I am not suggesting that Stein's texts do not 'mean' in any capacity but
rather that they consistently elude any kind of 'decoding' or attempt to fix
meaning within them. Moreover, it is exactly because they evoke such a
proliferation of 'meanings' and associations that they prove so engaging -
and frustrating. I agree that the texts engage with language and 'the ways
in which it experiences'in the sense that the syntactic playfulness of
Stein's work means that ultimately they refer to nothing more than
themselves, documenting their own process and loosening language from its
strict referential capacity. I don't think this is denying the texts have
'meaning', but maybe that what they are engaging with is exactly that shared
cultural knowledge- language- and its possibilities. I'm interested by your
last comment, could you explain what you mean by 'Stein constantly
endeavours to let her autobiography be written by the language itself'?
>From: Michaela Giesenkirchen <mgiesenk@artsci.wustl.edu>
>Reply-To: stein-l@ucdavis.edu
>To: <stein-l@ucdavis.edu>
>Subject: Re: Lifting Belly
>Date: Wed, 06 Feb 2002 17:12:05 -0600
>
>Hm, dear Helen, I am not so sure about the non-existent interiority. This
>is almost to say that Stein's text is empty of meaning. It undermines
>referentiality, yes, but it still means. The shared cultural knowledge is
>language and the ways in which it experiences. Anyone who has done
>biographical research on Stein has the opportunity to recognize how Stein
>constantly endeavors to let her autobiography be written by the language
>itself.
>
>Michaela Giesenkirchen
>--
>
>
> > From: "helen king" <ms_myrnaminkoff@hotmail.com>
> > Reply-To: stein-l@ucdavis.edu
> > Date: Wed, 06 Feb 2002 22:36:42 +0000
> > To: stein-l@ucdavis.edu
> > Subject: Re: Lifting Belly
> >
> >
> >
> > Although it is virtually impossible not to do so (and in many ways
> > anticipated by the text),I have always suspected that in attempting to
>read
> > _Lifting Belly_ as a love-poem to be deciphered and decoded, we are
>falling
> > for Stein's joke. Unlike much of her work, Lifting Belly seems to me to
> > explicitly set up the idea of an external reality, constructed as a kind
>of
> > love-poem between two (?) conspiring individuals, it is littered with
> > innuendo and nuance - absolute referential qualities - to which the
>reader
> > ultimately has no access, and which ultimately doesnt exist. Reading it
> > feels like doubling back on Stein's work, like being urged once more to
> > enter into an interpretative mode and de-code the 'secrets' embedded in
>the
> > text, only to be defeated by the robust impenetrability of its surface.
>Just
> > like _Tender Buttons_ there is no way in which meaning can be extracted
>and
> > fixed, but unlike _Tender Buttons_, _Lifting Belly_ consistently
>gestures
> > towards its own, non-existent, interiority. Peter Quatermain was really
> > interesting on _Lifting Belly_ , saying that Stein's strategy here
> > 'radically emphasises the reader's sense of the poem's referentiality
>while
> > rendering the precise nature of the reference irrelevant' (the reader is
>not
> > invited to, and cannot, draw on any shared cultural knowledge in order
>to
> > access the text-hence our problems with 'Cow' and 'Caesar'- there is no
> > assumed knowledge). I always get the sense that Stein would find my
>attempts
> > to work out what 'cow' referred to very funny, but also that it is just
>that
> > defiant, mischievous aspect of the poem (and the reader's inevitable
>attempt
> > to wrestle meaning out of it) that gives the text its inherent dynamism.
> >
> >> From: Ryan Jerving <jerving@Bilkent.EDU.TR>
> >> Reply-To: stein-l@ucdavis.edu
> >> To: stein-l@ucdavis.edu
> >> Subject: Re: Lifting Belly
> >> Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2002 12:33:35 +0200 (EET)
> >>
> >>
> >> In _Lifting Belly_, as elsewhere in Stein, the key words can be
>inflected
> >> in multiple and intersecting ways. I'd certainly agree with Renate
> >> Stendahl's explanation (and with the others on this list who've
>responded
> >> to this topic so far) that _Lifting Belly_ is a celebration of Stein's
> >> relationship with Toklas and a poem that is very orgasmic in both its
> >> referents and its exhuberant form--an extension of the "This Is This
> >> Dress, Aider" poem that ends the "Objects" section of _Tender Buttons_:
> >> "Aider, why aider why whow, whow stop touch, aider whow, aider stop the
> >> muncher, muncher munchers."
> >>
> >> But what do we do with the other, rather obvious, ways that a lot of
>the
> >> language in _Lifting Belly_, and in the other passages cited by
>Stendahl,
> >> points to pregnancy? The title, of course: a pregnant belly "lifts,"
>and
> >> it "grows and it [the belly] grows where it [what's inside it] grows,"
>it
> >> fills it "full of filling." "Cow" also has this connotation of child
> >> bearing--though this is trickier, since sometimes the referent of "cow"
> >> seems to slip sometimes into meaning the offspring: the thing a "wife"
>has
> >> when she "has a cow" (in the Bart Simpson sense). "Caesar" in this
> >> reading, of course, calls up "caesarian section": "And where does it
>come
> >> out of. It comes out of the way of the Caesars...And the cow comes out
> >> of the door."
> >>
> >> Now I don't think we'd want to put any of this down to some kind of
> >> celebration of compulsory heterosexuality for the sake of species
> >> propogation, unless terribly ironic. Or, unless this level of
>reference
> >> is designed to register in some other-than-literal way: for example, to
> >> displace the gendered expectations placed on women to be generative
>onto
> >> the field of language itself where generation (of words, sentences,
> >> paragraphs) is not so inflexibly linked to gender (on even to a
> >> necessary self-identical subject--the grammar itself supplies the
> >> generative force).
> >>
> >> This is definitely out of my usual critical territory, but I seem to
> >> recall Kristeva having written something on the issue of pregnancy and
> >> women's writing that may be useful here. Does anyone have any
> >> suggestions?
> >>
> >> Ryan Jerving
> >> Department of American Culture and Literature
> >> Bilkent University
> >> Ankara, Turkey
> >>
> >> On Tue, 5 Feb 2002, jessicalee wrote:
> >>
> >>> This is an excerpt from Renate Stendhal's introduction to
> >>> _Gertrude Stein In Words and Pictures_. I'm not sure how
> >>> much it will help, but the explanation of terms follows
> >>> what was said about "Caesar.":
> >>>
> >>> "There certainly is ample evidence in Stein's writing that
> >>> she pleased herself in the sexual role of the 'husband."
> >>> But this is a husband whose 'wife has a cow.'...The term
> >>> 'cow' covers a whole range of taboo topics ('sacred cows')
> >>> of traditional writing: female sexual organs, desire, and
> >>> above all orgasm. For example: 'Cows are very nice. They
> >>> are between legs' ('All Sunday'); 'Yes tenderness grows and
> >>> it grows where it grows. And do you like it. Yes you do.
> >>> And does it fill a cow full of filling. Yes. And where
> >>> does it come out of. It comes out of the way of the
> >>> Caesars...And the cow comes out of the door. Do you adore
> >>> me. When this you see remember me' ('A Sonatina Followed by
> >>> Another'). The romance clearly is of a bodily, orgasmic
> >>> nature. Pleasing Alice seems to have been a prime concern
> >>> of 'husband' Stein: 'Have Caesars a duty. Yes their duty is
> >>> to a cow. Will they do their duty by the cow. Yes now and
> >>> with pleasure.' ('A Sonatina'). A line in 'Lifting Belly'
> >>> ironically demands, 'Husband obey your wife.' Role-play and
> >>> role reversal should not be confused with fixed gender
> >>> stereotypes. If patriarchal patterns are played out, they
> >>> are played out with gusto, ad absurdum."
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --- "lou L." <ladylouba@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> Although, I am a die hard Gertrude Stein fan. This poem
> >>>> is one I can not
> >>>> quite grasp. I can honestly say, I do not know what is
> >>>> going on-
> >>>> What about Caesars? What does the cow signify? I have
> >>>> read it about five
> >>>> times in the last month. I found it's tone to be one of
> >>>> playful domestic
> >>>> bliss, but I can not figure out the underlining meanings
> >>>>
> >>>> Looking for feedback ideas and explanations
> >>>>
> >>>> thanks!
> >>>> Ladylouba@hotmail.com
> >>>>
> >>>>
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> >
> >
> >
> >
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Feb 06 2002 - 16:46:05 PST