Duke University Press

Duke University Press
Gertrude Stein: Humanism and Its Freaks

Author(s): Catharine R. Stimpson
Source: boundary 2, Vol. 12/13, Vol. 12, no. 3 - Vol. 13, no. 1, On Humanism and the University
I: The Discourse of Humanism (Spring - Autumn, 1984), pp. 301-319
Published by: Duke University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/302819
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GertrudeStein: Humanismand Its Freaks*
CatharineR. Stimpson
GertrudeStein died of cancer at 6:30 p.m.on July27, 1946,in

Paris. She had been a charismaticcelebrity,at once admiredand
ridiculed.Ifthe realityof herworkand the memoryof herlifewereto
survive,otherswouldnowhave to secure herfame.Otherswouldnow
haveto fastenherreputationto thewallboardsof history.Dead, Stein
had become a dependent.
So, ofcourse,willwe all. Yet fewof us are as freakishas Stein.
She accepted some of the demandingpreceptsof Westernhuman-
ism. Her ruptures,though,were manyand audacious-with the con-
ventions that governed language, rhetoric,and genre; gender and
sexuality;and perceptionsof timeand space.' She braced,and often
embraced,her streaks and irregularities withan antic cheerfulness.
Inevitably,herdefiances weremorenotable,and noticeable,thanher
acceptances. She was, then, a peculiar case for the various
parliamentsthat pass, and pass on, the laws of formal,institutional
memory.
The legislating of Stein's posthumous reputations,of this
peculiar case, has been, and is, morethan example of the play be-
tween the agents of that memoryand the individualtalent. It has
been, and is, morethan materialforpractitioners of receptiontheory
and studentsofcanon formation.2 The process ofsayingwhoStein is,
ifanyone,and what she means, ifanything,has proceeded as post-
301
modernculturehas emerged;3as the modernavant-gardehas become
a tradition;and as older"traditionalvalues," stillhostileto thatavant-
garde, have asserted theirstrength.The forming of the post-modern
GertrudeSteins,as yetincomplete,is one clue to the forming of post-
modernity. Her freakishnessmodulates,not intothe binaryopposite
of normality, but intoevidence forthe wholesomelegitimacyof hete-
rogeneity.
By 1946, Stein had spent nearlyfourdecades becoming a
media figure,a process she and hersupportershad begunto printin
the UnitedStates in 1913 when the indefatigableMabel Dodge had
lauded Stein in an issue of Artsand Decoration about the Armory
Show.4 The publicationof TenderButtonsin 1914 onlyintensified the
associations betweenStein,avant-gardeart,Bohemianadventurism,
and the gap betweenthat Bohemianismand bourgeoisvalues. She
was, then, at her death, a well-knownallusion. Like all modern
allusions, she had to send out a doubled message about heridentity
inorderto become well-known at all. On theone hand,she had to have
an identitystrong enough to sustain itself, to be recognized
repetitively. For Stein, it was her body,her appearance;5her leader-
ship of a band of exotic,ultimatelytriumphant moderns,a role The
Autobiography ofAlice B. Toklasfirmly scripted;and herwriting,
itself
perceived conflictingly as an incomprehensibletotalityand as a
source of pungent one-liners,blunt sentences-about roses or
Oakland-that could themselvesbecome allusions.
On the other hand, Stein could not affordthe neat, trim
packagingoftheallegoricalfigure.Fora mass audience consists ofa
numberof smaller communities,each with its own cognitiveand
emotionalneeds. Some had to hate Stein,and modernism;othershad
to desirethem.Stein's identity had to be sloppyenough,fluidenough,
to attractdisparategroups.She had to have the sillyputtyqualityof
the Rorschachtest.
Persistent,stubborn,smart,Stein (withToklas) had managed
the two-folddemands of being an allusion. At least fiveseparate
forces acted to permitthat allusion to endure. Nevera formalco-
alition,these forces providedtogethera necessary range of social
and culturalpossibilities.These were: 1) a groupof advocates and
guardians,affectionatelobbyists(manyhad been steadfastpersonal
friends,often for years, but some were to be free-lancereaders,
membersof a free-floating intelligentsia,who simplyliked Stein);
2) the mass media, primarily print,but electronicas well afterthe
1960s; 3) a youngergenerationof artistsand otherwriters;4) critics,
primarily in the academy, but some withsignificantparticipationin
the arts; and 5) the women's and gay liberationmovements.
Of these forces, the materiallymost necessary was that
devoted group of advocates and guardians. Some wrote memoirs
about her, perpetuatingthe figureof the personality/celebrity, the
fountof anecdote. Withthe help of moneythatStein had leftin her
will,fourof themalso directlysupervisedthe eightvolumeeditionof
herunpublishedwritings thatYale University issued inthe1950s: Carl
Van Vechten,whom Stein named her literaryexecutor;6Thornton
302
Wilder,thewriter, who had helpedto arrangeto haveYale become the
depositoryof her papers; Donald Gallup, who became her great
archivist;and Donald Sutherland,who, in 1951, publishedthe first
book-length studyof Stein's work.
Because few could grasp Stein's workuntilher unpublished
manuscriptsmoved out of draftsinto print,the Yale edition was
perhapsherequivalentofShakespeare's firstfolio.The publicationof
each volumeprovokedsome noticeof Stein. Moreimportant, in their
entirety, the volumes inscribedthe originalityand vastness of her
long career. Beforetheirpublication,obtainingStein's experimental
worktended to be a matterof chance. John Malcolm Brinnin,for
example, who was laterto writea book about her,accidentallydis-
coveredherwhenhe pickedup a "Dustybutotherwisepristine"copy
of Geographyand Plays in a Saratoga Springs bookstorein 1946.7
AftertheYale edition,Steincould at least enterlibrariesmoresystem-
atically.The Yale imprimatur also sanitizedStein's bohemianismand
radical quirks.That a prestigiousinstitutionwould do so inflamed
some of herdetractors.How,yelpeda critic,could Yale have been so
foolish?Had itstrucka bargainwithSteinthatentailedgettingstuck
with her so it could collect materialabout her far more valuable
friends,about Picasso and Gris?8
Beforeherdeath,some of Stein's mostcapable advocates and
guardianshad been women,often,butnotexclusively,participantsin
the lesbian circles of Paris: Alice B. Toklas, of course, but Mabel
Dodge, Mina Loy,9Janet Flanner,and EdithSitwellas well. In 1926,
VirginiaWoolf,with Leonard Woolf,had the HogarthPress issue
"Compositionas Explanation,"the essay that Stein firstgave as a
lecturein England.Yet, after1946,except forthe irrevocably faithful
Toklas, Stein's best-knownprotectorswere men. In her scatty,
whimsical introductionto the fourthvolume of the Yale edition,
Natalie Barney,who knew Stein in Paris, speaks of her friend's
capacity to attract "knightserrants."'0At least two reasons may
account forthe prevalenceofthe"knights"after1946.First,Steinand
Toklas had bothmen and womenfriends,buttheywere farmoreapt
to cultivatesurrogatesons, ratherthan surrogatedaughters,who
could then manage Stein's legacy. Next,duringthe periodin which
the "knights"were doingtheirscrupulous,carefullabors,masculine
culturalauthoritywas re-assertingitselfin the UnitedStates. In lit-
erature,and literaryuniverses,sons matteredmorethandaughters.
As theadvocates and guardianswho had knownStein finished
their obligations, and grew older, most lessened their activities.
Symbolically, Toklas died, in Paris,in 1967. Untilthen,the interestof
the mass media was, at best, erratic.Between1949 and 1973,Stein
gatheredbetweenzero and eleven entrieseach year in The Reader's
Guide to Periodical Literature;betweenzero and ten entriesin The
New YorkTimesIndex,a numberoftennearerto zerothanto elevenor
ten. Norwas that intereststeadfastlyaccurate.
Five citations from The New York Times, five bits of
journalisticconfetti,reflectthe perpetual/perceptual slippage be-
tween event and report.The firstis her obituary,that firstpost-
303
morteminalassessment of a person's life,on July28, 1946 (NYT,
p. 40). The mainheadlineannounces herdeath. Then,sub-heads say
that " 'A Rose is a Rose is a Rose' Literary
Style" distinguishesher.
However,theygo on, her firstbook and hertwo "biographies"were
"intelligible"and "lucid." So previewedand flagged,the textof the
obituary claimed that Stein's ". . . distinction rested on her use of
wordsapartfromtheirconventionalmeaning";thatshe had a "genius
forself-pressagentry"; and that,in 1903, afterstudyingElizabethan
prose fora yearin London,she movedto Paris withAlice B. Toklas,a
San Francisco friend,who was to be her "lifelong secretary-
companion."Afterthis flurry of praise, recognition,insult,and error
(especially about 1903), The Times returnedto the storya fewdays
later.It reportedthatAlice B. Toklas, now Stein's "secretaryand bio-
grapher,"was having Stein's body transferredto the cryptof the
AmericanCathedralChurchto await burial(NYT,July31, 1946,p. 27).
Fifteenyears later, The Times covered a tripthat John E.
Connelly, the Texas politician who was then Secretary of the
Treasury,made to Rochester,NewYork.His purposewas to persuade
his audience ofthecharmsofrevenue-sharing. Citingtheline,"A rose
byanyothername wouldbe as sweet," he passed up pureplagiarism
and gave whathe thoughtto be theauthor'sname-not Shakespeare,
but GertrudeStein (NYT,June 15, 1971, p. 15). Thoughhis allusion
was wrong,he neverthelesssoughtto ornamenthis prosethroughthe
act of allusion itself.
Over a decade later,printroses grew again. A JohnWillen-
becherpublisheda letterto The Times,dated December30, 1980. He
objected to a lead editorialin the paperthathad used the phrase,"A
Rose Is A Rose Is A Rose." Attempting to restorea correspondence
betweeneventand report,he correctly pointedout thatStein's phrase
had reallybeen "Rose is a rose is a rose," morepungentwithpuns
and meaning."UndauntedbyWillenbecher,The Times,onlythe next
year,headed anotherstorywitha parodyof "A rose is a rose is a
rose." Underthe line,"A Vote Is a Vote Is a Vote," it described the
annual banquet of the GertrudeStein DemocraticClub,an influential
homosexual politicalorganizationin Washington,D.C. (NYT,May 1,
1982, p. 12).
Whenthemedia attendedto Stein,theypreferred twoelements
of her identityto her writing.One was her picturecollection,parti-
cularlythe quarrelover it betweenAlice B. Toklas and Stein's blood
heirs,and theextraordinary show oftheSteinfamilycollectionsat the
Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1970. In altered form,it
travelledto two cities in whichthe Stein familyhad lived:Baltimore
and San Francisco. In 1967,fourtrusteesof the Museumof Modern
Art(David Rockefeller,Nelson A. Rockefeller,WilliamS. Paley, and
AndreMeyer)had purchasedGertrudeStein's artfromherblood heirs
forthe Museum.'2
The appeal of Stein as art collector is overdetermined. For
Gertrude,Leo, Michael and Sally Stein, as collectors, were huge
successes-aesthetically and financially. Theyselected artthatthey
liked,fortheirpleasure. It then had the grace to become critically
304
acclaimed, and because ofthe artmarket,a valuable commodity. The
Stein paintingswere at once beautiful,historical,and the fetishistic
substance of an upwardlymobile portfolio.The art collector is
inseparable fromthe second elementthe media foundpresentable:
Stein as Bohemian,the ex-studentof WilliamJames who entertained
great painters,and instructedgreat writers,in the Parisian salon
wherethe paintingshung.After1946,this"Stein" became even more
piquant withthe increasinglypublic awareness that Toklas was a
loveras well as a secretary/companion/friend.
Stein-as discreetly sexualized celebrity-cohered, even
crystallized,in the 1970s with PerryMillerAdato's television bio-
graphy,WhenThis You See RememberMe; James Mellow's full,but
lively,print biographyCharmed Circle; and Marty Martin's play
GertrudeStein GertrudeStein GertrudeStein.'3The play,at once an
inadvertent parodyof and advertenttributeto Stein, has, as its first
stage directions:
Incidentalmusic incidentally.Incidentalmusic and
incidentally.Incidental and incidental incidental
music and incidentally.
Alrightthen.Lights.
As Alice safelysleeps upstairs,a pointof referencebut not a stage
presence, Gertrudepreparesto move out of 27 rue de Fleurus.She
does throughindulgingin language, a cheerfulmonologue,by both
Stein and Martin-about herpracticalincompetence;hergenius; her
social relationswithPicasso and otherfables ofthe avant-garde;and
thatartcollection.
The advocates and the mediashareda conservative,and a con-
serving,function.Theywere partofthe mid-twentieth centuryinstitu-
tionalization of the avant-garde and of the canonization of
modernism-in brief,of the transformation of the atelier into the
museum;ofthelittlemagazineintothetextbook.Despitetheirefforts,
despite a commonacknowledgement of Steinas a "great"modernist,
she remained-as a writer-onthe marginsof a codifiedmodernism.
Later,I willtryto reason why.
Yet, that marginalitywas to become a virtue.From that
position,in partbecause of thatposition,she appealed to post-World
War II artists and writerswho wished to continuethe avant-garde
traditionof makingitnew,butwho could not,and wouldnot,become
xeroxcopies of the earlier,now-solidified, avant-garde.Stein was a
warrioragainst totalitiesand teleologies; against theocentricism and
metaphysics;'4 a warriorfor linguisticadventurousness and self-
consciousness, foropenness and, as MarjoriePerloffhas brilliantly
shown, indeterminacy.'15 Small wonder,then, that WarrenTallman
should have a particulardream about RobertCreeley.A man, who
turnsout to be Freud,hands thedreamera pairofspectacles. He then
sees anotherdoctor,Samuel Johnson-in spectacles, too. Johnsonis
conjuringup still moredoctors forthe difficult task of resuscitating
poetry.As theyemerge,the dreameridentifiesthemas Dr(sic) Stein,
"ourspecialist on grammarand syntax...," DrPound,DrWilliams,Dr
Crane, DrZukovsky,and Dr Olson.16
305
Significantly,John Cage, whose presence ripples through
much of post-modernexperimentalart,like sunlightthroughwater,
has consistentlypraised Stein, another mushroom-gatherer, as a
knowerof "nowness."'7 Both are also Californians,who reflectthe
culturalcoming-to-power of the AmericanWest. ThoughCage is far
more eclectic and versatile than Stein, they are both original
theoreticianswho deliberatelyconfuse theoryand practice in their
immediateperformances on the page or inspace. Inthe 1950s,Stein's
ghost was perhaps more livelyin literaturethan in the theater-al-
though Cage, among others, was blurringartificialdistinctions
betweenthem.In1957,JohnAshberypraisedSteinforseekingthe im-
possible-a counterfeitof "reality"more real than the apparently
real.'8 Simultaneously, Frank O'Hara, another cosmopolitan
Bohemianwho delicatelyfused the diaryof the everydaywithlyric
poetry,was learningfromher "vernacular,""tough,""non-mimetic"
style.'9Herparsingof thegrammarofthe Englishsentence; herplow-
ing up of the semanticfield;and herprickingapartof phonemesand
morphemes appealed to language poets and to such language-
conscious novelistsas WilliamGass. For Gass, who cares about the
qualityofthe "b" in "bush" or ofthe "B" in Babette,Stein is the most
radical,the most difficult,
of the moderns.Manipulatingthe familiar
comparisonbetweenStein and Joyce,he claims:
None of the literaryinnovatorswho were her con-
temporariesattemptedanythinglike the revolution
she proposed,and because hermethodswereso un-
compromising, herworkcannot reallybe metexcept
on the finestand mostfundamental grounds.FINNE-
GANS WAKE,forinstance,is a workof learning.It
can be penetratedbystages. Itcan be elucidatedby
degrees. Itis a complex,butfamiliar,
compound.One
can hearat anydistancetheteethofthedogs as they
feed on its limbs.WithMiss Stein, however,one is
never able to wet one's wrists before cautiously
trustingto the water,nor can one wade slowly in.
Therethe deep clear bottomis at once.20
Since the 1930s,audiences had knownofSteinas a playwright
or librettist,largelythroughher collaborative operas with Virgil
Thomson.Inthe 1960s,experimentaltheaterrevealedhow playfulher
scriptsand stage notationswere.She fragmented plotand voice; she
was benignlyindifferent to Aristoteleandemands foran apparently
organic flowwithinthe drama frombeginningto middleto end; her
stage space was a place inwhichto displaythe simultaneityof many
events.Likemuchpost-modern art,theywerealso concernedwiththe
operations of a medium-here language, sounds, words, and an
actor's representationof fictiveothers.2'Moreover,Stein's overtly
non-theatrical textswereadaptable to publicenvironmentsotherthan
the library.In 1964,the Judson Poets Theater,partof the New York
BaptistChurchthatwas renewingthe nineteenth-century avant-garde
306
compact betweena radicalpoliticsand a radicalculture,began either
to produceStein's playsorto set themto music. Likethe Happenings,
they seemed "Absurdist, irrational,spontaneous, improvised."'22
Some immediatelysaw the genealogical descent fromStein through
Cage. David Shapiro writes:
I wouldnotquestionthatthemostexcitingtheaterof
the last two decades may be seen in the lyricsof
JohnCage, just as GertrudeStein's dilapidatedlyric
plays entranceus morethan a whole host of more
obvious performers and performances.23
Among the most vital advocates of the performancesat

Judson,especially of the dance, was the writerJillJohnston.Her
rushingprose,at once autobiographyand criticism,followedStein's
effortsto erase the distance betweenexperienceand language,tale
and teller,in narrative.Johnstonalso explicitlysaluted Stein as a
precursor.In a wild mini-picaresqueabout her effortsto interview
Bella Abzug,Johnstonevokes two absent presences: the Abzugwho
is avoidingan interview;the Stein whomJohnstoncan neverinter-
view,or know,palpablyor as electronicimage:
I'd seen heron a tvdocumentaryyellingand puffing
and sayingall smartthingsand I thoughtshe was the
hottestthingsince gertrudestein whomI'd neverbe
able to see liveand in livingcolor;or some incredible
compositeof powerfulfemalesforwhomshe has no
historicalprecedent.24
Though Stein offersJohnstonexemplarytexts; thoughStein is an

exemplarof power,Johnston-in a progressiveline-goes beyond
her.Forshe can foreground whatSteincould giveonlyas background
information: femalesexuality,its embodimentsand fantasies.In one
punningchapter,"TenderGluttons,"Johnstoncan tellof a dream,in
whicha woman drags a foetusalong the ground,as if it were a toy
Raggedy Ann (GT, p. 143). Though she had studied obstetricsand
gynecologyin medical school, Stein was incapable of such detail.
Beforeherdeath,membersof an earliergenerationof writers
whoalso taught(Thornton Wilder,forexample)had helpedbuildsome
academic interestin Stein. AfterWorld War II, when many more
artistsand writerstookon facultypositions,in orderto earn a living,
they became potentialfilersof amicus curiae briefsforthe avant-
garde. Nevertheless,and notsurprisingly, the academic reputationof
Stein lagged behind that which she earned among experimental
artistsand writers.Between 1947 and 1971,the PMLA Bibliography,
thatclue to the scrubbedlabyrinth of the academic mind,shows that
publicationsbyand about Stein averagedabout threea year.In 1964,
forexample, she had but one citation,while Hemingway-the lost
youngerbrother-had thirty-four.
Then,between1972 and 1982,while Hemingwaycontinuedto
307
collect the trophiesof criticalbooks and articles,Stein averaged be-
tweensixteenand seventeencitationsa year.Theyfolloweduponthe
publicationof threebooks between1968 and 1970 byJohnMalcolm
Brinnin,Allegra Stewart, and, most notably, Richard Bridgman.
Bridgmandemonstrated,withpersistence and patience, that Stein
was interpretable. Indeed,certainpassages, especially sexual ones,
were even allegorical.All Stein scholars are indebtedto Bridgman's
inventoryof her literaryestate. However,his invaluable strategic
movetowardsStein inverteda commonperceptionof heras beinga
coherentpersonalitywithan inchoate body of work.For Bridgman,
Stein's personality was inchoate-anxious, internallyunstable,
fearfulof death. Herbodyof workwas, however,coherent-ifonlyas
a reflectionof that personality.The writingwas all of a piece-in
being in pieces.25
Stein's gain among academics was morethanthe resultof a
certain momentumfromthe late 1960s and of Bridgman'sreas-
surance thatStein was manageable-crackers butcrackable. Itwas,
as well,the consequence of the influenceupon research,criticism,
and teachingofthewomen'smovement, whichsaw Steinas a woman
writer;of the lesbian feministmovement, whichsaw heras a lesbian
writer;and of the gay movement, whichsaw heras an avatar,at once
huge and comic,of gay liberation,includingthatopenlyhomosexual
Democratic club. Ironically,Stein, so often ostensibly and self-
deceptivelyapolitical, became a sociopolitical icon. A sense of
eroticizedhistoricalaffinityreplaced friendship as a connection.
The scholarlyinteresttookthreeforms,each indicativeof one
way of doing feministtheoryitself.First,people saw Stein as the
victimof patriarchalpoliticsand poetics. As earlyas 1967, Rosalyn
Regelson was articulatinga feministdefense. Stein, she wrote,is
..a monumentalfemaleAmericangenius, lyingin wait like some
great untapped naturalresourceto revitalizethe theatricalscene."
However,"Momophobia," an equally pernicious backlash against
feminismand extensionof psychoanalytictheoryand practice,had
placed herout of rangeand blindedus to her.26
Secondly, feministcriticssought to place Stein in women's
history.Theybelievedthata gynocritical past wouldbe usable, notas
a source of jokyquotations forcollage-crazedpost-moderns, but as
proofof women's genuine achievements.These matronymic forces
matteredforthemselvesand as agencies ofempowerment forwomen
in the present.So EmilyStipes Watts offereda Stein who was a
woman poet who took femaleexperienceas hersubject; who resur-
rected a traditionof philosophical poetrythat had drooped since
Mercy Otis Warren; and who gave women younger than she,
especially Laura Riding,an alternativeto dominantpoetic practices
of the 1920s.27 For Joan Retallack, Stein ".... is a formidable ancestor
of much issue": Edith Sitwell; Barbara Guest; Anne Waldman;
Rochelle Owens; Judith Johnson Sherwin; Laura Chester; Lyn
Hejinian; BernadetteMeyer;Tina Darragh;Diane Ward;Carla Harry-
The assessment of Stein as partof a line of
man; Rae Armantrout.28
womenwriters, patriarchalstructures,
workingwith/within/against in-
308
evitablyleads to a renamingofthe poeticact thatprivilegesgenderas
a constitutivepart of that act-for writersand readers. Kathleen
Fraser,the post-modernpoet/critic, looks back, withcuriosityand
respect,not withanxietyor anger,at her precursors:
Modernistwomen poets, when firstread, exert a
magneticpulltowardswhatappears simultaneously
as unsolvedmystery and ample evidence,as though
the oftencrypticlanguage carriesessential informa-
tion. It is the poet as bearer of uncertainty. ... I over-
hear a poet talkingto herself,alone in most private
moments, where the expectation of publicly
accessible literary language dropsaway and thetrue
sorting-outbegins, in the deep space of the mind
whereharmcannot enter.., a woman piecing it to-
gether,catchingsome momentof babble or perplex-
ityor unidentified bliss notyetlocated inthehistoric
design of literature.... GertrudeStein going over
and under(uncertainty), GertrudeStein goingaround
and around.29
The placingofStein's culturalachievementshas playedoffthe
sightingof her sexuality,itselfnow read as an achievement.She
wroteabout lesbianism-but furtively-anevasiveness that society
and herown internalization of itssexual taboos imposeduponher.As
vitally,she was a lesbian-if furtively-asfar as that society was
concerned. Nevertheless,to the lesbian feministappropriatorof
Stein's past, hersexualitysignifiesa causal bond betweenwomen's
creativityand identificationwithotherwomen. Because the lesbian
feminist(likeJillJohnston)todayspeaks moreopenlythanStein did,
she can state home truthsthat Stein could put only into covert
language, a shroudedsemaphore signallingfromone generationto
the next.
Feministcriticsagree about the importanceof Stein's lesbian-
ism in understandingher familial,social, and literaryhabits.Onlya
homophobicfool would not. Nevertheless,theydisagree about the
relationshipof her"femaleness" to language,the thirdformthatthe
feministinterrogation of Stein has taken. The question haunts,not
simplythe pictureof Stein,but feministtheoryin general. For one's
positionis entwinedwithone's visionof the fundamentalnatureof
sex and gender.
One answer is that Stein,thoughskeptical of patriarchsand
patriarchy, was ultimatelyindifferent to gender.CynthiaSecor, for
example,writes:
She was interestedin characterand in the function-
ing of the mind,and was trulyradical in her belief
thatgenderis meaningless.30
Moreover,Secor suggests, Stein's language,unlikethatof H.D.,was
309
comparativelyfree of mythicreferences.As a result, given the
patriarchalstructuresof muchWesternmyth,she blithelyengineered
an escape fromthe "net of gender."
Opposing this approbation are two overlapping critical
stances. The firstowes its theoreticalallegiance to UnitedStates
radicalfeminism.Pumpingnew air intothe lungsof the binarismthat
propelswesternhumanism,it deeplygenderizesthe world.Knowing,
thinking,writing-allare dualistic,eithermale,or preferably,
female:
Patriarchal expressive modes reflect an episte-
mologythat perceives the world in terms of cate-
gories, dichotomies,roles, stasis, and causation,
while female expressive modes reflect an epis-
temology that perceives the world in terms of
ambiguities,pluralities,processes, continuities,and
complex relationships.3'
Deep withinlanguage and the process of creation,Stein pushes
against patriarchalmodes. So doing,likeWoolf,she preparesa birth
canal for the female modes that are emergingfullyin the late
twentiethcentury.
The second stance is theoreticallymore spacious. It draws
upon Frenchgendertheory,particularly thatof Kristeva;deconstruc-
tivetheory,particularlythatof Derrida;and a UnitedStates feminism
thatfearscasting"maleness" and "femaleness" intheeternalbronze
of an essential. Marianne DeKoven, for example, carefullydistin-
guishes between two languages: conventional,patriarchalspeech,
and an experimental,anti-patriarchal speech. The formercelebrates
thetriumph ofthe male overthefemale;the post-Oedipaloverthe pre-
Oedipal; the linearover the pluridimensional; the signifiedover the
signifier.Stein is the great "experimental"writerin English-less
because she was femaleas such than because she rejectedthe re-
pressionsoftheprivilegedpatriarchallanguageand located herselfin
the farless fortunatepositionof woman,waitingforherown public
language.32Because Stein was a woman,livingwithanotherwoman,
she mighthave moreeasily recoveredpre-Oedipalspace than ifshe
had been a man or a heterosexualwoman. Nevertheless,DeKoven
correctlysays, femaleness alone is neither a necessary nor a
sufficientguaranteeof experimentalwriting.
The five forces that have helped to constructStein's repu-
tations-advocates and guardians,mass media, artistsand writers,
academics, the woman's and gay liberationmovement-have their
power.Nevertheless,theyhave been unable to impelotherforcesto
attendto the scene of the writingof Stein's history.Some writersfail
to recognizeher.As Gass notes ruefully:
Althoughherinfluencecontinues(itseems evidentto
me inthe workof Barthelmeand Beckett),manycon-
temporaryexperimentersare merely,in ignorance,
repeatingherwork,and oftenrepeatingit badly.33
310
Norhave criticsand scholars of the avant-garde,witha professional
responsibilityforaccuracy,done Stein justice. She is missingfrom
book afterbook. Hugh Kenner,in his studyof Americanmodernist
writers,waves at hercontemptuously.34 To be fair,Ihab Hassan does
apologize (in two lines) fornot includingGertrudeStein in The Dis-
memberment of Orpheus, ".... forshe contributed to both Modernism
and Postmodernism."'35
Givensuch sloth on the partof the elders,juniorshave been
luckyto findStein in the literarycurriculum.A slumberingprofes-
soriate tends to breedsomnolentstudents.In an anthologyI used in
college, whichprintedabout 150 poets,nearlytwentyofthemwomen,
includingsuch stalwarts as Sarah N. Cleghorn,Stein appeared
once-with an entryunder"ModernLightVerse."'36In a morerecent
surveyof fifty courses in AmericanLiterature
introductory at twenty-
five colleges and universities,only eight women were there. No
Stein.37
A panoplyof motivesis necessary to explain these defenses
against Stein. Some criticswear one piece of armor,othersanother.
First,she was a woman writerwho wroteabout women.Those who
consciously or unconsciouslycenter the productionof cultureon
phallic presence cannot see or read Stein sharply,hear or read her
sonorously.Significantly, the titleof one book that fails to mention
her is Afterthe Wake,a tributeto Joyce.8 For Joyce himselfboth
masculinizedthe productionof cultureand, in cunningways,topped
out towersof structure.Next,Stein oftenwritesabout the domestic
and the pleasurable, the familiarand the pretty.If one's theoryof
modernismnursestheache ofmodernism;ifitbows downto wounds;
or ifit mournsthe atrophying of the tragicintohangingironies,then
Stein well may seem trivial,ignorantlyinsouciant, superficially
aesthetic.
Finally,even forthe most intrepid,Stein is hardto decipher,
decode, and teach. Elusive,repetitive, she demands botha relaxation
of the superego's drivetowardsinterpretative masteryand the most
intenseconcentration.Hoveringaroundher is the temptationto say
thatthe game is notworththecandles thatmustbe burntto read her.
Now that the academy and the academic marketplacetend to
constructourliterary canons, theteachabilityofa writeralso helpsto
decide who mightbe in anthologies and textbooks,which rollthe
canon intothe classroom. Stein's reputationforbeing difficultis a
commonplace,a cliche. Likeall clich6s,ithas power-here to breeda
strategythat bifurcatesher, that splits her into two writers:the
opaque and thetransparent, thetoughand thecharming, thehermetic
and theaccessible. The headlinesofthe Timesobituaryin 1946 name
that binaryStein, who wroteboth "A rose is a rose is a rose" and
some "intelligible"and "lucid" works.Partof the angerof those who
preferthe accessible Steinto theseeminglyopaque Stein is thatthey
know that she can be accessible if she chooses. Her experiments
thenseem willful,discourteous,rebellious.She wantsto be a freak.
The dividedStein thenbecomes an arena fora struggleabout
experimentalwritingand language that provokes the most pro-
nounced cultural anxiety. Indeed, the very persistence of the
311
argumentabout whichStein is the good Stein,whichbegan withher
firstmajor publication,ThreeLives, in 1909, is one measure of the
degreeofthatintensity. Those who insistthatthegood Stein is trans-
parent("lucid"), charming,and accessible are those who long for
language to be conventionally referential
and fornamingand narrat-
ingto be eventuallyrepresentational. TheyresentStein forchalleng-
ing the deep, and comforting, appearance of an organic marriage
betweensignifierand signified;betweensign and sensoryworld.
Perhaps the most temperedjudge that Stein was, finally,un-
readable was EdmundWilson. He saw heras a flawedvictimof her
ownexperimentations; of brittlepersonalrelations;and ofherneed to
conceal a tabooed sexuality that she was literallyunable to
represent.39However,a gaping lack of temperancemore oftendis-
tinguishesthe condemnationofStein's "unreadability." Itspits out in
a ridiculethatmasks confusionand hostility,or inoverthostility. That
spirit permeates the media, the general public, intellectualsand
academics.
Two parables. In June 17, 1945, Louis L. Perkinsof Auburn,
NewYork,publisheda letterin TheNew YorkTimesthatprotestedthe
appearance of a Stein article about G.l.s in The Times the week
the articlebears thestylisticsignatureofthe"read-
before.Ironically,
able" Stein. Nevertheless,Perkinsaccused Stein of being illiterate
and unreadable:
... in the firstplace the English of the article bears
no relation whatsoever to the accepted rules of
grammarand punctuation.Andinthesecond place it
takes slow and painfulreadingto makeout whatshe
has to say or means to say.40
As if he wanted to show his school-age daughterwhat not to do,
Perkins hands her the Stein piece. She laughs and
laughs-apparentlybecause an adult is beingfoolish,dumberthana
school girl,notbecause she is enjoyinga spasm ofjouissance at the
freeplayof Stein's signifiers.In brief,Stein is moreof a childthana
child,less socialized than a properdaughter,immaturely unable to
enterthe father'ssymbolicorder.To culturalenforcers,she is a study
in arresteddevelopment.
Perkinsis a baffledratherthana punitivefather.Takingon that
role in the 1950s, thatdear dumbdecade of genderconformity, was
B.L. Reid."Disenchanted"withStein,he declaredthathe wouldwrite
an "essay in decapitation,"surelythe expression of a castrating
desire thathe mustsubliminatesince Stein is only"mannish,"nota
man.4' For Reid,Stein is a sprawloferror.LikemanyofStein's detrac-
tors,he accuses herof threeculturalsins.
First,she is morethandifficult. She is incomprehensible. Art,
to be art,must"communicate,"and she does not. Monotonouslyun-
relenting, Reid even flailsout at herautobiographies.Theyare "para-
sitical" and "exploitative"(ABS, p. 186). Such adjectives hintat the
second brief:Stein is nota nice person.On the contrary, she is indis-
criminate, incoherent,egocentric (ABS, p. 193). Oddly, Stein's
312
detractors-even Hemingway-are discreet about her lesbianism.
Not untilher lesbianism became celebratory-in the women's and
gay movements-diditbecome a genuinelyopen subject.Instead,her
detractors display the tact of Stein's supportersand their own
distaste for Stein's sexuality,a distaste so overwhelmingthat it
chokes offdirectspeech, but notoverwhelming enoughto choke off
all speech. Reid instead hintsat Stein's lesbianism.She withdraws,
he murmursindirectly, into"the closet of privateart"(ABS, p. 19,my
italics). Finally,the fact that this aestheticallyand morallysuspect
hulkhas any supportat all is a sign of a vast culturaldecay. In a hys-
tericalf!urry of metaphorsof bad dreams and disease, Reid charges:
She is enormouslyinterestingas a phenomenonof
the power of personalityand as a symptomof a
frantic,fumblingnightmareage-our present-and
it is as such thatshe willlive.Laterages willgather
aroundthe corpus of herworklikea clusterof horri-
fied medical students around a biological sport.
(ABS, p. 207)
Mappingthe "bad Stein" is still moreproofof the fragility
of
claims of universalsisterhood. For women,as well as men, have
lashed out at her. Her figures,and her figure,set up cultural
perturbationsthat oftencross gender lines and erase gender loyal-
ties. Amongthe mostvicious femalevoices is thatof KatherineAnne
Porter,whose lacerationsand parodies of Stein appeared fortwenty
years.42Porter'snegativeresponse to Stein's stylewas conventional
enough. Her response to Stein as a person was snidelycruel,as if
Steinweretransgressing, notsimplythedemands of language,butof
Protestant femininitytoo. Stein is both Jewish and masculine, ". . . a
handsomeold Jewishpatriarchwho had backslid and shaved offhis
beard" (TDB, p. 43). Porter'scontempt,however,pushes herintothe
self-contradictionthatscars therhetoricof unresolvedhostilities.For
Stein is also a sexless woman. She is at once an "Amazon" and a
"New Woman,"ifa NewWomantaintedbya touchof "Oriental"(but
notJewish)"passivity"(TDB,p. 48). As deformedwoman,she has re-
tainedelementsof the avaricious,selfish,lazy,anxious,stupidchild.
During the 1970s, Stein's reputation became interesting
enough,hersupportersstrongenough,to dilutethe most poisonous
attacks on her readabilityand character.Perhaps the end of that
easily aggressive line was a 1970 academic article that compared
Steinto the post-modern AlainRobbe-Grillet intheiruse of repetition.
Despite this sign of respect, the article declared Stein-as
author-dead:
GertrudeStein belongs to the past now, and her
works are generallyunread. For most people, the
questions her worksraised are now answered,and
all negatively.43
Two moresophisticatedmaneuvershave since emerged.The firstis
313
to say-with varyingdegrees of aplomb-that the two Steins simply
co-exist.Itinstitutionalizes
thedividedStein.Significantly, theNorton
Anthologyof American Literature,the most importantforce in
dictatingthe literarycanon forcontemporary UnitedStates college
classrooms, adopted this method.Itdoes includeStein. Moreover,it
explicitly,but neutrally,calls Toklas her "lover." Sympathetically,
imaginatively recognizingthe influenceof culturalethnicity, it calls
her as "the firstimportantJewishwriterin America."However,the
selections are only fromthe "representational,"and presumably
"teachable," Stein: concluding pages fromMelanctha; an excerpt
from"Portraitsand Repetition";an excerptfromWarsI Have Seen.
The headnotes gravelyannounce how problematicthe rest of Stein
can be, how"muchof herlaterprose is a combinationof the patently
obvious and the abstruse."44
The second strategywears the costume of literarypost-
modernism.It accepts hybridizationof genres; the capacity of
language to be at once an omnipotentcontrollerof consciousness
and impotentrecorderofthe flops,folds,and flapsofconsciousness;
an ethic of weary,ironic perceptiveness.Reading, or not reading
Stein, is no longera contest forthe illusorysoul of language, or
culture,or a "normal" heterosexuality.It is, instead, a matterof
preference, of a consumer'schoice. In PitchDark,thatwell-bredand
scatteredwhine,Renata Adlerhas hersurrogate,Kate Ennis,decide
to give a "moment"to a "topic." She chooses, like a good student,
"Sentimentality intheworkof GertrudeStein." She thenimprovisesa
mockcompare-and-contrast paragraphon sentimentality in Gertrude
Stein and Thomas Wolfe,to end, abruptly, "All right.I can't read her
either."45
In contrast,a formidablegroupinsiststhatthe "good" Stein is
the seeminglyopaque, tough,and hermeticone. Fromthe beginning
of hercareer,such advocates as Mabel Dodge, SherwoodAnderson,
and WilliamCarlos Williamshad endorsed her"difficult" work.They
had defendedtheappearance ofnon-referentiality. Stein,theyargued,
was scouring,purging,and thenrenewinglanguage.Thingswouldbe
betterwhenshe was through.Inthe1960s and 1970s,such a linewent
througha post-modernswerve that restless artists, writers,and
critics directed. First,they asked, more preciselythan the earlier
generation,about the representationalnature of language. Stein,
David Antin(one of her great readers) said, knew that ". . . utterance is
play before it is address or discourse or representation."46Ronald
Sukenickhonoredboth Stein and Joyceforraising"the question of
whetherit is reallythe pragmatic,discursive,rationallyintelligible
side of language thatbest puts us intouchwithourexperienceofthe
worldand of ourselves."'47 Exultationthen followedskepticism-de-
lightinthe playofsignifiers;intheheterogeneity we mightenjoyonce
released fromthe chains of central,centeringpresence; in the sub-
versionof the patriarchsthatthis release would entail; in the jouis-
sance of a newly-inscribed femalewriting.Stein became "the Jewish
daughterof Westernculture,"the double outsider,neitherChristian
nor male, who proves the validityof new interpretations of inter-
pretation.48
314
Ebullientand appealing thoughthis all is, a double ironyen-
meshes it. First,as post-modernism becomes an ever more potent
analyticcategory,it willrepelas muchas attract.Its avatars,then,
willbe bleak signpostsas muchas welcomeprophets.Stein willhave
the place so longdenied; but itmaybe hauntedas muchas honored.
Yes, Jameson agrees, Stein is an "...astonishing genealogical pre-
cursor"; a post-modernist Yet, in his magisterial
"avant la lettre."'49
reading,post-modernism is thecultureoflate capitalism,ofAmerican
military and economic domination.We livewithoutdepth,chargedby
pastiche and the simulacrumof reality,effacinghistory,breaking
down the signifying chain of being.
Next,Stein,a figurewho doubles and doubles back upon her-
self, is both a persuasive and a perplexingwitness at the hearings
about herpost-modernism. Antincorrectlytells us thatof the "great
moderns," Stein had "the deepest interest in language... as
language... a philosophicalcommitment to the problematicdouble
systemof language-the self orderingsystemand the pointingsys-
tem-and fromthe beginningof her serious work she had en-
counteredthe peculiar conflictbetween the two, even in her early
stories."51 As a result,manyof hertexts are playful,self-rebounding
utterances.Manyofthemalso lack the linearnarrative a
(a beginning,
middle,and an end) that promisesto organize referential meaning.
However,Stein also defiantlyasserts the abilityof the literarycon-
sciousness to pointto and to graspthe present-as a moviecaptures
the moment. Writing,she asserts, is ". . . neitherrememberingnor for-
gettingneitherbeginningnorending.'' Yet,intimeinstant,writing is
panopticallyabout timeinstant,as well as a separate piece. Stein's
challengeto the formsof logocentrismis complete,butshe is also a
heartylogophiliac,attentiveto logonomicniceties,who believesthat
logotheticacts are representative.
That doubleness about language intertwineswith Stein's
varietyof radicalempiricism,thatphilosophicalpositionthatWilliam
James began to build up duringStein's last years at Radcliffeand
Harvard.Believingin pluralismratherthanmonism,she attendsto as
manyphenomenaas possible; to as manysimultaneoussensuous,
sensible and psychiceventsand sub-eventsas she can, and to their
relations. Convinced that "the crudityof experience remains an
eternalelement"of the world,52she wants facts to test hypotheses.
She once wrote to Van Vechten, ". . . it is not realism it is realityand
that'swhatinterestsme mostintheworld hersense
....,3 Rendering
of crudities,she decenters her most unconventional texts. Words
fragment, splash, collide,skip,burst.Yet she wouldmournifshe had
notevokedthe presentthingbehindthe presentingname.Whatcard-
carryingempiricistwould not?
Stein's post-modernreputationshave also been peculiarly
vexed because of the marginality of hersex, the frightening
marginal-
ityof her sexuality,and her implicitrequest that we come to terms
with language itself.The clamor of these vexations is itselfpost-
modern.HereStein is precursorwithoutambiguity. On theday before
she was to leave the UnitedStates in 1935,afterherlecturetour,she
wentfora walkon Madison Avenue.Deaf in herrightear, she asked
315
an interviewer to walk on the left. Indifferentto the stares she
provoked-forheridiosyncratic appearance had, bythen,been much
photographedand reproducedand circulated-she was alertto the
trafficand to the flowof the crowd.Accordingto herinterviewer,the
writer/journalistwho now mediates between Stein and us, her last
wordsto himwere:
"The greatthingis not everto thinkabout formbut
let it come. Does thatseem strangefromme? They
have accused me of thinking of nothingelse. Do you
see the real joke? It is the critics who have really
thought about form always and I have thought
about-writing!"
GertrudeStein laughedenormouslyand went
intothe hotelwiththe crowd.54
That action,laughing,and thatword,writing-Steinis a modernand
post-modern Medusa. Decades afterherdeath,she is a freakishghost
thatterrifies
and freesus. Some trailsofourterror
mustooze out from
our apprehensionof thatfreedom.
RutgersUniversity
Notes
1 Myarticle Gertrice/Altrude," Motheringthe Mind,ed. RuthPerryand M. W.
Brownley(New York:Holmes and Meier,1984),pp. 122-39,exploresStein's
defianceand acceptance ofone elementofthecompoundofWesternhuman-
ism:bourgeoisheterosexualideology.It,likethisessay, willbe partof a book
about Stein's dualities,the avant-garde,
and post-modernism, GertrudeStein
and the Re-placingof theAvant-Garde, undercontractto the Univ.ofChicago
Press.
2 I am, however,gratefullyindebtedto Hans RobertJauss, TowardAnAesthetic
of Reception,trans.TimothyBahti,withIntro.by Paul DeMan (Minneapolis:
Univ.of MinnesotaPress,1982);Paul Lauter,"Race and GenderintheShaping
of the AmericanLiterary Canon: A Case Studyfromthe Twenties,"Feminist
Studies, 9 (Fall 1983), 435; Barbara HernnsteinSmith's wonderful"Con-
tingenciesof Value," CriticalInquiry,10 (September1983),1-35;and to the
otheressays aboutthecanon inthatand subsequentissues ofCriticalInquiry
in December1983 and September1984.
3 Recent essays that have influencedme are R. Radhakrishnan,'The Post-
ModernEventand the Endof Logocentrism,"boundary2, XII(Fall 1983),33-60,
and Fredric Jameson, "Postmodernism,or the Cultural Logic of Late
Capitalism,"New LeftReview,No. 146 (July/August 1984),53-92.See, too,
Charles Newman, The Post-ModernAura:The Act of Fictionin an Age of
Inflation,"
Salmagundi, 63-64(Spring/Summer1984),5-199.
4 Mabel Dodge, "Speculations, or Post Impressionismin Prose," Arts and
Decoration,3 (March 1913), 172-74.Dodge also distributedand publicized
Stein's privately-printed of her,"Portraitof Mabel Dodge at the Villa
portrait
Curonia."
5 I developthisinmyessay, "TheSomagramsofGertrude Stein,"Poetics Today,
special issue editedbySusan R. Suleiman,forthcoming.
316
6 The stamina,good feeling,and detail of the Stein/VanVechtenfriendship
appear intheircorrespondence,
editedbyEdwardBurns,"The Gertrude Stein-
Carl Van VechtenCorrespondence1913-1946,"6 volumes,diss., CityUniv.of
New York,forthcoming fromtheColumbiaUniv.Press.
7 John Malcolm Brinnin,The ThirdRose: GertrudeStein and Her World
(Gloucester,Mass.: PeterSmith,1968),p. 407.
8 HilaryCorke,"Reflectionson a Great Stone Face," KenyonReview,XXXIII
(Summer1961),374-75.
9 CarolynBurke,"WithoutCommas: GertrudeStein and Mina Loy,"Poetics
Journal,4 (May1984),43-52,persuasivelywritesof theStein/Loy
connection.
10 Natalie Barney,As Fine As Melanctha(New Haven:Yale Univ.Press, 1954),
p. xiv.
11 New YorkTimes,January6, 1981,p. A-18,hereafter citedas NYT.Stein'slineis
from"Sacred Emily,"written in 1913,publishedin Geographyand Plays(New
York:SomethingElse Press, Inc.,1968,originally
published1922),p. 187.
12 The helpfulcatalogue is FourAmericansIn Paris: TheCollectionsofGertrude
Stein and Her Family(New York:Museumof ModernArt,1970),p. 175.
13 James Mellow,CharmedCircle: GertrudeStein and Company(New York:
PraegerPublishers,1974),528. MartyMartin,GertrudeStein GertrudeStein
GertrudeStein:A One-Character Play,as commissionedby Pat Carroll(New
York:VintageBooks,1980,originallyperformed 1979),p. 60. MarjoriePerloff's
"A Sentence Should NeverThink:The Problemof Impersonating Gertrude
Stein," read at the UCLA Symposium "Considering GertrudeStein,
rebukesthe tritenessand parasitismof the play.
devastatingly
14 MyreadingofRadhakrishnan,
"ThePost-Modern
Event,"p. 57,has shapedthis
phrase.
15 MarjoriePerloff,The Poetics of Indeterminacy:
RimbaudTo Cage (Princeton:
Princeton Univ. Press, 1981), p. 346. See, too, Joan Retallack, "High
of
Adventures Indeterminacy," 11
Parnassus, (Spring/Summer 1983),231-62,
and David Antin,"Some Questions About Modernism,"Occident,VII, n.s.
(Spring1974),36.
16 WarrenTallman,"Haw: A Dream for RobertCreeley,"boundary2, VI/VII
1978),461.
(Spring/Fall
17 JohnCage, Silences (Cambridge:MITPress,1961),p. 73. AtPomonaCollege,
Cage says, he had to writeabout the Lake Poets. First,he did so in the
"... mannerofGertrude and repetitiously."
Stein,irrelevantly He gotan A. "The
second timeI did it I was failed"(Silences, p. x). So muchforStein and the
academy.So muchforthe academy.
18 JohnAshbery,"The Impossible,"Poetry,XC (July1957), 250-54.See, too,
"G.M.P.,"ArtNews,69 (February1971),44-47,3.
19 MarjoriePerloff,Frank O'Hara: Poet Among Painters (New York: George
1977),pp. 30 passim. HenrySayre,"The Artist'sModel:LookingLike
Braziller,
GertrudeStein," UCLA Symposium"ConsideringGertrudeStein," helpfully
analyzes Stein's influenceon post-modern
artand performance.
20 WilliamH. Gass, "GertrudeStein: Her Escape fromProtectiveLanguage,"
Fictionand TheFiguresofLife(NewYork:VintageBooks,1972),p. 87. Gender-
izingthe modernistculturallegacies, Gass uses "masculine" language for
Joyce,i.e. "limbs,"and "feminine"forStein,i.e. "Miss Stein" and thewatery
metaphor.
317
21 The mostcomprehensive history dance since the 1960s,Sally
of post-modern
Banes, Terpsichore inSneakers:Post-ModernDance (Boston:HoughtonMifflin
Co., 1980),does notmentionStein.However,post-modern dancerswereaware
of her,e.g., in 1963,JamesWaringpresented"Stanzas in Meditation,"in four
parts,withtitlesbyStein.
22 RosalynRegelson,"Was She The Motherof Us All?",New YorkTimes(Novem-
ber5, 1967),11-5.
23 DavidShapiro,"Poetryand Action:Performance in a DarkTime,"in TheArtof
Performance: A CriticalAnthology, ed. GregoryBattcockand R. Nickas (New
York:E.P. Dutton,Inc.,1984),p. 161.
24 GulliblesTravels(NewYork:LinksBooks,1974),p. 208; hereafter
JillJohnston,
citedas GT.
25 RichardBridgman,GertrudeStein In Pieces (New York:OxfordUniv.Press,
1970),p. 411.
26 Regelson,"Was She The Motherof Us All?",p. 5.
27 EmilyStipesWatts,ThePoetryofAmericanWomenFrom1632to 1945(Austin:
as one to
Univ.of Texas Press, 1977),pp. 165-68.Wattssees thatalternative
Pound,Eliot,the FugitivePoets, and the regionalists.
28 Joan Retallack,"HighAdventures p. 242. Retallackis cor-
of Indeterminacy,"
rectingRichardKostelanetz'sassertionthatno womenhave followedStein.
29 KathleenFraser,"Overheard," 4 (May1984),98. Fraser'spuns,
PoeticsJournal,
on "bearer" and "piecing," evoke women's traditionalactivities,bearing
childrenor piecingtogetherquilts.
30 in
CynthiaSecor, "GertrudeStein: The Complex Force of Her Femininity,"
Women,TheArtsand the1920sin Parisand New York,ed. KennethW.Wheeler
TransactionBooks,1982),p. 31.
and V. L. Lussier(New Brunswick:
31 Julia Penelope and Susan J. Wolfe, "Consciousness as Style: Style as
Aesthetic,"in Language,Genderand Society,ed. BarrieThorne,C. Kramarae
and N. Henley (Rowley,MA: NewburyHouse Publishers,1983), p. 126.
Unfortunately, the authors have set up a false opposition between
and "female,"a biologicalcondition.
a historicalformation,
"patriarchal,"
32 Marianne DeKoven, A DifferentLanguage: GertrudeStein's Experimental
(Madison:Univ.ofWisconsinPress, 1983),p. 175.
Writing
33 Gass, "GertrudeStein:Her Escape fromProtectiveLanguage,"p. 96.
34 HughKenner,A HomemadeWorld(NewYork:AlfredA. Knopf,1975),pp. xviii,
221, ix.
35 Ihab Hassan, "POSTmodernlSM," History,Ill (Autumn1971),11.
New Literary
36 Oscar Williams,ed., A LittleTreasuryof ModernPoetryEnglishand American

(New York:CharlesScribner'sSons, 1952),p. 843.
37 LillianS. Robinson,"Treason Our Text: FeministChallenges to the Literary
2 (Spring1983),96.
Canon," Tulsa Studies in Women'sLiterature,
38 Avant-
ChristopherButler,Afterthe Wake: An Essay on the Contemporary
Garde(New York:OxfordUniv.Press,1980),p. 177.
39 EdmundWilson,Axel's Castle:A StudyIn TheImaginativeLiteratureof 1870to
1930 (New York:Charles Scribner'sSons, 1953, originallypublished1931),
318
pp. 237-56; Shores Of Light(New York: Farrar,Straus and Young, 1952),
pp. 575-86.
40 New YorkTimes,June17, 1945,VI-20.
41 B.L. Reid,ArtBySubtraction:
A DissentingOpinionofGertrudeStein(Norman,
Oklahoma:Univ.of OklahomaPress,1958),p. vii,hereafter
citedas ABS.
42 Porter'sthreemajorpieces on Stein("EverybodyIs a Real One,"1927;"Second
Wind,"1928;and "The WoodenUmbrella,"1947,whichshe also printedunder
anothertitle)are in TheDays Before(NewYork:Harcourt, Braceand Co., 1952),
pp. 36-60,hereafter cited as TDB.
43 StrotherB. Purdy,"GertrudeSteinat Marienbad,"PMLA,85 (1970),1096.
44 The NortonAnthology of AmericanLiterature,Vol. II, ed. RonaldGottesman,
L. B. Holland,D. Kalstone,et.al. (New York:W.W.Norton,1979),pp. 1516-46.
45 RenataAdler,PitchDark(NewYork:AlfredA. Knopf,1983),pp. 111-12.
46 Antin,"Some QuestionsAboutModernism,"
p. 13.
47 RonaldSukenick,"The NewTradition," 4 (1972),585.
PartisanReview,XXXIX,
48 Neil Schmitz,Of Huck and Alice: HumorousWriting in AmericanLiterature
(Minneapolis:Univ.of MinnesotaPress,1983),p. 190. Schmitz'sglittering
text
partiallyoverlapswithDeKoven.
49 p. 56.
Jameson,"Postmodernism,"
50 Antin,"Some QuestionsAboutModernism,"
p. 13. See, too,Perloff,
Poeticsof
pp. 67-108.
Indeterminacy,
51 GertrudeStein, The GeographicalHistoryof America(New York:Vintage
1936),p. 150.
Books, 1973,originalcopyright
52 WilliamJames,"Preface,"The Willto Believe and OtherEssays in Popular
Philosophy(Cambridge:HarvardUniv.Press,1979),p. 6. James'sotherpieces
about radical empiricismare in Essays in Radical Empiricism(Cambridge:
HarvardUniv.Press, 1976),intro,byJohnMcDermott.
53 Burns,"Stein-VanVechtenCorrespondence,"II,p. 530. Burnsdates the letter
at 5 October,1929.
54 JohnHyde Preston,"A Conversation,"
AtlanticMonthly,
CLVI (August1935),
194.
*Some of the ideas in thisessay also occur in mypaper,"GertrudeSteinand HerPost-

ModernReputation,"which I gave at a symposiumat UCLA,"ConsideringGertrude
Stein,"inNovember, 1984,and whichwillappearina collectionofsymposiumpapersthat
UCLAwillprepare.
319

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Duke University Press

Gertrude Stein: Humanism and Its Freaks

GertrudeStein died of cancer at 6:30 p.m.on July27, 1946,in

Among the most vital advocates of the performancesat

Though Stein offersJohnstonexemplarytexts; thoughStein is an

Moreover,Secor suggests, Stein's language,unlikethatof H.D.,was

36 Oscar Williams,ed., A LittleTreasuryof ModernPoetryEnglishand American

*Some of the ideas in thisessay also occur in mypaper,"GertrudeSteinand HerPost-

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