Gertrude Stein

In her provocative study of Gertrude Stein, G.F. Mitrano argues that Stein's particular take on modernity has special relevance for today. Tracing what she describes as Stein's deeply modernist story of transformation from a nineteenth-century American woman to the disquieting muse of avant-garde culture portrayed in Picasso's famous portrait, Mitrano illuminates Stein's immense appetite for life, her love of thinking, and her craving for recognition. Her approach is innovative, combining the exegetical, the visual, and the theoretical, to emphasize Stein's struggle for individuality and public achievement as a profoundly historical struggle involving personal choices linked, for example, to her sexuality or the uses of her physical appearance. Stein continues to attract attention, Mitrano contends, because she anticipates many contemporary concerns, especially in the field of critical thinking: from the question of subjectivity, to the status of the writer as a laborer among many, to the meaning of fame and the private/public divide.

G.F. Mitrano holds PhDs in American literature from Rutgers University and from the University of Rome. Her articles have appeared in Modern Language Studies, College Literature, The Explicator, Journal x, and Anglistica. She is a part-time faculty member at the University of Maryland - Europe.

Contents: Introduction; The woman without qualities; Shame and the fathers: The Making of Americans; Mabel Dodge, patronage, and the velvet garment; The looks of modern culture; Picasso and paper; From song to image: Four Saints in Three Acts; The 'visitor': Lectures in America; Appendices; Notes; Bibliography; Index.