The Making of Americans, Being a History of a Family's Progress

by Gertrude Stein

  The change then came in each one of them and now it was Anna the eldest of them that was a beautiful woman to everybody around them then. The beauty in her then to any one who came to know all of them was, as beauty came to be in each one of them, a thing that when it was in any one of them then, was to any one who knew them then, something that was always in them always to be in them, always had been in them, in the others of them then there was not any sign of any such a change ever to be in them, in the mother of them there was nothing then that connected her with any such a change in them, there was nothing in her then to connect her with that one or with them, when there were more of them that had then this change in them, there was nothing in her that made it true for any one who knew her then that she had had in her any such change to connect her with that one or with them who had it then, that she had had it in her before she had borne them. How any one knew it about them that the mother had had such a change in her before them, how any one knew it about them that the others of them would have such a change in them, that, no one who knew them could ever answer in them. Perhaps it was the existence the mother had inside her for all of them, perhaps it was this that gave to every one who knew them no feeling of surprise in them that each one of them and the mother before them had, were having and were to have such changes in them, there was not anything to connect them together then except the existence in the mother of them, existence that was real in her for every one who came to know them, that never made her important to them but that made her a real thing to them, and this was what made it natural that all of them should go through, each one of them, the changes in them that every one of them had in them, this is what never made one think it about them that they would have such changes in them, that is what never made it a surprise to any one of them that they had such changes in them, it was the existence in the mother of them, this is what made real the changes in them to every one that knew them. The existence in the mother of them is what made the change that was then in any one of them a final thing in each one of them, and the mother of them, to any one who knew them then. The existence in the mother of them, at the time then when one knew them, made it, the change that was then them, to every one who knew them then, a thing that was forever in them, it was the existence that the mother of them had in her then that made whatever was in them to any one who knew them as if it were everlasting. The mother had existence in her, she had no importance to her, there had been there would be changes in her but this never made any history for her, there was nothing in her to connect her with a past a present or a future, there was nothing in her to connect her with the changes in the daughters around her, to connect her with the man who was a husband to her, there was existence in her, there was no importance to her, there was no history in her for her, there was no history of her to her in the changes in the daughters there around her.

  In the eldest daughter Anna there, was more of importance inside her than there was in the mother of her, than there was in the sisters who went through their changes later, than there was in her father who lived in the house with her.

  In her there was not so much existence inside her as there was in the mother but there was more of importance to herself inside her, she was more important to every one who knew her, there was more of her in the things that happened to her, she was more important to the things that happened to her than her mother had ever been in all the living she had had all her life in her. Anna had inside her more importance in her, more than in her mother, more like that in her father, but with her there was real existence inside her, not so much existence as there was in the mother but existence enough to make alive the feeling of importance to herself inside her, enough to make others feel her, enough to make her important to every one that knew her. Anna had in her real existence to her, not so much as in her mother but enough to the making her living inside in her, she was important to herself inside from her own power in her, she was important to herself inside her as her father was when he was with other men around him to make him to be real inside him, when the father had men around him then there was in him a feeling of importance in him as a man among them and he was important to them then to his feeling, but really, in him there was no existing, it took other men around him to make him alive inside him, he had no existence in him. In the mother of them there was always strong existing but there was never anything of an important feeling, she was always existing, she was not important in her being, she was not any more existing with others who came near her in her living than she was when she was alone with her being, she was always existing, she was never important in her feeling, she was never important to any one who knew them, she was like any article around them, she had strong existence for them she was never in any way important for them, she had not in any way in her any changes for them, she was not important to any one of them.

  There were three of them then Anna and Cora and Bertha. In Anna had come the change that made a beauty of her, she had less existence in her than the mother she had as much importance in her as the father, she had enough existence in her to make real inside her the important feeling she had in her.

  It came to her to have things happen to her and in her, she had a career in her and later they will come out in her the things that happened to her.

  The second daughter Cora had in her less existence than the mother and no important feeling in her, beauty came to her, things happened to her, there was nothing in her that made anything important to her. Cora went through her changes a little slower than her sister Anna. They came in her slowly, they gave no importance to her, there was existence in her not enough to make her living, always, like the mother, there was not in her enough of existence like the mother to make a solid thing of her, there was in her a little uncertain feeling like that in the father but there was nothing in her that gave to her a sense of being important inside her from others being around her, others around her were as they were to her mother they were around her and that was all the meaning they had in her, they were around her, they did things to her, for her, they never gave to her as they did to her father and to her sister Anna a feeling of importance to herself inside her, they were as they were to her mother, things around in her; in her, existence was not strong in her as it was always in the mother and so in her as in her father there was a little something uncertain and not solid to her, and all this will come out in her in the history of the Hersland family who came then more and more to know her.

  There were three of them Anna and Cora and Bertha; Bertha had in her less of existence in her than any of them except the father. Bertha had in her enough of existence in her to make her alive when she was a little girl and there was not very much of her, she had not in her enough of existence to her to make her alive inside her when it came to her to be a young girl and later to have beauty in her and to be a woman then. There was not enough to her of existence in her to make her alive inside her when she had gone through in her with the change of being a little girl, not very much of her, even then she was not very living in her, she had not very much existence in her. She had a little more existence in her than her father, enough to make her living when there was so very little of her, then was the only time she had enough existence in her to make her alive inside her. No one who knew her could ever feel that there would be changes, there was not enough existence in her to any one who knew her to keep her alive through changes that went through her, the changes went on in her, they went on in her as they had done in her mother, in her sister Anna and then in her sister Cora, they went on slowly in her, she came later to have beauty in her, she never was very alive inside her, she never had existence like her mother who had existence like the useful things about her, she had not like her father importance from other people around her, when she was a little girl she had a little of such importance in her from the little existence that was then in her the little existence always in her that then kept her alive for there was then so little of her, more and more then as she
grew bigger there was not any such importance there was not in her enough existence to make her alive inside her, and there was not any very real living to her, she had never in her any importance from other people around her, she was like her mother only she had very little of existence in her, so that is the history of her, she was alive inside her when there was very little of her when she was a little girl and then she was alive inside her and had in her a little of importance to herself inside her, she grew bigger and there was never then in her any strong existence to her, there was never in her enough importance to her to make it real in her, there was not later an uncertain feeling to her, there was in her the existence in her, the importance of it to her that had been in her when she was a little girl and was alive inside her for then there was so little of her. There was not in her later an uncertain feeling to her as there was in her father as there was in her sister Cora, there was in her always just the same being inside her, when she was a woman, when she had beauty in her, there was then inside her just the same existence in her just the same importance inside her that there had been when she was a little girl and there was not very much to her. She was like her mother, the little existence she had was really there in her, she was like her father, the little existence she had was important to her, she was not like her mother, the little existence was never very strong in her, she was not like her father, she could never get existence in her she could never get importance to her from other people around her, she had enough existence in her it was important enough inside her to make her alive in her when she was a little girl and there was not very much to her. There never came to be any more in her neither of existence nor of importance in her and later when she was bigger when she became a woman and had beauty, there was not in her enough of existence and of importance in her to fill her and so she was then later never very alive inside her, there was then of her, too much, for the existence and importance inside her. She was then, never, when she was bigger, when she was finished with the change of being a little girl and not very much to her, she was never after very alive inside her.

  And now Anna had this change in her, she had beauty in her, Cora and Bertha were having the changes she had already had in her, there was yet nothing in Cora or in Bertha that could connect them with her, with the beauty change that had come to her.

  The three girls Anna and Cora and Bertha went through their changes one after the other, now the beauty change had come in Anna, now when there was no longer in her a young girl's growing change in her beauty had come into her and to every one who knew her it was as if it had always been in her, it had no connection in her with her sisters Cora and Bertha nor with her mother. The mother had strong existence in her, she was getting older and her face and body was getting to be wooden all through her and existence was always just the same in her, it was always all there was of her. No one who knew them then the mother or Anna or Cora or Bertha, ever thought about the father, and so to every one around them then, this to every one that knew them was a family of women, there was the mother who was getting old now and a little wooden who was never important to any one who knew them who always had existence in her and that was always strong inside her, that never made any history in her, that never gave any importance to her she was existing then and existence always had been in her as it was in the useful things around her, there was no history in her, there was nothing in her to connect her with the past the present or the future, there was never any history in her there was a history of her and that the three girls were living around her, they were having the changes she had had in her, there was nothing then in her to connect her with the changes in the three girls who lived in the house with her, there was nothing in any of them that connected themselves with the others of them, there was nothing in them to connect them with the mother of them, there was nothing in the changes in them that made any one who knew them ever feel in them that she had had changes in her as the three girls had them then the three girls who were around her then, there was nothing in any of the three of them that made one feel in them that they would have in them the changes that any one of the three of them had had already in her, there was nothing to connect them with each other, they did go through their changes one after the other, there was never anything in any one of them to make any one who knew them feel that there would be changes in any one of them, a little more perhaps in Anna than in any of the others of them, in her, changes might come, in the other two of them Cora and Bertha and in the mother of them there was never any thing in them to make any one who knew them think a change would come in them, the mother was getting older now and her face and body was getting to be wooden all through her and existence was always just the same in her, it was always all that there was of her, Cora was a little wooden then, girlhood was almost finished in her, beauty had not come yet to be in her, Bertha was a little girl then, there was never in her as much existence inside her as there was in the mother or Anna or Cora, there was in her a little more existence than in the father, Anna had then beauty in her and was important then to every one who knew her, in her there was a feeling that there might come changes in her. Nobody ever thought about the father. This family to every one who knew them was a family of women.

  There were many other families then living in the little houses near the ten acre place where the Hersland family were living in that part of Gossols where no other rich people were living, some of them were neat and made a good living like this family of women, some were not so well off in their living; some had a very straggling way of living, each one of the families of them in the small houses then had each its own way of living each its own uncertain ways of being, and this is a history of them.

  There were many kinds of families of them living in the little houses near the Hersland family then. They were each one of them different from all the others of them, they were different each one of them from all the others of them in their way of living, in their ways of earning a living, in the things that had been in their lives in the earlier days of their living, in the things that would now happen to them, they were different each one of them from all the others of them then, they were different in all the ways that they had in them, they were different in all the things that made them important, in all the things that made them uncertain inside them, they were different inside each one of them from all the others of them in religion. Some of them then had religion in them, some of them had not anything of such a thing in them, all of them who had religion in them were different from all the others of them who had religion in them too in them. One of these families then was made up of a father and two children, a boy and a girl Eddy and Lilly and the father of them, there were many uncertain things about all three of them, about the living that they had had before in them, about there not being to them a woman to be a wife to him and a mother to the two children, about the way they had money to live on when not any one of the three of them did any working, about the kind of man the father was for it was very hard to know anything about him, about the character of the two children; one thing was certain about them, they had religion in them, they were important in religion.

  The father was a tall thin man, they said of him that he was a sick man, perhaps that was true of him, no one knew how anybody knew that about him, his children never said it of him, he was a tall thin blond man, he was always smoking and that was said by every one who knew him to be because it was good for him, he was important in religion.

  There are many ways of being important in religion and this is a history of some of them, there are many men and many women and some children who have religion in them, there are many ways of having that in them. They are some who are important in religion, they are some who have religion and who are not important from the religion in them, they are many men and many women and some children who have religion in them and this is a history of some of them.

  There are many of all these kinds of them, there were some of many kinds of them in the families that t
he Hersland family came to know then, more and more in their living then the Hersland children came to know them came to know the many ways many men and many women and some children have religion in them, the many ways some of them have to have religion make them important inside them, the way some of them who have religion never have any of such an important feeling in them, more and more then they came to know in the families that lived there around them the meaning the religion each one of them who had religion in them meant to the one that had it inside him, for there were many of them that had it in them many men and many women and some of their children.

  This family the father and the two children Eddy and Lilly, all three of them had religion in them, there was no wife to him or mother to the children then. Slowly the Hersland children came to know them. They had it in them this man Mr. Richardson and his two children Eddy and Lilly Richardson, they had it in them all three of them to be important in religion, the father had always all his life had religion in him, he always had been important in religion, this is a history of the feeling in him, of the way his children too had it in them.

  As I was saying Mr. Richardson was a tall thin blond man, he was sick then, so everybody said who knew him though his children never said it about him, he was sick then and he was always smoking and everybody said who knew him that that was because it was good for him, good for the sickness he had in him.