Heather H
08-07-2011, 06:16 PM
It seems that many people enjoy reading about Gertrude Stein, but far fewer actually go to the trouble to read her work. Her style is unique and rather difficult by the standards of most people. She makes extensive use of word play, including puns, repetition, and near-repetition, and she challenges traditional genres and styles. She blurs the distinction between prose and poetry; her prose reads much like poetry and is full of poetic devices that one does not normally expect to find in prose. She is, of course, part of the Modernist tradition that produced such writers as James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Virginia Woolf, and artists such as Pablo Picasso. Stein was heavily influenced by the visual arts of the time, and this comes through in her writing.
The subtitle to her novel Lucy Church Amiably says a great deal about what she is up to. "A Novel of Romantic beauty and nature and which Looks Like an Engraving." This is a novel which doesn't have much of a plot; it is more of a word-painting. I started reading it recently and will post more about it in this thread when I am done.
I recently read Tender Buttons as part of a Modernist literature class, and the class discussion was quite animated. It was written in 1914, so the copyright has expired and it is easily found on the web. Here is a link to the complete text.
http://www.bartleby.com/140/
Tender Buttons is a series of prose descriptions divided into three sections - "Objects", "Food", and "Rooms". The first two are composed mostly of very short descriptions of a variety of objects and food, while "Rooms" is a series of longer paragraphs. The descriptions seem rather nonsensical at first, but they respond well to close readings. Hidden meanings can be found by looking at the poetic devices within the texts and by searching for sentences that seem to create definitions. Of course, multiple interpretations are possible. Reading Tender Buttons is somewhat like trying to solve a puzzle. The puzzle, of course, has no clear solutions.
To give everyone an idea of what Stein's writing is like, here is an example from "Objects" in Tender Buttons.
A LONG DRESS.
What is the current that makes machinery, that makes it crackle, what is the current that presents a long line and a necessary waist. What is this current.
What is the wind, what is it.
Where is the serene length, it is there and a dark place is not a dark place, only a white and red are black, only a yellow and green are blue, a pink is scarlet, a bow is every color. A line distinguishes it. A line just distinguishes it.
Here are a few ways to begin to interpret this passage. The repetition of the word "current" indicates that it is important. Since the word "machinery" is present here, this could be referring to the industrial manufacturing process, and perhaps the entire passage is a commentary on this. "Current", along with "crackle", could refer to another possibility - the rustling of the fabric (possibly caused by "the wind" in the second paragraph) and the generation and discharge of static electricity. The third paragraph is likely loaded with meaning. Throughout Tender Buttons, colors acquire various meanings, so using the colors to connect this passage to others could dredge up all kinds of meanings. Finally, the "line" at the end of the passage is important due to repetition. An immediately obvious interpretation is the cut of the dress, but there could be more. Maybe the line suggests divisions between the colors (including their hidden meanings). This would be a word to seek out elsewhere in Tender Buttons to search for connections.
Those who like word play could spend countless hours going through Tender Buttons and trying to interpret these cryptic passages. Of course, the text is mysterious enough that no one interpretation can be proven beyond doubt to be correct. For me, that is part of its appeal. It provides endless opportunities for interpretation and re-interpretation.
Stein's writing certainly rewards this sort of close reading, but that does not mean that close reading is the only way to interpret her work. Another possible method is to do a temporal reading of the work - read it from start to finish without getting hung up on details. That is how I am approaching Lucy Church Amiably - at least for a first reading. With this method, confusion results at first, but a general feel of the work gradually forms. It is a bit like standing in an art museum and staring at a Picasso painting, focusing more on the whole than on the details, while the close reading method is more like picking apart the painting and focusing on the fine details.
Heather
The subtitle to her novel Lucy Church Amiably says a great deal about what she is up to. "A Novel of Romantic beauty and nature and which Looks Like an Engraving." This is a novel which doesn't have much of a plot; it is more of a word-painting. I started reading it recently and will post more about it in this thread when I am done.
I recently read Tender Buttons as part of a Modernist literature class, and the class discussion was quite animated. It was written in 1914, so the copyright has expired and it is easily found on the web. Here is a link to the complete text.
http://www.bartleby.com/140/
Tender Buttons is a series of prose descriptions divided into three sections - "Objects", "Food", and "Rooms". The first two are composed mostly of very short descriptions of a variety of objects and food, while "Rooms" is a series of longer paragraphs. The descriptions seem rather nonsensical at first, but they respond well to close readings. Hidden meanings can be found by looking at the poetic devices within the texts and by searching for sentences that seem to create definitions. Of course, multiple interpretations are possible. Reading Tender Buttons is somewhat like trying to solve a puzzle. The puzzle, of course, has no clear solutions.
To give everyone an idea of what Stein's writing is like, here is an example from "Objects" in Tender Buttons.
A LONG DRESS.
What is the current that makes machinery, that makes it crackle, what is the current that presents a long line and a necessary waist. What is this current.
What is the wind, what is it.
Where is the serene length, it is there and a dark place is not a dark place, only a white and red are black, only a yellow and green are blue, a pink is scarlet, a bow is every color. A line distinguishes it. A line just distinguishes it.
Here are a few ways to begin to interpret this passage. The repetition of the word "current" indicates that it is important. Since the word "machinery" is present here, this could be referring to the industrial manufacturing process, and perhaps the entire passage is a commentary on this. "Current", along with "crackle", could refer to another possibility - the rustling of the fabric (possibly caused by "the wind" in the second paragraph) and the generation and discharge of static electricity. The third paragraph is likely loaded with meaning. Throughout Tender Buttons, colors acquire various meanings, so using the colors to connect this passage to others could dredge up all kinds of meanings. Finally, the "line" at the end of the passage is important due to repetition. An immediately obvious interpretation is the cut of the dress, but there could be more. Maybe the line suggests divisions between the colors (including their hidden meanings). This would be a word to seek out elsewhere in Tender Buttons to search for connections.
Those who like word play could spend countless hours going through Tender Buttons and trying to interpret these cryptic passages. Of course, the text is mysterious enough that no one interpretation can be proven beyond doubt to be correct. For me, that is part of its appeal. It provides endless opportunities for interpretation and re-interpretation.
Stein's writing certainly rewards this sort of close reading, but that does not mean that close reading is the only way to interpret her work. Another possible method is to do a temporal reading of the work - read it from start to finish without getting hung up on details. That is how I am approaching Lucy Church Amiably - at least for a first reading. With this method, confusion results at first, but a general feel of the work gradually forms. It is a bit like standing in an art museum and staring at a Picasso painting, focusing more on the whole than on the details, while the close reading method is more like picking apart the painting and focusing on the fine details.
Heather