Gertrude Stein �If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso�

Breaks down traditional rules of grammar syntax, discursive language to show the polysemy (multiple meanings) inherent in language (language is arbitrary set of rules)�poetry plays upon the magic of language that �breaks the rules��makes us look at the world in a new fresh way

It�s not supposed to �make sense� in traditional sense�what are the connecting tools in this work: repetition of words, flip syntax, rhymes, Napoleon=Picasso (symbolism?) �innovators, �If I told him��all conditional? 

�I judge judge.� �I call into question judgment itself  Why are you defensive?  What do you fear?  Insanity, lack of meaning that underlies the supposed organization of our linguistic structure

�Let me recite what history teaches. History teaches.�  History is arbitrary?  Recite it but cannot make it mean (Who came first, Napoleon first�nonsense of history)

Poetry is more than just the �denotation� sense of the words�the sounds themselves have meaning

Breaking away from literal meaning

William Carlos Williams

�The Great Figure�  what�s missing from this poem�exposition, explanation (doesn�t tell us what to mean); gives us a sense of his ongoing impressions of the fire truck, the five, etc., doesn�t try to pretend that there is a single moment/meaning

We must provide some element of �meaning�  Symbol of God (gold, five, sacred no.)

It anticipates film�visual images edited together in a sequence=sum of parts is greater than the whole

Bring your imagination into the work�not just leave it on hold

Take out all the filling, verbosity, extra words and get the essential images (imagism)�exclude editorializing and commentary that gets in the way of the reader�s appreciation of the image/poem

How would Williams or Stein written �Home Burial�

A shovel sits 

Next to the stairs

Through window

A fresh mound

Wife blames husband

�Between Walls�

Images�walls and cinders/green bottle pieces  beauty even in a place of ugliness and destruction

Open-ended�asks you to respond

�Dance Russe�

Russia ballet compared to him dancing naked by himself�liberating experience�being free�able to define himself (happy genius)

Art is about what makes us unique, ourselves, liberation from the ideas of others

�To Elsie�

American Dream gone bust�guys getting women pregnant, no love, no tradition, numb terror, 

Elsie�s purity�beyond the gauds she wears�all we have is Elsie, not the deer�beauty is there if you allow yourself to see it, not control it.