Gertrude Stein's Work

Upon my first reading of Gertrude Stein’s writings, I was highly confused. The words seemed randomly placed on the paper in a meaningless fashion as if it was painting canvas just splashed with paint and called art, yet in this situation it would be called “literature”. After taking a step back and reading the biographical note by Linda Wagner Martin, I realized that Stein’s writing was a unique form of literature misunderstood by many. Linda Wagner Martin explicitly explains the inimitable nature if Gertrude Stein’s work: “Diligent in her efforts to create a meaningful language, one that would reach the reader's consciousness in ways that most writing did not, Stein plumbed areas of communication that are as often non-verbal as linguistic.” In her writings, Stein used the random and sporadic, yet continuous placement of words to add to the meaning and rhythm of her writings. For example in “Susie Asado”, Stein uses repetition to form a sort of rhythm to go along with her subject. Susie Asado was believed to have been an actual dancer (either flamenco or salsa), thus the recurrence of, “sweet sweet sweet sweet sweet tea” (1149) can seen to be a sort of beat for the reader to catch as they imagine Susie Asado. Another example of Stein’s attempt to use her erratic repetitive words to form pictures is in “Preciosilla”. Stein is depicting a sex scene in and the rhythm of these two lovers can be caught and imagined as Stein says, “….go go go go go go, go. Go go. Not guessed. Go go.”(1150). Stein has created fragment sentences that on the surface seem to make no sense, however as one listens to the words, one gets a sense of the scene that is taking place. So like that piece of art work we might view which we might see as merely paint splashed on a canvas, Stein’s literature is really complex and picturesque, however one must view her uninhibited use of words as literature that draws upon more of our senses beyond sight. We must attempt to hear the piece or we will not get an accurate reading of the literature.