THE BOOK
..........................-
TENDER
BUTTONS
THE SUBBOOK ...................-
FOOD
THE SUBPOEM
..................- Roastbeef
WORD COUNT
(Total)……..- 1757
STANZA(S)............................-
37
THE
LEADER........................-
THE STEINY ROAD POET
CO-LLABORATORS.............- MODPO
STUDENTS/THE BUTTONS
Here are
“Roastbeef.” stanzas 30 through 37 with a 393-word count. Among the topics
addressed in this post are: the break between Gertrude and Leo Stein and the
importance of Stein’s union with Alice Toklas; linguistic coding in Stein’s
words; Sooners: American pioneers; string, thread, ribbon and free love; the
connection of clouds and food; and a whiff of Macbeth’s witches.
To bury a slender chicken, to raise an old
feather, to surround a garland and to bake a pole splinter, to suggest a repose
and to settle simply, to surrender one another, to succeed saving simpler, to
satisfy a singularity and not to be blinder, to sugar nothing darker and to
read redder, to have the color better, to sort out dinner, to remain together,
to surprise no sinner, to curve nothing sweeter, to continue thinner, to
increase in resting recreation to design string not dimmer.
Cloudiness what is cloudiness, is it a
lining, is it a roll, is it melting.
The sooner there is jerking, the sooner
freshness is tender, the sooner the round it is not round the sooner it is
withdrawn in cutting, the sooner the measure means service, the sooner there is
chinking, the sooner there is sadder than salad, the sooner there is none do
her, the sooner there is no choice, the sooner there is a gloom freer, the same
sooner and more sooner, this is no error in hurry and in pressure and in
opposition to consideration.
A recital, what is a recital, it is an
organ and use does not strengthen valor, it soothes medicine.
A transfer, a large transfer, a little
transfer, some transfer, clouds and tracks do transfer, a transfer is not
neglected.
Pride, when is there perfect pretence,
there is no more than yesterday and ordinary.
A sentence of a vagueness that is
violence is authority and a mission and stumbling and also certainly also a
prison. Calmness, calm is beside the plate and in way in. There is no turn in
terror. There is no volume in sound.
There is coagulation in cold and there
is none in prudence. Something is preserved and the evening is long and the
colder spring has sudden shadows in a sun. All the stain is tender and lilacs
really lilacs are disturbed. Why is the perfect reestablishment practiced and
prized, why is it composed. The result the pure result is juice and size and
baking and exhibition and nonchalance and sacrifice and volume and a section in
division and the surrounding recognition and horticulture and no murmur. This
is a result. There is no superposition and circumstance, there is hardness and
a reason and the rest and remainder. There is no delight and no mathematics.
“Roast beef is a luxury.” Judy Meibach
“Was Stein a
Sooner of Modernism?” Peter Treanor
DISPELLING
PLATO’S FEATHERLESS BIPED & COMING TO TERMS
In keeping
with the Steiny Road Poet’s biographical approach to Roastbeef., she will again
read through the last stanzas as the story of Gertrude Stein’s break with her
brother Leo and her bonding with Alice Toklas.
To bury a slender chicken, to raise an
old feather, to surround a garland and to bake a pole splinter, to suggest a
repose and to settle simply, to surrender one another, to succeed saving
simpler, to satisfy a singularity and not to be blinder, to sugar nothing
darker and to read redder, to have the color better, to sort out dinner, to
remain together, to surprise no sinner, to curve nothing sweeter, to continue
thinner, to increase in resting recreation to design string not dimmer.
The slender
chicken and old feather bring to mind what Steiny said of Roastbeef.
stanza 9, which begins Room to comb chickens and feathers. This slender chicken may be
pointing to Plato’s definition of a human being as featherless bi-ped,
something for which Diogenes of Sinope made fun of Plato. In this case, the
slender chicken would be Leo, who consider himself a philosopher. With his
departure from their shared home at 27 rue de Fleurus, Gertrude may be
suggesting the relationship with her brother was up for burial and she would
find repose
and be able to settle simply, to surrender one for another (Leo for Alice), to
succeed saving simpler (live without Leo’s financial contribution to the
household), to satisfy a singularity
(to move from being single to being a couple with Alice). The rest of this
stanza reads like a rant about how Leo through the eyes of society viewed his
sister and her lover as sinners making a life together cooking, dining, and
having sex (resting recreation).
Cloudiness what is cloudiness, is it a
lining, is it a roll, is it melting.
In stanza 31,
Stein questions her own feelings. Is she walking around with her head in the
clouds over her happiness that she has found a life partner. Is this her silver
lining? Is she on a roll? Will this happiness last or melt away like clouds that
are nothing but vapor?
The sooner there is jerking, the sooner
freshness is tender, the sooner the round it is not round the sooner it is
withdrawn in cutting, the sooner the measure means service, the sooner there is
chinking, the sooner there is sadder than salad, the sooner there is none do
her, the sooner there is no choice, the sooner there is a gloom freer, the same
sooner and more sooner, this is no error in hurry and in pressure and in
opposition to consideration.
The interior
dialog continues and Stein frets that over time (indicated by the repetition of
the word sooner twelve times) the
relationship with Alice will wear thin from the jerking, cutting, chinking and
that there will be no choice and gloom will descend.
A recital, what is a recital, it is an
organ and use does not strengthen valor, it soothes medicine.
In choosing
the word recital, Stein instantly
brings herself and Toklas together—she for the reading of texts (presumably
written by Stein) and Toklas as trained pianist. These two types of recitals
soothe Stein’s failed career in medicine. This stanza stands as antidote for
the preceding in which Stein worries she may have gone down the wrong path, a
path not fully considered.
A transfer, a large transfer, a little
transfer, some transfer, clouds and tracks do transfer, a transfer is not
neglected.
Stein has
made a huge change that she emphasizes by repeating the word transfer six times. While she may have
her head in the clouds about her immediate happiness, she is not neglecting the
momentous change she is enacting for herself.
Pride, when is there perfect pretence,
there is no more than yesterday and ordinary.
Again, Stein
takes her temperature relative to pride and pretense and determines there is no
more of these factors than she measure yesterday.
A sentence of a vagueness that is
violence is authority and a mission and stumbling and also certainly also a
prison. Calmness, calm is beside the plate and in way in. There is no turn in
terror. There is no volume in sound.
With the
word prison, Stein invokes the
specter of Oscar Wilde who revealed his same sex proclivities and paid for this
honesty by being sent to prison. This is what Leo was undoubtedly warning his
sister against. She says to herself there is no let up (turn) in terror and
that she must stay calm beside her partner (plate is a stand in for Alice) and
keep their relationship quiet by keeping the volume down.
There is coagulation in cold and there
is none in prudence. Something is preserved and the evening is long and the
colder spring has sudden shadows in a sun. All the stain is tender and lilacs
really lilacs are disturbed. Why is the perfect reestablishment practiced and
prized, why is it composed. The result the pure result is juice and size and
baking and exhibition and nonchalance and sacrifice and volume and a section in
division and the surrounding recognition and horticulture and no murmur. This
is a result. There is no superposition and circumstance, there is hardness and
a reason and the rest and remainder. There is no delight and no mathematics.
The word coagulation conjures unkosher rare-cooked roast
beef left on its serving plate as a dinner party winds down. Maybe this is a
bridal dinner of Stein and Toklas with the leftover meat sitting in the bloody
juice and fat that are now congealing. Coagulation
means to cause transformation of a liquid into some form of mass and Stein says
this can’t be achieved in prudence.
In other words, Stein must take a risk to transform her life from doctor to
writer.
The words stain, tender, lilacs, and disturb evoke Lincoln’s assassination,
an event Stein pointed to in the Objects
subpoem “Chairs.”. Lilacs points to Walt
Whitman’s elegy for Lincoln “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.” Stein
uses the events and imagery of the American Civil War as a contrast to the
strife between her brother and herself over her union with Toklas.
The question Why is the perfect reestablishment
practiced and prized, why is it composed pertains to the re-uniting of the
United States of America, a moment in history that did not cause celebration
since so many had died, including the president of the nation. However, the
Union survived and things went back to a regular routine: The result the pure result is juice and size and baking and exhibition
and nonchalance and sacrifice and volume and a section in division and the
surrounding recognition and horticulture and no murmur. What Stein hopes
for herself is to preserve her union with Toklas.
FINDING
SUBLIMINAL CODING IN THE REPEATED SOUNDS
Peter Treanor took a linguistic look at some of
these stanzas, initially looking at the repetition of the er sound:
To bury a
slender chicken, to raise an old feather, to surround a garland
and to bake a pole splinter, to suggest a repose and to settle simply,
to surrender one another, to succeed saving simpler, to
satisfy a singularity and not to be blinder, to sugar nothing
darker and to read redder, to have the color better, to
sort out dinner, to remain together, to surprise no sinner,
to curve nothing sweeter, to continue thinner, to increase in
resting recreation to design string not dimmer.
“So
many Er ending words. Er sounding like ‘her’ but then she
flips it—Er to Re.”
To bury
a slender chicken, to raise an old feather, to surround a garland and to
bake a pole splinter, to suggest a repose and to settle simply, to surrender one
another, to succeed saving simpler, to satisfy a singularity and
not to be blinder, to sugar nothing darker and to read redder,
to have the color better, to sort out dinner, to remain together, to surprise
no sinner, to curve nothing sweeter, to continue thinner, to increase in
resting recreation to design string not dimmer.
“And so
many Ss, so many S sounds, sounds like a snake hissing or bacon sizzling.”
To bury a slender chicken,
to raise an old feather, to surround a garland and to bake a pole
splinter, to suggest a repose and to settle simply,
to surrender one another, to succeed saving
simpler, to satisfy a singularity and not to be
blinder, to sugar nothing darker and to read redder, to
have the color better, to sort out dinner, to remain together, to surprise
no sinner, to curve nothing sweeter, to continue thinner, to
increase in resting recreation to design string not
dimmer.
“So there's
Re, Er, and SèRe (h) er s = rehearse.”
Alenier responded:
“Stein languages the unspoken rehearsal to
point at a roast beef dinner for the bridal party!”
Next Treanor took at look at the content for
the following close readings:
(a wedding
cake with decorative columns) to suggest a repose (a state of lying down and therefore repose also means a
harmonious relationship!) and to settle simply, to surrender (to) one another, to succeed saving simpler,
to satisfy a singularity (to satisfy becoming as one)
and not to be blinder, (not to be blind to or by love) to sugar
(so sweet) nothing darker and to read redder, to
have the color better, to sort out dinner, to remain together, to surprise
no sinner to curve nothing sweeter, to continue thinner, to
increase in resting recreation (the harmony of being together or in repose) to design
(want) string not dimmer.
“The sooner there is jerking, (love making, the spasms of passion) the sooner freshness (lust
and attraction) is tender (loving gentleness), the sooner the
round it is not round the sooner it is withdrawn in cutting (Cutting and
withdrawn suggests something cutting, entering, penetrating flesh to me, and
sounds very sexual), the sooner the measure means service (service
sounds sexual too, to be serviced is a euphemism for having sex, but also
suggests caring for someone or being devoted to them, I am at your service),
the sooner there is chinking (the clinking of glasses brought together in a
toast, at a wedding for example), the sooner there is sadder than salad, the
sooner there is none do her, (none do her, really makes me feel she is
talking about Alice rather than a meal , or as well as a meal maybe) the
sooner there is no choice, (the sooner it is decided, agreed. As soon
as they are wed, committed to each other) the sooner there is a gloom freer
(gloom freer, free of gloom, happiness), the same sooner and more
sooner, (she is wanting this to happen, to be resolved sooner than soon,
she’s really impatient for this to occur) this is no error in hurry and in
pressure (it’s the right thing to do, they may have just met but it feels
so right) and in opposition to consideration (stop considering/ thinking, just do it!)
“These last
few stanzas of the last part of Roastbeef seem to be talking about her relationship
with Alice. There seems to be doubt (cloudiness in the previous line) but in
this stanza, she seems to be dispelling any doubt, saying she wants to forge
ahead and form a union as it seems to be the right thing to do. Her sentences
seem less disjointed in this part too. They seem more linear and flowing. Maybe
the chaos and turmoil of her thoughts are being resolved as she becomes clearer
about what she wants to do and so she demonstrates this with more linear
language.”
PIONEERING SPIRIT AND SOONERS
In response
to Treanor, Alenier suggested
looking at the sooner stanza through the following definition, which is tied to
the American frontier and its pioneers. She said Stein was a big fan of living
off the land and being self-sufficient. [She put this into action in choosing
to stay in southern France during World War II when food was scarce and
everyone grew vegetables as Stein and Toklas did.]
soon•er
(ˈsu nər)
n.
a person who settles on government land before it is legally opened to settlers in order to
gain the choice of location.
The
sooner there is jerking (makes
me think of dried meat—jerky which was made by American Indians from buffalo
meat), the sooner freshness is tender (the person arriving ahead of everyone else impertinently stands to gain
more currency—tender), the sooner the round it is not round the sooner it is
withdrawn in cutting (the pioneer is butchering meat which he can’t decide
if it is that cut of beef called a round located between rump and shank of the leg
or maybe the animal is a buffalo), the sooner the measure means service (the
pioneer needs to survey his claimed land to effectively use it without fear of
losing it), the sooner there is chinking (the pioneer is making his way
through a narrow passage of time perhaps? Maybe before the land is officially
released), the sooner there is sadder than salad (Out on the frontier,
who had time for delicate salad? Those pioneers ate roast beef.), the sooner
there is none do her, the sooner there is no choice, the sooner there is a
gloom freer, the same sooner and more sooner, this is no error in hurry and in
pressure and in opposition to consideration (life was hard on the
frontier—plenty of lacks with plenty of time to think about how hard life was).
Treanor
was taken off guard by the American Sooner:
“Well, I
never heard of Sooners before. Staking your claim, sooner rather than later, to
get the piece of land you desire. Wonder if you could call someone a sort of
Sooner if they got in early to stake their claim on the girl they desired or
if they got in early (or first) to write in a way that staked a claim on a new
and pioneering way of writing? Was Stein a Sooner of Modernism?
“I like the
idea of staking a claim and being a pioneer, a settler in a new untouched
landscape. (If you don’t dwell too much on the dispossession of the indigenous
inhabitants.) I wonder if she would have identified with the Sooner's spirit of
adventure, stepping into the unknown, the new and fruitful lands . She was
adventurous and pioneering in many ways it seems both personally and
artistically.”
Alenier
further explained:
“Pete, Oklahoma
is known as the Sooner State and presumably this has to do with the settlers
who jumped the gun to stake out their territory.
“In a way, her
father Daniel was a pioneer taking his family to California and getting
involved in the start up of the cable cars there. Not so many Jews there. By
the way, the family lived on a large piece of property in Oakland, CA. They had
an orchard. One of the governesses hired knew how to garden and taught the
Stein kids how to garden. Anyway that must have come in handy when she and
Alice had to grow some of their own food during WWII. Days before she died she
was out in the countryside looking for a place to buy. Yes she was pioneer in
many ways.”
TYING A
COLORED THREAD ON THE FINGER: STRING & FREE LOVE
Changing the
subject, Alenier asked:
“Pete,
Do you remember how we keep running into the word string in section 1 ‘Objects’?
“In ‘Food,’
we only see it once in this stanza:”
To bury a
slender chicken, to raise an old feather, to surround a garland and to bake a
pole splinter, to suggest a repose and to settle simply, to surrender one
another, to succeed saving simpler, to satisfy a singularity and not to be
blinder, to sugar nothing darker and to read redder, to have the color better,
to sort out dinner, to remain together, to surprise no sinner, to curve nothing
sweeter, to continue thinner, to increase in resting recreation to design string not dimmer.
“While I was
looking for a connection to Lincoln or Walt Whitman given the word lilacs in the last stanza of
"Roastbeef.", I found this about free love that gives us a new way to
look at string:
“See the
line about couples signifying their union by tying colored thread on their
finger? The quote comes from a biography on Whitman by David S. Reynolds.”
Treanor
answered:
“Now that's
really interesting, Karren. It amazes me to think that there were communities
doing this in the 1800s, I think of such things as really modern and only
beginning in the 1960s, but there it is happening a whole 100 years before.
“And, yes,
the string thing as an indicator of a temporary bond is interesting. It made me
think of the phrase ‘tying the knot’ as a euphemism for marriage/ partnership. Just
looking that up, there seems to be a long tradition of knots being used in
marriage ceremonies and also used to talk about marriage. I guess you’ve got to
have string (or something like it) before you can tie a knot. String or ribbon
maybe (Stein uses ribbon a lot too).
“I wonder if
to ‘string somebody along’ in part refers to this too, by giving someone the
false hope that the string will be tied into a marriage knot, while also giving
the feel that the string is like a lead that you are leading them by. There is
a danger of falsehood and deception lurking within string.”
ON CLOUDS
THAT TRANSFORM TO FOOD
Aguinaldo
stepped back to look at the relationship of clouds to food:
Cloudiness
what is cloudiness, is it a lining, is it a roll, is it melting.
“Stanza 31
plays with several things at once. There's the silver lining and the rolling of
thunder among others. Melting... could that be rain? Such a painterly way of
putting it.
“It's all of
a single line (lining?), perhaps a lesson on evocation, that you need only see
(lining), hear (roll), and feel (melting) certain select details to account for
the whole sky. It begins and returns to taste: the cloudiness of the gravy or
soup maybe, the roll on the side, the butter.”
Treanor added:
“Yes this
definitely suggests silver to me too, silver linings. Is there a silver lining
in all this cloudiness? Something is unclear (cloudy) here , . And a
lining could be aligning too.
Something was unclear but is becoming clearer, aligning, falling/rolling
into shape. Maybe it is her heart (or doubts about Alice) that is melting?
Alenier rejoined:
“I love Dennis’
comment about how painterly this stanza is. It feels like a landscape with a
heavy hanging of clouds with maybe a peek of sunlight that reveals the silver
lining. Still there is the thunderhead rolling in. Maybe dark clouds are
melting away the light.
“Very nice
transition to the culinary side!”
Aguinaldo
continued:
A transfer,
a large transfer, a little transfer, some transfer, clouds and tracks do
transfer, a transfer is not neglected.
“In terms of
food, clouds seem to me steam, also the dimming of the clear liquid as it
becomes broth. Heat transfer has ever defined the process of cooking, a central
consideration when living off the land. Tracks are more difficult in this
level. But if I'm following Karren's reading of the pioneer-in-Stein, then
there's the possibility of seeing a dynamic process (collecting firewood, butchering,
going to the market) making possible a couple of hours of cooking, standing in
more or less the same spot and just cooking. All those errands are in that pot.
And later, in the stomach.
“Unburdening?
An emotional, physical connection? These are here.
“Conversation
too. And the poem itself as a transfer, even the misreadings, all of that is
communicated, assimilated (even if only a little), proven indelible.”
FINDING A
WHIFF OF THE WITCHES OF MACBETH
Alenier answered,
“Dennis and
Pete, Do you think Stein might be pointing to witches of Macbeth?
“It seems
like this whole passage points to some kind of brew being concocted with that
burial of a slender chicken, an old feather, a pole splinter… and Stein refers
to violence, sinner, cloudiness, cutting, jerking, a transfer, coagulation
(something bloody like the roast beef but maybe a human body?)”
Aguinaldo
said,
“That
would be a great connection to make, Karren. I'm trying to remember Macbeth now, and I'm sure (almost sure,
anyway) that Macbeth tried to squeeze
some clarity from the witches. I'm seeing Stein's 'cloudiness' as important,
vital, even if the brew (and the words) of the witches were necessarily
'cloudy'. Macbeth would project his longings into the words, seeing what he
wanted to see and establishing a set of plans upon that vision. If Stein is
making spells for us here, it seems the acceptable reader-position is that of
the Thane of Glamis [Macbeth was the Thane of Glamis].”
So with that
provocative statement about Stein making spells for her readers who then might
take on the role of Macbeth, a man full of ambition that turns bloody, (yikes),
the Steiny Road Poet concludes this review of stanzas 30 through 37 of
“Roastbeef.”. In the next post, Steiny will attempt to summarize what was
discovered in seven separate discussions of “Roastbeef.”.
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