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Ida
Après la retraduction de "L'Autobiographie d'Alice B. Toklas", les éditions Cambourakis continuent de faire redécouvrir l'oeuvre de Gertrude Stein, en publiant, dans une nouvelle traduction, "Ida", l'un des romans les plus énigmatiques et l'un des portraits de femme les plus saisissants jamais écrits par Stein.
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First published January 1, 1971
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About the author
Gertrude Stein
407 books1,187 followersGertrude Stein was an American writer who spent most of her life in France, and who became a catalyst in the development of modern art and literature. Her life was marked by two primary relationships, the first with her brother Leo Stein, from 1874-1914, and the second with Alice B. Toklas, from 1907 until Stein's death in 1946. Stein shared her salon at 27 rue de Fleurus, Paris, first with Leo and then with Alice. Throughout her lifetime, Stein cultivated significant tertiary relationships with well-known members of the avant garde artistic and literary world of her time.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
January 9, 2008
Ida Ida Ida Ida Ida. I like talking to myself, too. This kind of book gets tiring to read pretty fast. Fortunately, this book is very slim. I think of it as the sushi of the book world. With sushi, you don't really feel like you've eaten, but the idea and the aesthetic of it was a pleasant and somewhat transcendent experience. At the same time, you certainly don't want to eat it everyday.
January 19, 2020
قطعا نمیتونم بگم اثر بدی هستش ولی خب اصلا مطابق سلیقه کتابخوانی من نیست
من این شکل سبک مدرن و بدون پیرنگ اصلی رو اصلا اصلا دوست نداشتم و برام قابل تحمل و درک نبود
من این شکل سبک مدرن و بدون پیرنگ اصلی رو اصلا اصلا دوست نداشتم و برام قابل تحمل و درک نبود
October 25, 2007
Read this on Acid. Acid acid acid.
September 13, 2007
I got through it. I read it at a time when I was feeling crazy and its verse calmed with predictable waves of ida ida ida over and over again. It's a short, quick and hypnotic read.
October 18, 2024
«آیدا» رو خوندم. دومین چیزی که از گرترود استاین خوندم.
استاین خیلی خیلی ساده مینویسه، همه چیز خیلی ساده است، با این حال جزو سختخوانها حساب میشه. چون آدما به این سادگی، به اینکه کل کتاب یک آیدا باشه که استراحت میکنه و روایت خطیای لزوما نداره، عادت ندارن، جریان همیشگی داستان و رمان جوریه که این سبک نوشتن برای آدما تعجبآور و تحمل ناپذیر میشه.
تکرار زیاد، جملات پشت سر هم، کمترین استفاده از علامتهای نگارشی، شعرگونه بودن جملات، و حالتی از گیجی و سبکی.
آیدا آیدا بود. همینی که بود. خیلی زیاد و کم نبود. استراحت میکرد، یهو پا میشد میرفت، ازدواج میکرد، حرف میزد، و فقط بود.
استاین خیلی خیلی ساده مینویسه، همه چیز خیلی ساده است، با این حال جزو سختخوانها حساب میشه. چون آدما به این سادگی، به اینکه کل کتاب یک آیدا باشه که استراحت میکنه و روایت خطیای لزوما نداره، عادت ندارن، جریان همیشگی داستان و رمان جوریه که این سبک نوشتن برای آدما تعجبآور و تحمل ناپذیر میشه.
تکرار زیاد، جملات پشت سر هم، کمترین استفاده از علامتهای نگارشی، شعرگونه بودن جملات، و حالتی از گیجی و سبکی.
آیدا آیدا بود. همینی که بود. خیلی زیاد و کم نبود. استراحت میکرد، یهو پا میشد میرفت، ازدواج میکرد، حرف میزد، و فقط بود.
July 3, 2018
آیدا / گرترود استاین
ترجمه فهمیمه زاهدی / انتشارات نیلوفر
گرترود استاین (Gertrude Stein 1874/ 1946) متولد امریکا در خانواده ای یهودی و المانی تبار است. تحصیلاتش را در دانشکده پزشکی حوصله سربر دانست و رهایش کرد {محض رضای خدا چطور پژوهشهای تجربی در زمینه تلقینات ناخودآگاه و نوشتن غیرارادی یا تشریح اناتومی مغز حوصله سربرند!!!!}. سال 1902 در پاریس بود و با برادرش مشغول جمع آوری آثار نقاشان بنام زمان. خانۀ معروفش را که محلی برای گرد آمدن نویسندگان، شاعران و نقاشانی مثل پیکاسو، همینگوی، ماتیس و ... بوده حتما در فیلم Midnight in Paris وودی الن دیده اید {کاش یک فیلم فقط درمورد این خانه میساختند. نکند ساختند؟! مطلعین خبردارم کنند}. نوشتن کار همیشگی اش بود و از سال 1910 شیوه غریب خود در نوشتن را پی گرفت شیوه ای دور از منطق روایی، خوددار در نشانه گذاری، با کمترین دایره واژگان و مملو از تکرار که مطمئنا سالها دست آویز نقد و شوخی و نکوهش بود. اما بشنوید دلیل گرترود را: ادمها انچه را دوست داشته باشند تکرار میکنند و هرچه را تکرار کنند دوست دارند. ضمنا شیوه نوشتن ام نه تنها غیر ارادی نیست از فوران خودآگاهیست. {دست مریزاد.مبهوتم از این میزان اعتماد به خود اگاهی ات گرترودجان، این میزان بی اعتنایی به داوری از سوی جامعه و سپردن عنان متن به خواننده تا هرچه میخواد بیابد و ببافد و گسترش دهد. هر چه میخواد حس و دریافت کند، ان هم از متنی که حس و اشتیاق و خشم و فراز و فرود روح و روان در ان هیچ نقشی ندارد هیچ}
آیدا حکایت زنیست بله گو و اهل استراحت، که محبوب است و مشتاقان فراوان دارد. با خودش حرف میزند، به دیگران گوش میسپارد و میرود. "رفتن" فعل غریب آیداست. سر بچرخانی حتما آیدایی دور و برت میبینی.باید احوالات این محبوبان بی عمل جایی ثبت میشد و استاین بخوبی از پس اش برآمد. اینها را من میگویم؛ گرترود استاین توصیفش این گونه است: آیدا آیداست آیداست.
ترجمه فهمیمه زاهدی / انتشارات نیلوفر
گرترود استاین (Gertrude Stein 1874/ 1946) متولد امریکا در خانواده ای یهودی و المانی تبار است. تحصیلاتش را در دانشکده پزشکی حوصله سربر دانست و رهایش کرد {محض رضای خدا چطور پژوهشهای تجربی در زمینه تلقینات ناخودآگاه و نوشتن غیرارادی یا تشریح اناتومی مغز حوصله سربرند!!!!}. سال 1902 در پاریس بود و با برادرش مشغول جمع آوری آثار نقاشان بنام زمان. خانۀ معروفش را که محلی برای گرد آمدن نویسندگان، شاعران و نقاشانی مثل پیکاسو، همینگوی، ماتیس و ... بوده حتما در فیلم Midnight in Paris وودی الن دیده اید {کاش یک فیلم فقط درمورد این خانه میساختند. نکند ساختند؟! مطلعین خبردارم کنند}. نوشتن کار همیشگی اش بود و از سال 1910 شیوه غریب خود در نوشتن را پی گرفت شیوه ای دور از منطق روایی، خوددار در نشانه گذاری، با کمترین دایره واژگان و مملو از تکرار که مطمئنا سالها دست آویز نقد و شوخی و نکوهش بود. اما بشنوید دلیل گرترود را: ادمها انچه را دوست داشته باشند تکرار میکنند و هرچه را تکرار کنند دوست دارند. ضمنا شیوه نوشتن ام نه تنها غیر ارادی نیست از فوران خودآگاهیست. {دست مریزاد.مبهوتم از این میزان اعتماد به خود اگاهی ات گرترودجان، این میزان بی اعتنایی به داوری از سوی جامعه و سپردن عنان متن به خواننده تا هرچه میخواد بیابد و ببافد و گسترش دهد. هر چه میخواد حس و دریافت کند، ان هم از متنی که حس و اشتیاق و خشم و فراز و فرود روح و روان در ان هیچ نقشی ندارد هیچ}
آیدا حکایت زنیست بله گو و اهل استراحت، که محبوب است و مشتاقان فراوان دارد. با خودش حرف میزند، به دیگران گوش میسپارد و میرود. "رفتن" فعل غریب آیداست. سر بچرخانی حتما آیدایی دور و برت میبینی.باید احوالات این محبوبان بی عمل جایی ثبت میشد و استاین بخوبی از پس اش برآمد. اینها را من میگویم؛ گرترود استاین توصیفش این گونه است: آیدا آیداست آیداست.
March 28, 2016
Gertrude Stein is, for me, the most difficult of the High Modernists to like. I have repeatedly failed to get through even a page of her longer works. Tender Buttons was OK, and I would like to give it a try again. But her first novel, Three Lives, I loved, unreservedly. Ida is interesting because it is more radical than Three Lives, more 'typical' of what I expect from Stein and yet it delighted me on every page. Does anything happen? Well, Ida is born, Ida gets married, she has husbands, and she has dogs. She is 'always' doing things, and doesn't like doors at all. For a while Ida is a twin. Then she's not. Ida never loses her sense of adventure. She lives in Washington DC and Boston and a few other places. Every paragraph brings a new set of events, told with some repetition. The book demonstrates that the novel can be like a Cubist painting, always her claim, and fully justified here. The elements of story, of action are here in extremely simple form. There are hardly any adjectives (but a fair share of adverbs!). The rhythm of the sentences is playful, and inseparable from the thoughts. At 154 pages, with wide margins, there is space to consider, to read and to think and to smile.
October 30, 2025
Primícia per als meus amics de goodreads. L'any que ve podreu llegir aquesta novel·la em català, traduida per un servidor
May 3, 2017
Gertrude Stein (1874 – 1946) fue una escritora estadounidense considerada como la pionera de la escritura modernista. Ida, publicada por Alfabia, nos propone una autobiografía ficticia de sus años vividos en América. Así, esta es la historia de Ida, desde que nace hasta su edad adulta. La mente de Ida es incansable y no para, como así lo hace físicamente. Ida vivirá en diversas casas, diversos estados, hoteles y ciudades, siendo este uno de los principales ejes de la historia.
Ida será una mujer en busca de un hogar continuo. A ella le parecerá natural vivir el momento, el carpe diem, sin importar donde vivirá ni que hará mañana. Así vemos a una mujer cuya máxima aspiración será estar, con todo lo que este verbo implica. Cada situación le suscita pensamientos que se van disipando conforme avanza en la vida. Ida no deja de hablarse a sí misma, de contestar a sus preguntas, descubriendo los diversos aspectos que posee de ella misma y su entorno.
La protagonista se casará y estará siempre haciendo cosas, como lo es su vida, ya hemos dicho, siempre cambiando y pasando de casa en casa. Está Ida, la que ama a tres hombres y a cada uno de ellos le dice adiós; y está Ida, la que sueña con tres hombres que cuando se despierta ya nunca más están ahí. Así, vemos a la protagonista de Stein como una mujer perdida por el curso y los eventos de la vida. Una vida llena de paradojas y de profunda psicología que Stein explora en las innumerables expresiones de la protagonista, creando una imagen que ella misma encuentra sofocante y también liberadora.
Ida es un libro extraño, que se puede considerar cercano al cubismo, movimiento pictórico a partir del cual Stein quería hacer literatura. La intertextualidad se halla presente en todo el libro y se hace palpable cómo el uso de la palabra repetida nos evoca cosas y sensaciones íntimas y sustanciales sobre los tejemanejes de la vida de la mujer, esta vez estadounidense y de una época concreta. Cada párrafo de la novela muestra un conjunto de hechos que hace adelantar siempre lo que puede o debería pasar. El ritmo de cada frase es lúdico e inseparable de los pensamientos. De hecho, una simple frase de esta novela de Gertrude Stein puede llegar a revelar profundas verdades de la conducta humana y de la posición de cada individuo.
La prosa de Stein es bella, dinámica y dialéctica, así como calmada e hipnótica. Es una prosa, casi poética, que se repetirá continuamente y en la que hallaremos una rima hermosa, en la que Stein nos adentra en su poética; una poética particular que podríamos considerar, como bien dice en la solapa del libro, una reconstrucción feminista del lenguaje patriarcal. De este modo, estamos ante una novela digna de ser estudiada, por su relevancia ante el uso de la palabra que tiene Stein. Una obra que nos incita a querer saber más de su protagonista e incluso de la autora, ya que la expresión que se ve en el libro es totalmente liberadora y nueva, dentro del tiempo y el contexto en el que fue escrita.
Ida será una mujer en busca de un hogar continuo. A ella le parecerá natural vivir el momento, el carpe diem, sin importar donde vivirá ni que hará mañana. Así vemos a una mujer cuya máxima aspiración será estar, con todo lo que este verbo implica. Cada situación le suscita pensamientos que se van disipando conforme avanza en la vida. Ida no deja de hablarse a sí misma, de contestar a sus preguntas, descubriendo los diversos aspectos que posee de ella misma y su entorno.
La protagonista se casará y estará siempre haciendo cosas, como lo es su vida, ya hemos dicho, siempre cambiando y pasando de casa en casa. Está Ida, la que ama a tres hombres y a cada uno de ellos le dice adiós; y está Ida, la que sueña con tres hombres que cuando se despierta ya nunca más están ahí. Así, vemos a la protagonista de Stein como una mujer perdida por el curso y los eventos de la vida. Una vida llena de paradojas y de profunda psicología que Stein explora en las innumerables expresiones de la protagonista, creando una imagen que ella misma encuentra sofocante y también liberadora.
Ida es un libro extraño, que se puede considerar cercano al cubismo, movimiento pictórico a partir del cual Stein quería hacer literatura. La intertextualidad se halla presente en todo el libro y se hace palpable cómo el uso de la palabra repetida nos evoca cosas y sensaciones íntimas y sustanciales sobre los tejemanejes de la vida de la mujer, esta vez estadounidense y de una época concreta. Cada párrafo de la novela muestra un conjunto de hechos que hace adelantar siempre lo que puede o debería pasar. El ritmo de cada frase es lúdico e inseparable de los pensamientos. De hecho, una simple frase de esta novela de Gertrude Stein puede llegar a revelar profundas verdades de la conducta humana y de la posición de cada individuo.
La prosa de Stein es bella, dinámica y dialéctica, así como calmada e hipnótica. Es una prosa, casi poética, que se repetirá continuamente y en la que hallaremos una rima hermosa, en la que Stein nos adentra en su poética; una poética particular que podríamos considerar, como bien dice en la solapa del libro, una reconstrucción feminista del lenguaje patriarcal. De este modo, estamos ante una novela digna de ser estudiada, por su relevancia ante el uso de la palabra que tiene Stein. Una obra que nos incita a querer saber más de su protagonista e incluso de la autora, ya que la expresión que se ve en el libro es totalmente liberadora y nueva, dentro del tiempo y el contexto en el que fue escrita.
November 24, 2025
💫Immerse Yourself in Ida💫
🎶Listen | American Classical for Reading & Focus | 1900-1949
Because of Stein's stylistic deviations, I'm lead to believe that when explaining a "truth", one must consider the articulation as importantly as the "truth" itself. Despite agreeing with this credo, since a truth, in a way, is simultaneously constructed and conveyed; in the way it is presented and thusly understood, I don't much like Stein's style. I can appreciate it for its purpose, but in separating the quality of the goal and the vehicle, I think even she can admit the possibility of her failure; as if she opened up the validity of any style and, upon the reader's discernment, any style can be as bogus as the next. Or on the contrary, any "truth" can be as bogus as the next. But this, after all, might lend much more credibility, not to mention pomp, to style.
I imagine Stein writing this novella and instead of rewriting it, she guts it; removing chronology, places, descriptors. There are so many holes left for the reader to fill. I wouldn't be able to describe much about Ida's relationship to Andrew or about Ida herself other than what is most likely an elementary observation that she is somewhat of a "Yes-Woman" who travels and marries at the whims of others, or because of her inability or choice to refrain from saying no.
I will say that her writing is simple. Not just in her word choice or sentence structure, but in her thinking. Things that don't happen, happen. People are understood by where they are NOT from, by what they DON'T do, etc. For example: "It is so easy not to be a mother. This too happened to Ida" (p 57). Or, "Once upon a time all who had anywhere to go did not go. This is what they did" (p 62). Rather than complicating or dramatizing the image of these characteristics, negatives are made to serve character construction in this way for the sake of clarity.
At first, her style seems like reading from right to left, down to up, with a lack of traditional rhythm; like a long poem whose stanzas are crammed together in paragraphs. Perhaps on future re-reads, I'll find more to appreciate in her style and understand more about the plot and characters.
Yeah.
🎶Listen | American Classical for Reading & Focus | 1900-1949
Because of Stein's stylistic deviations, I'm lead to believe that when explaining a "truth", one must consider the articulation as importantly as the "truth" itself. Despite agreeing with this credo, since a truth, in a way, is simultaneously constructed and conveyed; in the way it is presented and thusly understood, I don't much like Stein's style. I can appreciate it for its purpose, but in separating the quality of the goal and the vehicle, I think even she can admit the possibility of her failure; as if she opened up the validity of any style and, upon the reader's discernment, any style can be as bogus as the next. Or on the contrary, any "truth" can be as bogus as the next. But this, after all, might lend much more credibility, not to mention pomp, to style.
I imagine Stein writing this novella and instead of rewriting it, she guts it; removing chronology, places, descriptors. There are so many holes left for the reader to fill. I wouldn't be able to describe much about Ida's relationship to Andrew or about Ida herself other than what is most likely an elementary observation that she is somewhat of a "Yes-Woman" who travels and marries at the whims of others, or because of her inability or choice to refrain from saying no.
I will say that her writing is simple. Not just in her word choice or sentence structure, but in her thinking. Things that don't happen, happen. People are understood by where they are NOT from, by what they DON'T do, etc. For example: "It is so easy not to be a mother. This too happened to Ida" (p 57). Or, "Once upon a time all who had anywhere to go did not go. This is what they did" (p 62). Rather than complicating or dramatizing the image of these characteristics, negatives are made to serve character construction in this way for the sake of clarity.
At first, her style seems like reading from right to left, down to up, with a lack of traditional rhythm; like a long poem whose stanzas are crammed together in paragraphs. Perhaps on future re-reads, I'll find more to appreciate in her style and understand more about the plot and characters.
Yeah.
November 27, 2025
Hmm. Ja det här är ju den sortens bok om vilket man kan säga what the fuck did I just read, men inte på samma sätt som det kanske påkallas av böcker som Pisces eller Monstrilio osv, utan för att man just genomlevt ett grammatiskt staccato och nu är lite vimmelkantig. Jag kunde uppskatta första delen mera, när Ida experimenterar med att vara tvilling, men upplever att jag blev less ungefär halvvägs igenom och inte får ut så mycket av det upprepande kring alla män hon gifter sig med, och särskilt Andrew i slutet, där det verkligen slutade tillföras så mycket nytt. Även om det är där passagen med de talande guldfiskarna kommer förstås. En ganska tråkig surrealism landar jag nog i till slut, och det i sig är ju lite av en bedrift, i och för sig. Men jag kan nog inte med ärlighet säga att jag riktigt har "greppat" Gertrude Stein. Alice B. Toklas självbiografi gillade jag dock.
June 25, 2019
IDA ought to be as popular as a bodice-ripper. Because we all love to read about the lives we yearn for. Do we not live in a society where celebrities outnumber those who sleep well? Ida is both! Ida is famous just for being Ida. As such, Ida is a spiritual foremother of the Kardashians, she’s just a lot more interesting. And Ida is most often resting. She is resting more often than she does anything else, even marry, which she does at least five times. Who could possibly resist that? A woman is resting! A famous, beloved, and wildly successful woman is resting. The book deserves to sell 10 million copies on that fact alone.
Most important: YES, the super-fancy Yale University Press edition is absolutely worth the money. Skip supper if you have to, but get this edition. The paper, the typeface, the design of the book -- it’s all just right. You can read Ida as Ida deserves to be read. Besides that, the supplemental essays and materials, longer than the text itself, are absolutely interesting and helpful. My favorite, “How Writing Is Written” appears to be a transcription of a talk Stein gave at the Choate Boys School, of all places. Stein’s peculiar and delightful style of speech is remarkably similar to the narrative style of “The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas” or, even more, “Everybody’s Autobiography.” Logan Esdale, the editor, shows very carefully how the book involved, as well as other texts that were incorporated into the book or grew out of it.
(A Yale edition of Stein’s ‘Stanzas in Meditation’ also exists. A dozen Stein texts, at least, surely deserve this same royal treatment. How I wish Logan Esdale would edit an entire Stein library, with the support of Yale University Press. If anyone starts a petition, please do add my name.)
As an ordinary reader, not a scholar, I read this edition twice, very slowly, over several weeks, with great pleasure and great care, as one reads a scripture. I think the people who hurry into “But what does it MEAN?” or “It means nothing!” are entirely missing the point. (Although this is one of Stein’s most accessible texts and there is indeed plenty of “ordinary” meaning and pleasure in it.) This is a different kind of reading, a different experience of being, and as such it is so very welcome. To use music as a metaphor: a lot of popular fiction is like Katy Perry. And a lot of literary fiction is like “Katy Perry Sings Jazz Standards”. (For the record, I love Katy Perry, but I do not need Katy Perry all the time.) And, well, in this metaphor, Gertrude Stein is . . . Tibetan singing bowls. Something else entirely and entirely wonderful. The use of repetition, the use and non-use of punctuation, her way of writing about being in the midst of being writing, of consciousness with and without its act together -- it is both captivating to read and as a way of reading. If it takes you awhile to get into the swing of that -- I suggest 2 glasses of wine and reading with the intent to listen, to listen more than to understand -- the supplemental notes and essays will help you enter into the swing and enchantment of the text.
“It happened that when she went out she came in. She she did go out and when she went out she came in.
Andrew went in and went out, but Ida did not.
When she went out she came in” (120).
Most important: YES, the super-fancy Yale University Press edition is absolutely worth the money. Skip supper if you have to, but get this edition. The paper, the typeface, the design of the book -- it’s all just right. You can read Ida as Ida deserves to be read. Besides that, the supplemental essays and materials, longer than the text itself, are absolutely interesting and helpful. My favorite, “How Writing Is Written” appears to be a transcription of a talk Stein gave at the Choate Boys School, of all places. Stein’s peculiar and delightful style of speech is remarkably similar to the narrative style of “The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas” or, even more, “Everybody’s Autobiography.” Logan Esdale, the editor, shows very carefully how the book involved, as well as other texts that were incorporated into the book or grew out of it.
(A Yale edition of Stein’s ‘Stanzas in Meditation’ also exists. A dozen Stein texts, at least, surely deserve this same royal treatment. How I wish Logan Esdale would edit an entire Stein library, with the support of Yale University Press. If anyone starts a petition, please do add my name.)
As an ordinary reader, not a scholar, I read this edition twice, very slowly, over several weeks, with great pleasure and great care, as one reads a scripture. I think the people who hurry into “But what does it MEAN?” or “It means nothing!” are entirely missing the point. (Although this is one of Stein’s most accessible texts and there is indeed plenty of “ordinary” meaning and pleasure in it.) This is a different kind of reading, a different experience of being, and as such it is so very welcome. To use music as a metaphor: a lot of popular fiction is like Katy Perry. And a lot of literary fiction is like “Katy Perry Sings Jazz Standards”. (For the record, I love Katy Perry, but I do not need Katy Perry all the time.) And, well, in this metaphor, Gertrude Stein is . . . Tibetan singing bowls. Something else entirely and entirely wonderful. The use of repetition, the use and non-use of punctuation, her way of writing about being in the midst of being writing, of consciousness with and without its act together -- it is both captivating to read and as a way of reading. If it takes you awhile to get into the swing of that -- I suggest 2 glasses of wine and reading with the intent to listen, to listen more than to understand -- the supplemental notes and essays will help you enter into the swing and enchantment of the text.
“It happened that when she went out she came in. She she did go out and when she went out she came in.
Andrew went in and went out, but Ida did not.
When she went out she came in” (120).
November 30, 2009
Simplistic, beautiful sentence structure. Reads like a long continuous poem rather than a novel. You could linger on a sentence to decipher an array of meanings due to the use of ambiguous words that can be construed to have dual meaning or behave as different parts of speech, depending on the context, of which she provides little and of which the reader is at will to create. Her sentences aren't punctuated properly and one often doesn't read into the next. This carries with it the task of constant interpretation for the reader. That said, it is work to derive meaning when reading this, and if the reader does not fixate on that goal, the stream of babble could quite easily pass by as just that and nothing more.
You won't come away with much aside from an appreciation of the beauty of Stein's subtlety (if even that). Paradoxically, the whole is less than the sum of its parts. Taken individually, a simple sentence of Stein's can reveal subtle yet altogether profound truths about the human condition and personality, but as a whole it's just a load of nonsense. It could be read completely out of order; there is no sense of time or progression or even a linking of events or thoughts, in general. It is not cohesive-- Stein's beauty is most certainly in the particulars.
You may get a sense throughout that the main character Ida is insane or that Stein herself is. You'll never know what is real or what is simply in the (perhaps perverted) mind of the protagonist. But I suppose that's the rule rather than the exception with postmodern lit, generally speaking.
You won't come away with much aside from an appreciation of the beauty of Stein's subtlety (if even that). Paradoxically, the whole is less than the sum of its parts. Taken individually, a simple sentence of Stein's can reveal subtle yet altogether profound truths about the human condition and personality, but as a whole it's just a load of nonsense. It could be read completely out of order; there is no sense of time or progression or even a linking of events or thoughts, in general. It is not cohesive-- Stein's beauty is most certainly in the particulars.
You may get a sense throughout that the main character Ida is insane or that Stein herself is. You'll never know what is real or what is simply in the (perhaps perverted) mind of the protagonist. But I suppose that's the rule rather than the exception with postmodern lit, generally speaking.
July 26, 2011
There doesn't seem to be a strong enough rating for me on this one. I truly HATED this experimental, modernist text. I decided it looked like there wasn't a book in this world I didn't like, but, truth be told, there are plenty! I'm just more apt to add the books I loved. In Ida, Stein experiments with language and stream of consciousness in very inventive (nonsensical!) ways. Maybe all these years later I should give it another try. But the very thought of it warps the mind!
Okay... I'm going to try this one again and see if time and age have given me any new perspective. Additionally, all of the SF arts community is honoring STein through exhibits, readings, lit crawls, etc and I want to get in on the hype. Maybe there was something I missed, if not in this work than in another. I'm a doin' some Stein explorin' for a while, and a see's what I a come up with!
Alright, alright. I just can't do it. I've tried again and have put it down again. Trying some other Stein instead. Actually liking it a good deal. Three Lives
Okay... I'm going to try this one again and see if time and age have given me any new perspective. Additionally, all of the SF arts community is honoring STein through exhibits, readings, lit crawls, etc and I want to get in on the hype. Maybe there was something I missed, if not in this work than in another. I'm a doin' some Stein explorin' for a while, and a see's what I a come up with!
Alright, alright. I just can't do it. I've tried again and have put it down again. Trying some other Stein instead. Actually liking it a good deal. Three Lives
July 14, 2018
It is good to experiment with prose in novels. Yes, it is.
Simple sentences, which often contradict each other, and then don't, sometimes can re-wire the brain, or perhaps not. Anyway, they enrage the bourgeoisie. Rightly so.
But the bourgeois in me, the one I have spent a lifetime denying, also finds such childlike ramblings tedious. Very very tedious indeed.
And yet a passage here and there... Well, nothing good is wholly bad, and nothing bad is wholly good.
Ida felt like a long child's fantasy of storytelling, playacting, telling adult stories without understanding wholly what the words mean. Words like "Marriage," or "resting," or "Washington"--they are only words. Sometimes interesting words, but mostly boring words, like very young children use, when they are just getting used to using words and don't quite yet know what the words that they hear their parents use mean and they are also apt to be somewhat repetitive.
Theat's what Ida is like.
Poor Ida.
Not quite profound.
Simple sentences, which often contradict each other, and then don't, sometimes can re-wire the brain, or perhaps not. Anyway, they enrage the bourgeoisie. Rightly so.
But the bourgeois in me, the one I have spent a lifetime denying, also finds such childlike ramblings tedious. Very very tedious indeed.
And yet a passage here and there... Well, nothing good is wholly bad, and nothing bad is wholly good.
Ida felt like a long child's fantasy of storytelling, playacting, telling adult stories without understanding wholly what the words mean. Words like "Marriage," or "resting," or "Washington"--they are only words. Sometimes interesting words, but mostly boring words, like very young children use, when they are just getting used to using words and don't quite yet know what the words that they hear their parents use mean and they are also apt to be somewhat repetitive.
Theat's what Ida is like.
Poor Ida.
Not quite profound.
September 13, 2020
Repetitiv, och liknar inget jag läst. Ida saknar allt vi lärt oss att en roman ska ha: finns ens en uttänkt handling? Karaktärsutveckling? Nån sorts twist? Ida flyttar och gifter sig och gifter om sig och vilar. Och så är hon känd för sina looks. Har hon ett känsloliv? Ja, emellanåt, men det får vi inte veta något särskilt om. Jag testade att läsa högt en sväng, blev helt annat, insåg att språket nog är tänkt och att ansträngning har gjorts. Kul att läsa för utmaningens skull. Boken är i sig inte svårbegriplig, men den är märklig. Handlingen är märklig. För det händer liksom ... ingenting. Kan inte sätta ett rättvist betyg, tror inte den här typen av böcker skulle skrivas i dag. Och därför ska jag absolut läsa mer av och om Gertrude Stein.
December 6, 2012
Stein at her most fun, and it is a lot of fun. It's full of knockout sentences--"Nature is not natural, and that is natural enough" may be the one everyone remembers. There's a very subtle and persistent examination of marriage and family conventions, as well as amazing comic digressions on dogs, clouds, names, U.S. geography, upper-class social life of Washington, D.C., and a colloquy among "the things anybody has to worry about" (namely spiders, cuckoos, goldfish and dwarfs). Ida is also a quite sad and disturbing cumulative picture of a long and varied life that almost isn't. Read aloud to a loved one.
August 11, 2009
I read this over the course of a weekend and had a difficult time getting through it. I had read "Three Lives" and found it quite enjoyable, but this book was more of a challenge. I am not a fan of experimental prose.I was once told that this book is one long diagnosis of a mental illness, but did not come away from it thinking that. At time pretentious, at times just good escapism. I did not hate it but rather felt that I either was missing the point of the story or, maybe, there was no story there to begin with.
March 5, 2016
Some say Gertrude Stein's writing can be like cubism but "Ida" feels more like Art Brut to me. With its simple vocabulary and loopy recounting of one beautiful woman's life --from her birth to her final rest (with plenty of resting in between), this novella feels slightly insane, slightly all-knowing. Maybe it's just plain slight. And yet it's impossible to dismiss outright because it so often strikes chords that have the ring of truth, the sound of the undeniable. I can't recommend it and yet I'd read it again. And I've already read it before. Make sense of that.
December 14, 2009
Read it as I also read Stacey Levine's My Horse, a good choice because Ida was less of a spiral into a tale. Levine seems to be influenced by the complex, puzzle-like sentence style.
January 19, 2011
What a little joy. I should read this again when I'm 50.
September 14, 2011
....what the freak did I just read?....
March 18, 2015
All the fun of a Stein novel, but I feel here she was writing at a point when she was very developed and had a clear vision.
January 17, 2022
Cubism, as defined by E. H. Gombrich in ART AND ILLUSION, is...
"the most radical attempt to stamp out ambiguity and to enforce one reading of the picture – that of a man-made construction, a coloured canvas." (pg 281)
In the case of painting, the ambiguity of a single perspective is opposed by presenting the subject from all possible perspectives.
In the case of writing, it would be superficial to suggest that a story told from multiple perspectives (as in the case of RASHOMON) it the literay equivalent to cubism. On the contrary, a story told from multiple perspective only accounts for the narrative; it neglects the craft of writing, which is as integral to literary cubism as it is to cubist painting. While a story told from multiple perspective may account for "all possible perspectives" in the narrative, it has as much potential to perpetuate ambiguity as it has to stamp out ambiguity. (For example, the unreliable narrator.)
True literary cubism would therefore focus on the craft of writing. Rather than retell a narrative from different perspectives, a sentence or paragraph may be reworded without altering the meaning. (For example, if I were to follow the previous statement with the following: "Focusing on the craft of writing entails the rewording of a sentence of paragraph without altering the meaning." The same statement could be reworded as many times as the writer sees fit, just as the subject of the painting may be portrayed from as many angles as the painter sees fit.)
If this is to be definition of literary cubism, then Gertrude Stein may be the only practitioner. How appropriate that Gertrude Stein, who counted Pablo Picasso among her closest friends, should be the only practitioner of literary cubism.
Aside from "literary cubism", IDA is best characterized by Stein's sentences and her punctuation (or lack thereof). Like most of Stein's experimental writing, I found myself reading and re-reading certain sentences, unsure whether or not I had understood the meaning. More often than not, I did understand the meaning, but Stein's structure can be so jarring as to cause the reader to falter.
Once the reader gets past the "literary cubism", the sentences, and the punctuation (or lack thereof), they encounter a story about a woman named Ida. She is the Ida of the title, but at times she is not the Ida of the title. That is it is called into question whether or not she is the Ida of the title, which she is.
The description states:
"Gertrude Stein wanted Ida to be known in two ways: as a novel about a woman in the age of celebrity culture and as a text with its own story to tell."
Gertrude Stein has accomplished this and more, she has written a novel that is a constant battle between form and content. Indeed, the two seem to be at odds with one another. At times, one overtakes the other. But for the most part they coexist with the independence of two living things - not unlike the dogs Lillieman and Dick...
"As much as possible they never knew the other one was there. Sometimes when they bumped each other no one heard the other one bark it was hard to not notice the other one. But they did. Days at a time sometimes they did." (pg 80)
IDA is distinguished from other works by Gertrude Stein with the use of rhyming. Perhaps I overlooked the rhyming in her other works. I don't think so, but perhaps I did. I haven't read any of her poetry, but whether or not her poetry incorporates rhyming it is distinguished from IDA by the form, poetry being poetry and IDA being a novel...
"For a four.
Shut the door.
They dropped in.
And drank gin." (pg. 94)
On the subject of rhyming, there are long passages in the second half of the novel, each of the long passages narrated by an animal, and all of them heavy on rhyming and light on meaning (or apparent meaning)...
"Listen to me I, I am a spider, you must not mistake me for the sky, the sky red at night is a sailor's delight, the sky red in the morning is a sailor's warning, you must not mistake me for the sky, I am I, I am a spider and in the morning any morning I bring sadness and mourning and at night if they see me at night I bring them delight, do not mistake me for the sky, not I, do not mistake me for a dog who howls at night and causes no delight, a dog says the bright moonlight makes him go mad with desire to bring sorrow to any one sorrow and sadness, the dog says the night the bright moonlight brings madness and grief, but says the spider I, I am a spider, a big spider or a little spider, it is all alike, a spider green or gray, there is nothing else to say, I am a spider and I know and I always tell everybody so, to see me at night brings them delight, to see me in the morning, brings mourning, and if you see me at night, and I am a sight, because I am dead having dried up by night, even so dead at night I still cause delight, I dead bring delight to any one who sees me at night, and so every one can sleep tight who has seen me at night." (pg. 99-100)
This passage is also characteristic of the second half of the book, which departs from the first half. The first half may lack the coherence of a conventional novel, but it is certainly more coherent than the second half. More coherent and more focused. The focus being Ida.
Addressing Gertrude Stein's concern, that the novel be remember "as a novel about a woman in the age of celebrity culture", it is pertinent to suggest that the fragmentary structure of the novel may be a reflection of this "celebrity culture". The suggestion being that the novel may be the accumulation of many voice, all talking about the same person: Ida...
"Who is careful.
Well in a way Ida is.
She lives where she is not.
Not what.
Not careful.
Oh yes that is what they say.
Not careful.
Of course not.
Who is careful.
That is what they said.
And the answer was.
Ida said.
Oh yes, careful.
Oh yes, I can almost cry.
Ida never did.
Oh yes.
They all said oh yes.
And for three days I have not seen her.
That is what somebody did say somebody really somebody has said. For three days I have not seen her.
Nobody said Ida went away.
She was there Ida was.
So was her husband. So was everybody." (pg. 50-51)
This recalls my first description of literary cubism, the multiple perspective description, that I denounced. But what sets IDA apart from other multiple perspective narratives, aside from the focus on the craft of writing, is the fragmentation and disassociation. We do not know the narrator, nor do we know how many narrators there are (if if can be said there are more than one). If there are multiple narrators, their narration is not distinguished one from another, but rather fragmented into an indecipherable collage, or at times superimposed one atop the other (which may help to explain the frequency of contradictory statements).
There are, throughout the novel, many contradictory statements - in some cases, contradictions that exist within the same sentence...
"When she went out she came in." (pg. 120)
These contradictions create ambiguity, ambiguity that discredits the "literary cubism" label that I have attributed to Gertrude Stein and her novel, IDA.
"the most radical attempt to stamp out ambiguity and to enforce one reading of the picture – that of a man-made construction, a coloured canvas." (pg 281)
In the case of painting, the ambiguity of a single perspective is opposed by presenting the subject from all possible perspectives.
In the case of writing, it would be superficial to suggest that a story told from multiple perspectives (as in the case of RASHOMON) it the literay equivalent to cubism. On the contrary, a story told from multiple perspective only accounts for the narrative; it neglects the craft of writing, which is as integral to literary cubism as it is to cubist painting. While a story told from multiple perspective may account for "all possible perspectives" in the narrative, it has as much potential to perpetuate ambiguity as it has to stamp out ambiguity. (For example, the unreliable narrator.)
True literary cubism would therefore focus on the craft of writing. Rather than retell a narrative from different perspectives, a sentence or paragraph may be reworded without altering the meaning. (For example, if I were to follow the previous statement with the following: "Focusing on the craft of writing entails the rewording of a sentence of paragraph without altering the meaning." The same statement could be reworded as many times as the writer sees fit, just as the subject of the painting may be portrayed from as many angles as the painter sees fit.)
If this is to be definition of literary cubism, then Gertrude Stein may be the only practitioner. How appropriate that Gertrude Stein, who counted Pablo Picasso among her closest friends, should be the only practitioner of literary cubism.
Aside from "literary cubism", IDA is best characterized by Stein's sentences and her punctuation (or lack thereof). Like most of Stein's experimental writing, I found myself reading and re-reading certain sentences, unsure whether or not I had understood the meaning. More often than not, I did understand the meaning, but Stein's structure can be so jarring as to cause the reader to falter.
Once the reader gets past the "literary cubism", the sentences, and the punctuation (or lack thereof), they encounter a story about a woman named Ida. She is the Ida of the title, but at times she is not the Ida of the title. That is it is called into question whether or not she is the Ida of the title, which she is.
The description states:
"Gertrude Stein wanted Ida to be known in two ways: as a novel about a woman in the age of celebrity culture and as a text with its own story to tell."
Gertrude Stein has accomplished this and more, she has written a novel that is a constant battle between form and content. Indeed, the two seem to be at odds with one another. At times, one overtakes the other. But for the most part they coexist with the independence of two living things - not unlike the dogs Lillieman and Dick...
"As much as possible they never knew the other one was there. Sometimes when they bumped each other no one heard the other one bark it was hard to not notice the other one. But they did. Days at a time sometimes they did." (pg 80)
IDA is distinguished from other works by Gertrude Stein with the use of rhyming. Perhaps I overlooked the rhyming in her other works. I don't think so, but perhaps I did. I haven't read any of her poetry, but whether or not her poetry incorporates rhyming it is distinguished from IDA by the form, poetry being poetry and IDA being a novel...
"For a four.
Shut the door.
They dropped in.
And drank gin." (pg. 94)
On the subject of rhyming, there are long passages in the second half of the novel, each of the long passages narrated by an animal, and all of them heavy on rhyming and light on meaning (or apparent meaning)...
"Listen to me I, I am a spider, you must not mistake me for the sky, the sky red at night is a sailor's delight, the sky red in the morning is a sailor's warning, you must not mistake me for the sky, I am I, I am a spider and in the morning any morning I bring sadness and mourning and at night if they see me at night I bring them delight, do not mistake me for the sky, not I, do not mistake me for a dog who howls at night and causes no delight, a dog says the bright moonlight makes him go mad with desire to bring sorrow to any one sorrow and sadness, the dog says the night the bright moonlight brings madness and grief, but says the spider I, I am a spider, a big spider or a little spider, it is all alike, a spider green or gray, there is nothing else to say, I am a spider and I know and I always tell everybody so, to see me at night brings them delight, to see me in the morning, brings mourning, and if you see me at night, and I am a sight, because I am dead having dried up by night, even so dead at night I still cause delight, I dead bring delight to any one who sees me at night, and so every one can sleep tight who has seen me at night." (pg. 99-100)
This passage is also characteristic of the second half of the book, which departs from the first half. The first half may lack the coherence of a conventional novel, but it is certainly more coherent than the second half. More coherent and more focused. The focus being Ida.
Addressing Gertrude Stein's concern, that the novel be remember "as a novel about a woman in the age of celebrity culture", it is pertinent to suggest that the fragmentary structure of the novel may be a reflection of this "celebrity culture". The suggestion being that the novel may be the accumulation of many voice, all talking about the same person: Ida...
"Who is careful.
Well in a way Ida is.
She lives where she is not.
Not what.
Not careful.
Oh yes that is what they say.
Not careful.
Of course not.
Who is careful.
That is what they said.
And the answer was.
Ida said.
Oh yes, careful.
Oh yes, I can almost cry.
Ida never did.
Oh yes.
They all said oh yes.
And for three days I have not seen her.
That is what somebody did say somebody really somebody has said. For three days I have not seen her.
Nobody said Ida went away.
She was there Ida was.
So was her husband. So was everybody." (pg. 50-51)
This recalls my first description of literary cubism, the multiple perspective description, that I denounced. But what sets IDA apart from other multiple perspective narratives, aside from the focus on the craft of writing, is the fragmentation and disassociation. We do not know the narrator, nor do we know how many narrators there are (if if can be said there are more than one). If there are multiple narrators, their narration is not distinguished one from another, but rather fragmented into an indecipherable collage, or at times superimposed one atop the other (which may help to explain the frequency of contradictory statements).
There are, throughout the novel, many contradictory statements - in some cases, contradictions that exist within the same sentence...
"When she went out she came in." (pg. 120)
These contradictions create ambiguity, ambiguity that discredits the "literary cubism" label that I have attributed to Gertrude Stein and her novel, IDA.
April 11, 2023
i say no, no no no, no i said. i say no. write normally u little freak
May 5, 2024
این آیدای ***خل ! که همش خورد و خوابید و شوهر کرد! خب چ کنمممم؟!!!
May 5, 2024
از بدترین کتابایی که خریدم و خوندم😑😑
February 12, 2024
One of the more challenging books I've read.
Dan-ible Audiobook #1: The Movement: How I got this body by never going to the gym in my life by Jack Garbarino. LOOK IT UP
Dan-ible Audiobook#2: Ida by Gertrude Stein COMING SOON
Dan-ible Audiobook #1: The Movement: How I got this body by never going to the gym in my life by Jack Garbarino. LOOK IT UP
Dan-ible Audiobook#2: Ida by Gertrude Stein COMING SOON
April 18, 2018
Ida is a fascinating and difficult read. It's modernist and experimental. It doesn't flow, sentence to sentence, like you would expect a novel to. It's like a cubist painting made from text. Multiple points of view collide in a single paragraph so that each sentence may be a repetition of a previous sentence but from a different point of view. This style makes Ida difficult to read, at least until you get the hang of what's going on.
In terms of plot, things do happen: Ida is born, gets married, has dogs, likes things, hates things, is out and seen in Society. But this is a novella driven by the structure and style rather than character or plot. Ida the character remains opaque. We get so many points of view at once that any real sense of Ida is fragmented.
Ultimately I think this is a smart way to write about the beginnings of celebrity culture. Everyone sees Ida differently, and these different versions of Ida make a fragmented tableau that supplants narrative about the character Ida as a person.
Ida is enjoyable in as much as it is fascinating. If you enjoy looking at how a text is constructed and how the style itself gives meaning, you might enjoy this read.
In terms of plot, things do happen: Ida is born, gets married, has dogs, likes things, hates things, is out and seen in Society. But this is a novella driven by the structure and style rather than character or plot. Ida the character remains opaque. We get so many points of view at once that any real sense of Ida is fragmented.
Ultimately I think this is a smart way to write about the beginnings of celebrity culture. Everyone sees Ida differently, and these different versions of Ida make a fragmented tableau that supplants narrative about the character Ida as a person.
Ida is enjoyable in as much as it is fascinating. If you enjoy looking at how a text is constructed and how the style itself gives meaning, you might enjoy this read.
November 10, 2012
Ok... what a weird book. It was hard to figure out what some of the sentences meant, as their construction is all wonky. (Poetic, one might say?) I couldn't figure out what this book was trying to say. On the first couple pages I thought it might be a book about someone who was a twin, but who was always referred to/treated as one person. But then it wasn't. Then I thought, maybe this is a book about someone with a mental illness? But by the end of the book, there was no conclusion. No hint as to why the book was written in the strange way it was written. Didn't love it, didn't hate it, wouldn't read it again.
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