Olga Rudge & Ezra Pound: "What Thou Lovest Well..."

271 Olga Triumphant
In her later years, Olga was becoming an icon. At a Cini Foundation
reception, U.S. Ambassador Richard Gardner approached and introduced
his wife. Christopher Winner interviewed her for Newsweek, but Olga still
refused to talk about herself, only about Ezra and his poetry: ‘‘I never
pretended to be an expert in things I didn’t know about. . . . the most
important thing in The Cantos is ‘the quality of the a√ection.’ ’’
She kept in touch with other poets from Ezra’s world. Stephen Spender,
at another Cini Foundation reception, announced that ‘‘Olga Rudge has
just told me that Robert Lowell is dead.’’ Olga had last seen Cal Lowell
with Ezra in New York, and recalled his troubled life with bittersweet
memories.
Distressing news from England on September 14: her beloved brother
had been taken to West Su√olk Hospital; she suspected he was dying. He
sounded very weak when she telephoned but asked—typical of Teddy—
‘‘How are you?’’ Olga urged her grandson to drive to Norfolk to call on his
great-uncle, but Walter failed to do so. She harbored ‘‘heavy thoughts’’
about Walter: ‘‘the hearts of others—and my own—are a dark forest,’’ she
wrote in her notebook, paraphrasing Dante’s selva oscura; then she remembered
her daughter’s visit, when Mary left in a rage—‘‘not dark
forests, but dark jungles!’’
Elena, the housekeeper, was the first to come with the news that Count
Vittorio Cini, who had arranged Ezra’s funeral at San Giorgio, had died on
September 18. ‘‘He was a fine 93,’’ Olga reminisced; ‘‘it seems only yesterday
that he turned up with two bottles of champagne, iced, for Ezra’s
85th.’’ She never dreamed of the dead, but felt their presence: ‘‘I have to
stave o√ everyone who wants to invade their time and space.’’ The next
day dawned bright and sunny after days of downpour, ‘‘most beautiful and
unexpected,’’ for the Cini service at San Giorgio. She felt deeply another
loss on October 9 of Father Victor Stanley, the priest who had read the
Anglican rites at Ezra’s memorial.
Olga had just finished reading Pericles, ‘‘the house copy marked by
EP.’’ She considered Bernard Berenson’s The Last Years ‘‘perfect reading
for 80-year-olds . . . both EP and BB had wide views of relationships and of
life.’’ William Cookson’s edition of Pound’s Collected Prose was found
wanting; he referred to Olga’s translation of Cocteau’s Mystère Laïc, but