Gertrude Stein Books

Of the three great books published 1922/23--Ulysses, The Wasteland, and Geography and Plays--I rate Stein's work the highest. It is a bit daunting at first, though you will probably be amused at least by the wit on every page. But for experiments in poetry, plays, and prose, it by far outstrips Joyce and Eliot. The one essential modernist work. So advanced it is actually postmodernist in its approach to its audience, including, as it does, echoes of what is happening now around her so as to achieve a release from time and to become essentially timeless. Try it and see. This is a great investment. The first edition in four separate bindings is worth seeking out, though Stein tends to be pricey. But just read it in any edition. You'll love it. Bob Finley

Using Stein's words and pictures of her, her contemporaries and the places that were the backdrops of their lives, Renate Stendhal has created one of the most vital picture-bios of Stein and her era. The introductory essays at the beginning of each chapter set the stage for what follows, giving the reader a clear chronology and context. The excerpts from Stein's works are helpful in determining which of Stein's works(many of which are still in print) you'll want to read next. Everyone who was anyone in their crowd is here. A great gift for anyone interested in the literary/artistic period between WWI and WWII.

Though not the first Stein reader, this edition presents some additional selections from the works of one of the 20th century's most influential writers. It gives readers a taste of some of her less familiar works with brief comments beginning each selection from editor, Richard Kostelanetz. His introduction also gives readers a good perspective of Stein's life and the development of her writing. Many still view Stein's work as difficult or hard to comprehend, but exposure to her works in this kind of reader format, allows for re-reading and comparison, which after a time makes her work more and more accessible and enjoyable. The publisher's decision to print editions simultaneously in paper and hardcover was a very good idea, making copies available for both the collector and classroom use.

This book is never boring and rarely hermetic. It does not lack distancy and really offers a kind of detailed commentary on the content of Stein's writings. Before reading it, I would not have believed that Dante or the Cabala could have anything to do with Stein. Now I read Stein with different eyes. Perhaps a new Stein biography will be written on the basis of the insights of this book.

Gertrude Stein's How to Write, as much about how to read as about how to write, is one of the great "unreadable" modernist classics. As a student of the psychologist/philosopher William James, she could predictably want to approach the task of explaining how to write from an observational/laboratory perspective rather than as a problem of providing discursive information. The reflexive style of the book has made it something of an underground favorite (thought the fact that Amazon.com lists it on the "available in 24 hours category suggests that it is considerably more above ground) for people of a post-structuralist bent. Its value is both philosophical and mental/calisthenic. Her fragmented sentences force one back on all one's language-processing resources, providing a kind of linguistic stress-test, while reminding one of the philosophical depths of language experience. One finds many crossed wires as one traverses the field of her writing: psychology and society, orality and writing, image and discursion, grammar as form and grammar as experience-just for starters. It is one amazing textual trip whether you bus in for a segment or sign on for the whole course. And as a small cheap book it can be lived with forever.

Like love, transcendence and magic are often unexpected. Coming with the rain, skirting the horizon between waking and dream, shaking your hand at a meet-and-greet outside a corner office, surf pulling the sand from under your heart. In Lonelyhearts Pawn Shop, they are cheerfully carried through galaxies, across languages and barriers, ferried to and from islands cut off from the mainland by this endearing, disarming and benevolent purveyor of goodwill, humanity, and fine muse.

From her modest shop on the outskirts of desire Pawn Queen dedicates her life to the good work of good work, warmly returning her patrons' barter ten fold with wisdom and grace served unpretentiously like a complimentary sweet delivered with a reassuring smile. In heels, or sensible pumps, a perfect lady.

Here, principles of assorted disciplines, concrete and abstract, simple and complex turn transcendent trinkets of art, philosophy, prose and poetry displayed in clear unlocked cases for everyone to admire.

A less ambitious or envious competitor might cry foul, accuse this lovely enterprise of unfair trade practice, wonder how they missed the exchange of these simple treasures. Might contest in the cosmic court this glistening collection of cubic zirconium. (Or are they diamonds?) But the cosmic court is judicious, wise, and advised by familiar cats.

Pawn Queen pleads no contest to a generosity of ideas. This time, a dancing chain of love's DNA doodled on the back of a receipt while chatting with a customer. Serendipity? Painstaking design? At Queenly Pawn one never knows.

Perhaps she has mapped the genome of the heart.

A significant and important investigation of the problem of autobiography, place, and identity through the works of Gertrude Stein (the overlooked Everybody's Autobiography), Lillian Hellman (Scoundrel Time), Sam Shepard (Motel Chronicles), and Joan Didion. Reaves creatively and critically centers these writers around the problem of constructing an identity on an impossibly fractured and contradictory American grid. She devotes substantial and well-informed chapters on each author, and she successfully channels her discussion among the currents of autobiographical studies.

The study is refreshing because Reaves is not beholden to any single critical approach in her close and intelligent readings of the texts. To be sure, her work reflects a strong grounding in contemporary literary theory, but her writing is not bogged down by slavish thinking and overwrought jargon. The approach is accessible, perceptive, and rigorous. For anyone who's interested in any or all of these important American writers, and for anyone interested in deepening their appreciation for autobiography, I highly recommend this lively and bold book.

Sordello gets a Cubist alignment, we go through a very good development, the choruses get good music, and when you want it's clear, if that's what you want.

You would set about it in this way, to form these sentences as they will come, and it goes like this: form, sound, noun, sentence. Later: discrete sentence, sound, noun. Still later: sentence, noun. What gained? Rapidity, clarity. Lost?

a tremendous acheivement that argues an original and controversial thesis at every turn. the scholarly research is truly outstanding.her grasp of the critical literature across a number of fields of intellectual inquiry is thorough exacting and always subtle. an extraordinary book.complete intimacy with its subject.

This book is odd, but very lovely. It is quite in the stream-of-consciousness vein, very modernist. I am not sure how much sense it would actually make to a child, but I found it to be particularly good.