Stepping on Tender Buttons: “A Shawl." Part 2 of 2

SIZING THE BUTTONS BOX

THE BOOK ..........................-           TENDER BUTTONS

THE SUBBOOK ...................-           OBJECTS

THE SUBPOEM ...................-          A SHAWL: NUMBER 54

WORD COUNT......................-           104

STANZA(S)............................-           6

THE LEADER........................-           THE STEINY ROAD POET

CO-LLABORATORS..............-           MODPO STUDENTS/THE BUTTONS

GENRE..................................-           VIRTUAL OPERA

LOCATION............................-USA, UK, Australia, Philippines, S. Africa, Canada.

TIME......................................-           ALL HOURS OF EARTH’S CLOCK

TONE.....................................-           MELLIFLUOUS BUT STICKY

“Stein is a talker of size.” Eleanor Smagarinsky

“…when we talk we torque objects in space.” Eleanor Smagarinsky

 A SHAWL.

A shawl is a hat and hurt and a red balloon and an under coat and a sizer a sizer of talk.

A shawl is a wedding, a piece of wax a little build. A shawl.

Pick a ticket, pick it in strange steps and with hollows. There is hollow hollow belt, a belt is a shawl.

A plate that has a little bobble, all of them, any so.

Please a round it is ticket.

It was a mistake to state that a laugh and a lip and a laid climb and a depot and a cultivator and little choosing is a point it.

While Stepping on Tender Buttons: “AShawl." Part 1 of 2 attended to items of Stein’s strategy for “A Shawl.”, the comments presented focused on concrete associations dealing with fashion, wedding traditions, birth, death, and tickets. Part 2 of 2 captures the commentary about grammar, lyricism, science with a dash of Walt Whitman.

OPEN NOUNS

Eleanor Smagarinsky:

“This is a tough one, so I decided to start by concentrating only on the first two lines.

“I'm going to try to apply what I learnt in the grammar workshop, but I'm learning as I go.

“How is Stein attempting to define the concrete noun SHAWL? It is a generic shawl, it's not the shawl, but a. This already allows my imagination to run riot, I'm looking up the styles of shawls worn in the early 1900s, while I'm also aware of the prayer shawl, and the idea that any piece of material wrapped around one's shoulders may well be called a shawl. I could, of course, go abstract/metaphorical with the idea of shawl, but I'll leave that for later (too confusing).

“The good news is that what we have here is the expected grammatical structure for a definition this is this, i.e. NOUN, VERB, NOUN ----- SUBJECT, VERB, OBJECT.

SUBJECT = shawl

VERB = is

OBJECT = hat

A shawl is a hat

“Both a shawl and a hat are concrete nouns, as well as items of clothing. I can imagine putting a shawl over my head and it does, indeed, become a type of hat.

“Stein continues this definition by using the coordinating conjunction AND. And (like but, or, for) is used to link things of roughly equal weight and of simple relationship; it is, therefore, very disconcerting to read:

‘A shawl is a hat and hurt’

“HURT is an abstract noun (think of this example: ‘Her sympathy eased the hurt he felt after his dog's death.’). HURT is an open noun, which means it can shift into a verb (to hurt), an adjective (the hurt man) or adverb (hurtfully). Open words make up the dynamic part of our language, this is how new words are created, and this is usually the part of language which is most frustrating to many people. During the Olympics (at least in Australian English) the noun medal began to be used as a verb, e.g. ‘She medalled in the swimming.’ Word usage, when undergoing this type of change/evolution depends on acceptance by the community - just look at how easily we transformed "Google" into a verb.

“Now...even though we have this very odd coupling of a concrete noun HAT with an abstract noun HURT, it's still not *that* disconcerting, after all...it's poetry...we could try to imagine how a shawl could function as a metaphor for a hat and a hurt. But wait, Stein deletes the article a, and immediately puts us on edge. Imagine how much more pleasant it would feel to read:

‘A shawl is a hat and a hurt’

“Why is that? Well... A shawl is a hat and a hurt functions as a COMPLEX SENTENCE - i.e. there is a simple sentence (it could, if you wanted, stand on its own) ‘A shawl is a hat’; and a fragment (in incomplete clause) attached to it ‘and a hurt.’ Pop a period on at the end, and you have a nicely flowing sentence (albeit a poetic one).

“But let's go back to the clause as written:

A shawl is a hat and hurt

We still have the simple sentence ‘A shawl is a hat,’ but the fragment ‘and hurt’ nudges us towards reading HURT as an ADJECTIVE. Is it describing the shawl? Can a shawl hurt?

“Everything is suddenly just a bit ‘off,’ and this is further emphasised by the alliteration (hat & hurt) and the fact that the next clause and a red balloon brings us back to the realm of concrete nouns.

“If Stein had written:

‘A shawl is a hat and a red balloon’

I would have no feeling of unease at all. I'd simply adjust my imagination to see how a red shawl, wrapped around a slim woman's shoulders, might very well remind one of a red balloon.

“But Stein doesn't let the reader relax, and it's all due to that phrase ‘and hurt.’

“On the other hand, could Stein be inventing a new phrase? A hat and hurt, like.....let's see...a ball and chain. Marriage is a ball and chain....A shawl is a hat and hurt?”

Karren Alenier:

“I have never heard the term open noun but am so glad to have a name for those nouns that slide into verbs! 

“Of course grammar became an obsession with Stein but it's how to break the lock the literary establishment had on the rules that interested her. Some how breaking the rules of grammar are intimately connected with breaking the rules of standard marriage. It seems whenever she writes about grammar she draws attention to weddings, marriage, maybe a dash of romance as she does in the essay ‘Saving the Sentence’ (in How to Write).

“I think knot tying is important as is the fashion statement made by shawls in the 19th century.”

Stepping on Tender Buttons: “A Shawl." Part 1 of 2

SIZING THE BUTTONS BOX

THE BOOK ..........................-           TENDER BUTTONS

THE SUBBOOK ...................-           OBJECTS

THE SUBPOEM ...................-          A SHAWL: NUMBER 54

WORD COUNT......................-           104

STANZA(S)............................-           6

THE LEADER........................-           THE STEINY ROAD POET

CO-LLABORATORS..............-           MODPO STUDENTS/THE BUTTONS

GENRE..................................-           VIRTUAL OPERA

LOCATION............................-USA, UK, Australia, Philippines, S. Africa, Canada.

TIME......................................-           ALL HOURS OF EARTH’S CLOCK

TONE.....................................-           MELLIFLUOUS BUT STICKY

“Is this a prayer shawl or a fashion statement that masquerades as hat, undercoat and belt as well as other things?” Karren Alenier

“What interests me about a shawl is that it is a semi-permeable membrane, full of holes, like lace.” Mary Armour

A SHAWL.

A shawl is a hat and hurt and a red balloon and an under coat and a sizer a sizer of talk.

A shawl is a wedding, a piece of wax a little build. A shawl.

Pick a ticket, pick it in strange steps and with hollows. There is hollow hollow belt, a belt is a shawl.

A plate that has a little bobble, all of them, any so.

Please a round it is ticket.

It was a mistake to state that a laugh and a lip and a laid climb and a depot and a cultivator and little choosing is a point it.

Surely Miss Stein is up to something significant with all the subpoems in Section 1 “Objects” that pertain to things worn on the body or the body itself:

“A Method Of A Cloak.”

“A Long Dress.”

“A Red Hat.”

“A Blue Coat.”

“A Purse.”

“Eye Glasses.”

“A Petticoat.”

“A Waist.”

“A Handkerchief.”

“Colored Hats.”

“A Feather.”

“Shoes.”

“A Shawl.”

“This Is This Dress, Aider.”

and this is not to bypass:

“A Substance In A Cushion.” which has such words and phrases as costume, tassel, wear it, suit, trimming, sewing, sash

“A Piece Of Coffee.” Talks about silk, cotton, ribbon and something that may be strangely flattering

“Nothing Elegant.” which seems to have a sensitive leaning toward charm (does this point to fashion?) and things sewn

“Mildred’s Umbrella.” specifically mentioning a small sac (possibly a purse) and ribbon

“A Piano.” mentions button holder

“Chair.” which elicited extended commentary on what Civil War widows wore

“A Cloth.”, ample cloth seems to hint at Stein’s ample body

“Malachite.”, a stone used in jewelry

“Suppose An Eyes.” that features a white dress, worn lace, and leather.

“A Little Called Pauline.” sports such words as dressing, soles, spats, bow, sleeve, feather

The Steiny Road Poet conjectures that more than half of the 58 subpoems of “Objects” contain some touchstone to clothing, shoes, wearable accessories, or the body. Because Tender Buttons is a coded love poem from one woman to another, what covers the body is a logical and important theme for this work.  Clothing, particularly in Gertrude Stein’s time, represented constriction. Stein came out of the nineteenth century where women’s fashion was largely about sleeves, collars with lace, corsets, long skirts and dresses with layers of petticoats as well as hats, boots, and shawls.

One of the first things that Gertrude did with her brother Leo after she left her highly regimented life in the United States was set a new standard for dressing. She and Leo decided they would have clothes made from brown corduroy fabric, which was soft but durable. Gertrude wore a corduroy robe held together by a broach. The sister brother team also decided that sandals were preferable over shoes or boots. Releasing the body allowed for releasing the mind. Their Harvard teacher William James taught that to be a genius, one must break the constriction of habit. Within the study of “A Shaw.”, Steiny saw the connection of restrictive clothing, especially the uniforms (habits) of women college students (long skirts, long-sleeved blouses with ties at the neck—mimicking the shirts and ties worn by the male students,), as a way to hold women back from achieving creative potential. Those long skirts got in the way. Corsets sapped a woman’s breath and energy.

Among the topics elicited from the discussion of “A Shaw.” by the members of The Buttons Collective were:  fashion; wedding, birth and death traditions; shawl-as-stand-in-for-a-woman; cawl-caul-cowl; card/magic trick; and grammar, phrase construction, musicality. Here are some highlights from the discussion:

NINETEENTH CENTURY FASHION

Tamboura Gaskins:

“From what I understand, shawls were in fashion in the late 19th century--

The period of the 19th century up to the 1870s, when the fashion silhouette changed, was known as the "shawl period" because women in Europe and America wore shawls with almost all their clothing. At the beginning of that century, shawls were a necessity in a fashionable woman's wardrobe because dresses were thin and décolleté; it was a sign of gentility to wear a shawl gracefully.

“In light of this, I see hat as old hat, or old-fashioned.  So, could hat and hurt mean old-fashioned and insulting?”

SHAWL AS WOMAN; SHAWL IN WEDDING RITUAL

Pramila Venkateswaran:

“A shawl is mostly associated with a woman's garment, although men in the east do wear shawls. A shawl could be a stand-in for a woman. And a woman is hurt. In the next line, I am reminded of weddings in many cultures where the bride and groom are hidden under a shawl as part of the wedding ritual that culminates the binding or tying of the knot.

Wax is used to build stuff. Perhaps the shawl is this wedding wax that builds a marriage. But if the woman is hurt, does giving her a red balloon, as one would a child, pacify her? The under coat is like petticoat—again a word that was used as a substitute for female! And women are always sized up—whether it is their physical appearance, their talk, their accent, their whatever.

CAWL-CAUL-COWL

Mary Armour:

“This shawl reminds me of the Celtic cawl—babies born wrapped in a cawl.

Karren Alenier [a.k.a. The Steiny Road Poet]:

“OMG, Mary, yes but caul in American English. And look at this: A caul (Latin: Caput galeatum, literally, helmeted head) is a piece of membrane that can cover a newborn's head and face.”

 Eleanor Smagarinsky:

“I googled ‘Gertrude Stein caul’ and Karren's blog popped up!!!”

Perhaps the word spectacle refers to the wonder of birth, something Stein had hands-on experience with during her four years of medical training at Johns Hopkins University. While a spectacle is something extraordinary and might be deemed ‘a strange or interesting object or phenomenon,’ the process of giving birth is a natural occurrence among living entities. Therefore Stein adds that the spectacle is nothing strange but merely a single hurt color. The Steiny Poet now thinks that ‘A kind in glass’ could also refer to the transparent amniotic sac in which a fetus develops and parts of which may coat the baby in a bloody caul as it enters the world. [from Stepping on Tender Buttons: “A Carafe, That Is a Blind Glass.”]

Karren:

“The caul can be associated with the amniotic sac and voilà the red balloon!”

Mary:

“My cawl is I think a Welsh or Scottish  spelling variant.  From Wikipedia:

A caul or cowl (Latin: Caput galeatum, literally, "helmeted head") is a piece of membrane that can cover a newborn's head and face.[1] Birth with a caul is rare, occurring in fewer than 1 in 80,000 births. The caul is harmless and is immediately removed by the physician or midwife upon delivery of the child.

“The en-caul birth, not to be confused with the caul birth, occurs when the infant is born inside the entire amniotic sac. The sac balloons out at birth, with the amniotic fluid and child remaining inside the unbroken or partially broken membrane.”

Karren:

“Look at that—A caul or cowl—here comes the cow again!!

so helmeted head—hat and hurt.”

Mary:

“Red balloons, afterbirth, red flags, a psychic cloak, a helmet. A caul bearer is a person who is born with the caul.”