THE BOOK
..........................-
TENDER
BUTTONS
THE SUBBOOK
...................-
OBJECTS
THE SUBPOEM
...................- Glazed
glitter: NUMBER 2
WORD
COUNT......................-
45
STANZA(S)............................-
1
THE
LEADER........................-
THE STEINY ROAD POET
CO-LLABORATORS..............-
MODPO
STUDENTS/THE BUTTONS
“Almost
every analysis of Stein begins with rhythm analysis.” Mary Armour
GLAZED GLITTER.
Nickel, what is nickel, it is originally
rid of a cover.
The change in that is that red weakens
an hour. The change has come. There is no search. But there is, there is that
hope and that interpretation and sometime, surely any s is unwelcome, sometime
there is breath and there will be a sinecure and charming very charming is that
clean and cleansing. Certainly glittering is handsome and convincing.
There is no gratitude in mercy and in
medicine. There can be breakages in Japanese. That is no programme. That is no
color chosen. It was chosen yesterday, that showed spitting and perhaps washing
and polishing. It certainly showed no obligation and perhaps if borrowing is
not natural there is some use in giving.
The 2014
Buttons Collective discussion of “Glazed glitter.” includes highlights of comments
on: currency/money,
fluidity/rhythm/sex, graven image/sacred text, interconnections between the
first 2 subpoems, apocalypse, black sulfide as well as various word/phrase
deconstructions. The Steiny Road Poets invokes her time machine and compass to
offer a little background.
AT THE
WAY/WEIGH STATION
While “A
carafe, that is a blind glass.” goes head on with Stein’s existence in the
universe, “Glazed glitter.” is a way/weigh station on her matrimonial route.
She is both pausing to contemplate how she got to this trip down the wedding
aisle and she is weighing the change she is experiencing. As stated in Steiny’s
October
7, 2013 post: in “Glazed glitter.”, “Stein
is talking about money, specifically the American coin called the nickel
and possibly the chemical element which is used to make up the American nickel.
She is also talking about one’s livelihood and specifically her own, which
formerly had been predicated on her study of medicine.” Here are some
highlights of Steiny’s original look at “Glazed
glitter.”:
· — The
buffalo nickel went into production in
1913. Because Stein wrote the “Objects” section last and Tender Buttons was written from 1912 to 1913 (and published in the
spring of 1914), the new nickel was probably something Stein was aware of.
·
— —“As a chemical element, nickel presents a
silvery-white shine but may oxidize (turning a rusty red) when exposed to air
or water. Maybe Stein considers this oxidation glazed glitter and is
suggesting the oxidation is a temporal condition in the phrase red weakens
an hour. In nature, nickel is often found in combination with the chemical
element iron. Maybe Stein was referring to this condition of existing with iron
in the opening line, Nickel, what is nickel, it is originally rid of a
cover where cover stands for iron.”
·
—While “Glazed glitter.” is heavy on negatives (5 no’s and 1 not), it is counter balanced with the linking verb is
(without not) 13 times and to be with modal verbs twice
(i.e. will be and can be).
BUFFALO, THE PERIPATETIC COW, &
OTHER MOVING PARTS
Some new
thoughts that occur to Steiny based on reviewing what she wrote originally are:
·
—Cows,
cattle, sheep—cloven beasts—matter to Stein’s Tender Buttons landscape. (This will be
learned later, especially in the “Food” section which begins with “Roastbeef.”
and is followed by “Mutton.”.) While “Glazed glitter.” does not feature what
adorns the American coin called a nickel, it does enough pointing—Nickel, what is nickel. It is originally
rid of a cover—to make the discerning reader dig and find that the
Liberty Head nickel circulated as the American five-cent coin from 1883 to 1912.
Is Stein ironically remarking about the symbology for a nickel employed by the
United States government—America, land of liberty (not for someone like Stein
who was choosing a same-sex partner) now covered with a wild beast known better
by the nomadic native Americans called Indians. Was Stein thinking of herself,
she who had left America to make her home in France where she could better exercise
her choices and be more liberated?
·
—The history and
making of Tender Buttons can be
referenced in “The Making of ‘Tender Buttons’: Gertrude Stein's
subjects, objects, and the illegible” by Joshua Schuster. One
sticking point is that Schuster was unable to determine whether “Food” or
“Rooms” was written first.
·
—If “Carafe…”
with its containers (carafe and glass) and family words, like cousin and resembling, emphasizes existence, then “…Glitter.” weighs in
heavily on appearance. Cover raises
the question of what is underneath and the specter of “keeping up appearances.”
Charming suggests how appearance or
form can be changed with a magic spell or just pleasing behavior that alters
another person’s bad mood. Clean, cleansing, washing, and polishing are what we
do to make us look good, if not feel better. Also color declares itself
strongly with that
red weakens an hour but it comes with
contradiction: That is no color chosen.
It was chosen yesterday (perhaps a ruse to keep something too bright, too
smart from getting too much exposure).
HOW A NICKEL
POINTS TO THE GOLDEN CALF
Judy Meibach asked what glazed glitter has to do with nickel? Karren Alenier (a.k.a. Steiny)
answered:
“This
subpoem is about change. Nickel is one type of change.”
Then Karren
suggested looking at this list of words:
change
red weakens
change has
come
search
hope
interpretation
unwelcome
breath
clean and
cleansing
glitter is
handsome
no gratitude
in mercy
breakages
chosen
yesterday
showed no
obligation
if borrowing
is not natural
some use in
giving
Karren
continued building a case about how glazed glitter is connected to nickel.
“If you buy into Tender Buttons being
a sacred declaration of Stein's marriage to Toklas (and you may not, especially
if you haven't had much time to sit with the "Objects" section), then
you might sense a whiff of things Jewish and of sacred texts.
“I think
this list of selected words might help you see the Jewish connection.
“For
example, the word chosen, as in The Chosen People. Here's an excerpt
from Wikipedia:
In Judaism, chosenness is the
belief that the Jews are a people chosen to be in a covenant with
God. The Jewish idea of being chosen is first found in the Torah (five books
of Moses) and is elaborated
on in later books of the Hebrew Bible.
This status carries both responsibilities and blessings as described in the
Biblical covenants with
God.
“Except
something is broken (breakages), weak (red weakens) and there are
other problems like no gratitude and no sense of obligation. And why is borrowing
not natural and this—a half hearted some use in giving?
“If you go
back to Stein's text: there will be a sinecure
(a cushy job paying well). The root meaning of sinecure means without
care. What is so good about a sinecure? Because glittering is
handsome and convincing.
Then Karren suggested the possibility that Stein was associating the 1913 buffalo nickel with the Golden
Calf. From Wikipedia:
When Moses went up
into Biblical Mount
Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments (Exodus 24:12-18),
he left the Israelites for forty days and
forty nights. The Israelites feared that he would not return and
demanded that Aaron make
them "gods" to go before them (Exodus 32:1).
Aaron gathered up the Israelites' golden earrings, constructed a "molten
calf" and "they" that demanded "gods" declared:
"These [be] thy
gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." (Exodus
32:4) The plurality of gods depicted or honoured on the ear-rings became a
united image of a calf, fashioned by Aaron with a "graving tool", a
plurality in unity.[2]
Karren
continued: “Then glazed glitter might refer to a graven image made from metals
coming from the earth.
“What does
the Golden Calf / glazed glitter represent to Stein?
“Could it be
the lost income from that cushy job as a doctor? There is no gratitude
in mercy and in medicine.
NICKEL AS TENDER
Therese
Pope reporting on her live ModPo study group in California, said her group
associated nickel with currency
(nickel is a monetary coin) and how that relates to Stein’s overall title Tender Buttons (tender—something,
especially money, offered in payment)
Mary Armour responded, “The current of attraction/repulsion
running through currency!”
Wanting
clarification, Therese asked, “Do
you mean the ‘flow’ of attraction like the current/connection between two
people (maybe Gertrude and Alice?) and ‘repulsion’ for money/currency?”
Mary answered:
“I was
thinking here about what happens to currency in circulation. Nickel, inferior
to the original gold louis or franc, was a commonly held international
reserve currency in the 19th and 20th centuries—in France nickel 25-centime
coins were introduced in 1903.
“The
etymology of currency and connection to a current:
1650s,
"condition of flowing," from Latin currens, present
participle of currere "to run" (see current (adj.));
the sense of a flow or course extended 1699 (by John Locke) to
"circulation of money."
“There are
coins glazed and glittering, new coins but as you say, all is not gold that
glitters. This may refer to new nickel that will become tarnished nickel. As
coins pass from hand to hand in circulation, from trouser pocket to shopkeepers
till, what happens to the 'cover' or surface of such coins? They
become tarnished, greasy, —but perhaps more shiny, rubbed shiny
with spit and polish. They acquire a patina perhaps, or they lose
original lustre to take on another value or surfacing.
Nickel,
what is nickel, it is originally rid of a cover.
“My mention
of an electrical current responding to forces of attraction/repulsion
arises from what seems to me ambivalence in tone for certain phrases.
Certainly
glittering is handsome and convincing.
“Could this
be read ironically? What glitters may be handsome, but not necessarily
convincing. Handsome is as handsome does. And if we read this as an ironic
aside, what about that statement in the previous sentence—
there
will be a sinecure and charming very charming
“What could
be charming very charming about a sinecure? Within some of Stein's
sentences are embodied contradictions—how do we read phrases that seem to stand
alone rather than integrated into the sentence? How are we meant to read handsome,
convincing, charming except as terms that could point to either attraction or repulsion? Is sincerity found in
what glitters?
“I am very
taken with the reading you and Charles give of that complex last sentence which
points one way and then another.
It
certainly showed no obligation and perhaps if borrowing is not natural there is
some use in giving.
“That word certainly
again. Do we read it this time without irony? And then the pointer towards the
value of altruism, giving. That tension between borrowing and giving—which
incurs obligation, which shows obligation? Obligation in the exchange of
currency referring to that sense of forced contractual obligation which means
'I owe you'.”
WHEN PHRASES
XCEED THEIR SENTENCES
Here Steiny pauses
for Mary’s unattended question: “how do we read phrases that seem to stand
alone rather than integrated into the sentence?” Perhaps these stand-alone
phrases are signposts that direct competing thoughts as if we readers were
driving along a highway where the signs are not quite the language we are
familiar with. This very phenomenon has caused Steiny to chart the kinds of
words encountered in Tender Buttons into thematic categories. Steiny sees these themes in Tender Buttons: existence, appearance,
morality, sexuality, gender, union, games, and printing-publishing-writing.
“Glazed
Glitter.
Let's
imagine there is a metronome somewhere in the room. A wave beating up
against the beach, a dog lapping water from a deep bowl, someone having hot sex
on the other side of the wall, the pistons of an early Ford pumping. Almost
every analysis of Stein begins with rhythm analysis. This helps us do an
'unbuttoned reading', if you like to call it that.”
At this
juncture, Mary casually tossed in the following quote from a French Marxist
philosopher who is best known for his three-volume study “Critique de la vie
quotidienne” (The Critique of Everyday
Life), which Wikipedia says puts everyday life at: the
intersection of "illusion and truth, power and helplessness; the
intersection of the sector man controls and the sector he does not
control",[14] and is where the perpetually
transformative conflict occurs between diverse, specific rhythms: the body’s
polyrhythmic bundles of natural rhythms, physiological (natural) rhythms, and
social rhythms (Lefebvre and Régulier, 1985: 73).[15]
Everywhere
there is interaction between a place, a time and an expenditure of energy,
there is rhythm. Henri Lefebvre
Mary continued:
“What is
glazed glitter? There are a multiplicity of subtexts here, multiple readings of
persuasive force.
“Art
materials: A decorative glaze is a layer or coating of a vitreous
substance which has been fused to a ceramic object through firing. Glaze can
serve to color, decorate, strengthen or waterproof an item. Tiles, faience and
mosaic.
“So you have
surfaces. And a glaze that glitters. An old glazing technique is
aventurine. Aventurine
glazes consist of a glassy matrix that contains randomly distributed
laminar crystals of high reflectivity. Direct incident light causes these
crystals to sparkle, producing a glittering effect that varies with the
angle of incident light.
“We're
talking about dispersal of light across surfaces and surfaces that sparkle when
seen from many different angles. We're looking at surfaces that shine and
glitter as if wet and glossy. Remember that red wheelbarrow glazed with
rainwater [in the poem by William Carlos Williams]? Surfaces that are hard and
brittle and look wet and touchable. That glitter everywhere and anywhere.
Surfaces that are both fixed and malleable, shifting, altering constantly
like the surface of an ocean, sparkling glittering and glazed with sheen, a
pleasurable sight when seen from any angle, always new and scattered, diffused
like starlight or a kaleidoscope, right over the body of the object. Everywhere
you choose to look, there is glazed glitter.
“Your eyes
glazed over with pleasure at the sight. And we could also be talking about
that glazed glitter in a woman's eyes after…”
At this
point Mary seductively gestures and drifts on but advocates that everyone
should spend time listening to the Kelly Writers House webcast on Tender Buttons at 100.
CROSS
CONNECTING CARAFE & GLITTER
Peter
Treanor jumped in here to talk about the connections between “Carafe…” and
“…Glitter.”:
“I was
wondering with all the talk of GS writing in the continuous present and the
parts of TB being a web relating to
parts of itself, if it would be useful to look at all the objects together,
rather than being separate in time and place. Are they on the same table or
being encountered during a continuous present experience?.
“From A
Carafe, we end with the difference spreading and in Glazed Glitter, we have
change. The difference causes change.
“In GG, we
have Nickel, nickel as a term for coins, needed to pay if you are in a cafe,
and nickel rid of a cover, the absinthe spoons were often nickel-plated. They
cover the glass, they have no lid on the spoon, it is open-topped.
”It was
chosen yesterday, that showed spitting and perhaps washing and polishing.
And
I’m looking at both of them through absinthe eyes.
“There is
color in both poems (a single hurt color—Carafe) and in Glazed Glitter no
color chosen. Red weakening
the hour, could this be sunset? The reddening hour as the sun goes down. 5 pm
was referred to as the green hour in Paris, as this was when you finished work
and popped in the cafe for your first glass of absinthe. (according to Wikipedia).
Red weakens green or maybe the weakening hour is the awakening hour. The green
fairy is awakened. All resolve not to drink today is weakened and we decide
we'll just have one . , the change has come, it is the green hour. The change
of colour from green to opaque pearl of the absinthe in the glass.
“And
sinecure comes from the Latin root to be ‘without care,’ which could be the
seen as the desired destination of the traveler in absinthe. Without care
and comfortable in the world of green.
All that washing, spitting and
polishing makes me wonder if the chrome water fountains in the bars, with their
system of taps to point into your glass of absinthe are being suggested.
“Therese,
there are so many references to money and tender as well, aren’t there? Nickle
as coin, change as small coinage. And sinecure (I had to look that up), status
and financial benefit. And borrowing (usury), giving and gratitude (gratuity).
All types of currency, exchange or tender.”
Sinecure—noun A position requiring little or
no work but giving the holder status or financial benefit
Origin: mid 17th century:
from Latin sine
cura 'without care'.
FINDING THE DEVIL & GOD
IN NICKEL
Then Peter offered this
deconstruction:
The
change in that is that red weakens an hour.
to The
change in that ist hatred weakens an hour.
or The change
in that ist hatred weakens amour.
Peter also offered this: “Satan was referred
to as ‘Nick’ or ‘old Nick.’ And El is [one of many] Hebrew [names] for God, so
Nickel (Nick El) becomes an alloy of God and Satan.”
Karren reminded Peter of another
deconstruction he saw in an earlier study of “Objects”: nick=nicht (in German
for not) + kel=k-El (Elohim, a name for G-d with the cover k)
IS THIS
GLITTER THE END OF THE WORLD?
Allan Keeton responded to this conjoining of
devil-god and not god by seeing the apocalypse announced in this subpoem:
“Speaking of
Old Nick (nicht El) rid of a cover.
Apocalypse
means uncover.
Word Origin and History for apocalypse
n. late 14c., "revelation,
disclosure," from Church Latin apocalypsis "revelation," from
Greek apokalyptein "uncover, disclose, reveal," from apo-
"from" (see apo
-) + kalyptein "to cover, conceal" (see Calypso ). The Christian
end-of-the-world story is part of the revelation in John of Patmos' book
"Apokalypsis" (a title rendered into English as
"Apocalypse" c.1230 and "Revelations" by Wyclif c.1380).
Nickel, what is nickel, it is
originally rid of a cover.
That gives the change that red weakens
an hour a darker cast.
The change in that is that red weakens
an hour. The change has come.
“But there
is hope.
Even when
the unwelcome glittering and convincing charmer,
Satan-the Snake-has claimed his sinecure.
There is no search. But there is, there
is that hope and that interpretation and sometime, surely any S is unwelcome, sometime there is breath and there will be a
sinecure and charming very charming is that clean and cleansing. Certainly
glittering is handsome and convincing.
THE MYSTERY
OF ANY S
Karren: “is S for Stein, She or
the German word es as in to eat?”
Peter:
surely
any S is unwelcome,
analysis
surely
analysis unwelcome
MS Boase:
“I think
it's simply exclusivity. S is just a signifier, any Somebody. Stein wants her
[Toklas] to herself. But instead of surely not anybody is welcome, it becomes
surely any somebody is unwelcome. It's against authority. … She doesn't want
ABT herself to become the object of affection of some somebody sometime.”
Like silver
which is more often found embedded in lead, nickel is often found embedded in
iron. In later subpoems of “Objects,” Stein pairs silver and lead in such a way
that it seems Toklas is silver and Stein, lead. MS made this comment about S, “Coming back from subpoem three,
there are implications of silver in this one. The obvious one that silver
glitters, silver as Ag, the S which is unwelcome is black sulfide (Ag2S) which tarnishes
silver over time (and has application in photography, not sure if relevant, or
since when), the polishing and cleansing referenced could then mean to keep
silver sparkling...”
Ah yes, MS, Steiny nods appreciatively, photography, silver, the elements are all
relevant.
One final
thought, after all this discussion of tarnish, apocalypse, devil versus God,
and the seduction of what glitters, is There can be breakages in
Japanese could be
connected to the Japanese philosophy of wabi-sabi, which embraces
what is flawed or imperfect. (Buttons, listen up, you might remember this
concept from our 2013-2014 studies and yes, there will be lots of other
examples.) In “Glazed glitter.”, Stein is allowing for the imperfect. It might
also glance off the broken relationship with her brother Leo. Leo, by the way,
traveled to Japan and lived there several months with his cousin. He even took
a Japanese “wife.” For Stein, Toklas may
be flawed but Stein is willing to appreciate her for the color and nourishment
Toklas brings into Stein’s existence.
Contributors
to this discussion included: Karren Alenier, Mary Armour, M S Boase, Allan
Keeton, Judy Meibach, Therese Pope, Nicola Quinn, Peter Treanor, Nathan Walker
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