An Introduction of Sorts.
This short story is written in a similar style as the great American writer, Gertrude Stein. (1874 - 1946) The bold lettering indicates direct quotes by Gertrude Stein. Stein wrote in repetitive, rhythmic patterns often ignoring rules of grammar and punctuation to create short, powerful images and insights. Her most famous work was An Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas which was really an autobiography of Gertrude Stein seen through the woman she loved.
An Autobiography of Jody Evans
by Anne Azel
a_azel@hotmail.com
This is Jody Evans story. It happened to her and so it happened to me also. It's Gertrude Stein's story too because she lived her life in the lives of others. Others. And she wrote Rose is a rose is a rose, is a rose. So this is Gertrude Stein's story. This is my story too because I am reading for my degree in literature. And what I read is Gertrude Stein.
I an lost. I also study the lost generation who were not so much lost as sacrificed at the turn of the century - the turning of the war machine. You are all the lost generation, Stein said. I am lost too. We were lost at the turn of the century and are lost still at the turn of the millennium or, at least, I am lost. Jody Evans does not feel that she is lost, just unsure at this time of which way to go.
You know how it is. You read and read and read and read and read and read - until - you believe that Stein is a person and not the lingering words in a book.
I write for myself and strangers. The strangers, dear Readers, are an afterthought.
A closeted writer and me the afterthought trying to understand. I read and read and read and read - until - I believe that Stein is a person. So when Jody Evans saw her- Stein - she wasn't surprised and she told me, and I wasn't surprised either. She came into my room and sat down, Stein that is, amongst the clutter of words.
In her time, they said that she butchered the English language with her experimentation with prose. She lived in Paris, France and wrote of her American heritage - simplified and fragmented memories - nightmares - conjuring up emotions and moods in an exotic soup of syntax and punctuation - flowing - repeating words rhythmically. She investigated the characters of others, and so herself, within her Paris closet apartment, an exile from the wide open spaces of America.
In the United States there is more space where nobody is than where anybody is. That is what makes America what it is.
She was then, a square faced, sturdy, butcher butcher butch and she lived with - through - the American writer, Alice B. Toklas, who was not so much the butcher but could be. They lived together in Paris for thirty-nine years. So Jody Evans told me. Stein lived for others and so for herself each of them lost in Paris and living on the far left bank precarious close to the edge.
"You knew them all, poets, writers, artists, and intellects. They came to visit you and stayed- returned - and went away. Were not Eliot, Hemingway, Scott Fitzgerald among your friends? Did you not buy the art of friends such as Picasso, Matisse and Braque? They visited you often when you lived at 27 Rue de Fleurus. They were all flowers - like you - nipped in the bud by a rigid world."
I noticed, when she crossed Jody Evan's room to sit amongst the clutter of words, that she had strong features, a high forehead, and close cropped hair. She was more butchered than feminine. She walked like a beat cop - toes out and flat footed. She talked straight - into flights of creative fantasy.
Sweet - - - - tea.
Susie Asado.
Sweet - - - - tea.
Susie Asado.
Susie Asado which is a told tray sure.
A lean on the shoe this means slips slips hers.
When the ancient light grey is clean it is yellow,
it is a silver seller.
"I am a sweet sweet tea so Jody Evans says," I tell Stein. "Too sweet to live comfortable within the skin that is Jody Evans' dreams."
Stein laughs and quotes her friend Ernest Hemingway. What is moral is what you feel good after.
I snort. "Will I feel good if I step out--as Jody Evans and not this too sweet sweet me?
If Herod mediate gibblets
If Herod flunk a might plane,
If Herod dice a chigger
Then Herod is to blame.
Life would be so easy, if we only talked in riddles and never had to stop to try to make sense of it, I feel. Jody Evans feels too. She feels I think far too much when all I need do is live. It is all right for Jody Evans. She seems to manage but I am reading for my degree and need my grant money and so I am cautious.
Stein has been reading amongst the clutter of words that is my room. She looks up annoyed. She likes to read. She does not like not to read. So having been disturbed and not being able to read as she wished her answer comes more sharply than perhaps she intended.
Money is always there but the pockets change; it is not in the same pockets after a change, and that is all there is to say about money.
I am not sure. Money has given me a good deal of worry in my student life and so I feel there must be more to it than this. Jody Evans, however, felt this pretty well summed it up and said so. I felt the need to argue for a little common sense - cents on the matter. But Gertrude Stein, who was never known for her patience stood.
When Gertrude Stein stood, she sometimes yelled. She was not known, as I said, for her patience, and so was know for her temper. And at this time, she did stand but did not yell even though she was angry. She did, however, talk loudly.
Everyone gets so much common information all day long that they lose their common sense.
I too stood and so felt the need to be angry that my common sense was reduced by Stein to merely common information. "You talk in off hand remarks."
Remarks are not literature, Stein snapped and I blushed. I had got carried away and had forgotten that Stein was literature and for a minute, thought I saw a person. Although, in her time she was seen as a butcher of words. Today, she is seen more as the butch, and of course, more of a literary movement than a person. There was a good deal of Gertrude Stein even then and more so now.
She moved around to read my notes. I understand you undertake to overthrow my undertaking.
I blush. "No! I am lost that is all. Jody Evans says that she does not feel lost just unsure at this time which way to go. Do I write about the words, or the woman - women behind them?"
Stein looks at me with curious eyes. "Do you write?" she asks, but she has sat down again so her voice is softer and not so angry.
"Yes," I admit. "But my work is on the closet shelf."
She laughs. Then you need to know, The central theme of the novel is that they were glad to see each other.
I look at Jody Evans, who looks back at and like me. Then I look at Stein. "I don't know if they will be glad and I am not sure if I can learn not to have my novel in the closet."
You have to learn to do everything, even to die.
With that she stands, but not to be angry which Gertrude Stein can be when she stands but to step from the cluster of words as a person. Our eyes meet. "I can learn to be me," I say and she nods.
When you get there, there isn't any there there, she said with a smile.
I smile too and watch her walk away, She walks like a beat cop, toes out and words rhythmic. I look at Jody Evans who stares back at me from the mirror. "I will write about Alice B. Toklas and so will write about Gertrude Stein. And when I get there, of course, it will be here. I am not lost anymore nor is my novel on the closet shelf. I am Jody Evans and I am a lesbian.