"We Abjure Our Symbolist Masters"

Sorting through some old papers while preparing for next week's Return to the Outer Boroughs, I found a xerox of an FT Marinetti manifesto that must have caught my eye when I was an undergrad. A quick glance before sending it to the recycle bin did turn up this great bit of literary criticism:

"One must at all costs combat Gabriele D'Annunzio, because with all his great skill he has distilled the four intellectual poisons we want to abolish forever: 1) the sickly, nostalgic poetry of distance and memory; 2) romantic sentimentality drenched with moonshine that looks up adoringly to the ideal of Woman-Beauty; 3) obsession with lechery, with the adulterous triangle, the pepper of incest, and the spice of Christian sin; 4) the professorial passion for the past and the mania for antiquity and collecting."