if the market is the enemy, the writer becomes a combatant, not a worker.
Context matters because Pound’s certainty often did double duty. He attacked “commercial” writing while actively networking, editing, promoting, and building a literary economy of his own - just one organized around prestige rather than sales. The quote’s real intent isn’t to abolish money; it’s to delegitimize market validation as a measure of worth. It’s a rallying cry for autonomy, delivered with the scorched-earth confidence of someone who believed culture should be curated, not consumed.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
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