Whenever I go to a really old, really cool building, I think, "This building was built by men with chisels and hammers. How come the modern world, with all its

Whenever I go to a really old, really cool building, I think, "This building was built by men with chisels and hammers. How come the modern world, with all its power tools and advanced materials, can’t build such cool stuff?" The answer is "Banks won’t let you." A bit of literary trivia: This is exactly the insight that lies behind one of Ezra Pound's most famous poems, "Canto XLV": http://emsh.calarts.edu/alumni/bkeresey/ http://emsh.calarts.edu/alumni/bkeresey/ (Note that I don't intend to suggest any deeper comparison to Pound. For him, the idea was an insidious one, leading him on a dark path that would take him from Fascist Italy to a psychiatric institution for the criminally insane in Washington, D.C.)