Stein and James: The Same Coin

“If the red is rose and there is a gate surrounding it, if inside is let in and there places change then certainly something is upright. It is earnest.”

This is a short passage from Tender Buttons by Gertrude Stein. If you read this and didn’t scratch your head at all you either understand the giant intellectual buffet that is the poet’s mind or are mentally unsound. With Gertrude, its often easy to be uncertain which applies to you. Stein’s writing appears to be randomized and pure gibberish, but – to paraphrase Hamlet – there is method to her madness, or at least that’s what she told us. Stein is exploring the language gap between words and objects. By exploring this gap, she shows the sort of limitations our language has. We can not adequately express a rose because of all the connotations a rose may have for every individual who sees it. I see a rose, I may also see other flowers or gardening equipment or clichéd expressions of love. Gertrude Stein may see a gate.

The problem with Gertrude’s expression of this idea, language and limits and how to break through them, is that the lack of convention makes it difficult to understand. The leaps and jumps she makes may make sense for her, but they won’t make sense to everyone (or even anyone?). This is where I feel it is best to let William James pick up the slack. Because James is a natural lecturer and speaks in the very clear terms that Stein does not, he can explain away Stein’s seeming insanity. For example, in his lecture “The Stream of Consciousness”, James explains that “[t]he entire history of what is called Sensation is a commentary on our inability to tell whether two sensible qualities received apart are exactly alike.” James can give reasonable explanations, easier for our minds to follow, that Stein can’t.

James and Stein are complimentary. Stein is the poetic, the chaotic, while James is the scientific, the order. They are both dealing with the same subject, but each on their own terms. Two sides of the same coin if you will. Each accomplishes something the other can’t. James can’t adequately show the examples he talks about but he can explain them. Stein can’t explain what her writing is without breaking the form, but she can use that form for all she’s worth.