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

by Gertrude Stein

  Now then there will be a little description of the learning of men and women as kinds of them, of the resemblances that are there in the nature in them, in the bottom nature in them that makes one kind of a way of making kinds of them.

  Now this is the way resemblances among men and women have meaning to me to make kinds of them. Now this is the way I am learning men and women, knowing kinds in them.

  Every one has some feeling of knowing kinds in men and in women, some have some feeling of knowing kinds in men and women. This is now then to be some description of my knowing kinds in men and women. This will soon be clearer in little descriptions of some of them as kinds in women and men.

  This is now a little a description of my learning kinds in men and women. Mostly every one as I was saying has some feeling of knowing kinds in men, mostly every one as I was saying has some feeling of knowing kinds in women as I was saying some have some feeling of knowing kinds in men and women. Mostly every one sees resemblances between some men, between some women, some between some men and women, and men and men, and women and women. There are then as I was saying many ways of making kinds in men and women.

  There will be now more description of the learning of knowing of the kinds there are of men and women, of the resembling that makes kinds of them around one. As I was saying always each one is sometime a whole one to me, each one always is like some one or many other ones to me.

  This is then the way I do my learning, slowly knowing each one, more and more seeing each one as a whole one and at the same time as a kind of men and women, slowly more and more having everybody in me as a real one, slowly more and more knowing resemblances all the resemblances existing, slowly more and more having confusion and then slowly again and again beginning and getting clearer the kinds of them and then losing them in more complicated differences and resemblings and so always more and more I am understanding and always more and more I am changing and always more and more I am beginning and always more and more I am having uncertainty in my feeling and always more and more I am certain and always more and more there are distinct kinds of them kinds of men and women, and then sometimes there are so many ways of seeing each one that I must stop looking.

  This will be always then a longer and longer description always longer with my living and my knowing.

  Always then I am seeing the resemblances that make kinds of them kinds of men and women and always I come back again and again to see it in them. Always then I am thinking and feeling and learning resemblances in men and women, always then I am making kinds in them.

  Every one then has their own being in them. Every one is of a kind of men and women. Always then I see resemblances in each one to another one to other ones and always I come back again and again to looking at that one and always I am seeing something, and always I am having a confusion inside me about that one and always I am beginning again and again and again and then sometime that one is a whole one to me, that one is of a kind of men and women from the bottom nature in that one and always then sometime it is clear about that one to me the nature or natures in that one with the bottom nature in that one and then sometime I know of that one all the kinds of being in that one, all the kinds of ways that one is of kinds of men and women.

  Always then I am thinking and feeling and seeing all the ways the one I am then knowing has of being resembling to any one. Every one as I was saying mostly every one feels and tells about resemblances in men and women, mostly every one has a feeling of kinds in men, of kinds in women, of kinds in men and women. There are then as I was saying many ways of feeling kinds in men and women.

  Mostly then as I was saying every one has some feeling of people resembling each other, some have it more some have it less in them the feeling that people are resembling, some are always looking for resemblances, some are then with that very annoying, some are always saying this one is like some one I can tell it by remembering, some are always thinking that every one is resembling a few they have known in living and these then often are annoying, always then mostly each one feels something of interest in seeing resemblances between some one and some other one or ones sometime, some feel this very often, some feel this all the time, mostly then there is a good deal of discussing mostly then there is a good deal of irritation, mostly then there is a good deal of difference of opinion about the ways people are resembling, about resemblances between someone and some other one some one then is seeing and some one else is then not feeling. Always then there is in living much finding of resemblances between men, between women, between men and women, between children, and mostly always then when any one tells it to any one there is much discussing often very much irritation. This is then very interesting. There are then often some who find every one they are ever knowing resembling a few men and women whom these sometime have had come to be in them a certain kind of men and women, these then make many of those they are seeing of these few kinds of them. Mostly then every one has some feeling for resemblances and for kinds in men and in women and in men and women.

  Now then to begin again understanding, to begin again learning men and women, to begin again seeing them as whole ones each one and each one as kinds in men and women. As I was saying each one I am ever knowing some time is a real one to me, as I was saying each one I am ever knowing sometime is like some one else too to me. Always then I am learning always then I am remembering, I am puzzling, I am in a confusion, always then I am coming back again and again and seeing, feeling, thinking all the ways any one can see that one, all the ways that one is resembling to any one, slowly then each one I am ever knowing is a whole one to me, slowly then I can learn other ones from having that one a whole one inside me, more and more then I am understanding kinds in men and women, more and more then I am learning different values in resemblances existing always between each one and others of them, sometime then each one comes to be to me a completed being. This is then now a slow description of my way of learning, this is then now a little description of some whom I am knowing.

  Every one is themselves inside them, mostly every one reminds some one of some other one of some other ones, every one has it to say of some one some of many, he is like such a one I see it in him, she is like some one else I can tell it by remembering. Mostly every one is sometimes thinking that some one is resembling the one at whom they are then looking. So, many always go on thinking that every one is resembling to others, and often some one is disagreeing some one to whom such a one is pointing out resemblances does not agree with that one. This is very common. There are many ways of feeling kinds in men and women. People disagreeing about ways of being resembling, people seeing different ways of making kinds in them often makes such irritation, sometimes exciting, sometimes confusing, sometimes to some one puzzling.

  There are many ways of making kinds in men and women. Each way of making kinds of them comes from a different way of feeling knowing them as resembling. There are many ways then of feeling knowing kinds in men and women. Sometime some one will know all the ways there are for people to be resembling, some one some time then will have a completed history of every one, every one who ever is or was or will be living. There are many ways then of knowing kinds in men and women, there are many ways then, there is a way of feeling them as kinds of them by ways of doing that come from education and tradition, kinds of them that come from the ways that make a nation, there are ways of seeing kinds of them by the kind of learning in them, tastes, beliefs, fondness for walking, working, doing nothing, there are ways of feeling kinds in them in color resemblances and gentlenesses in them, and courage, and ways of showing angry feeling, there are ways of knowing resemblances in them from occupation giving certain habits to them, there are ways of seeing kinds in them from their being always young, always old in them, bright all of some of them, dull all of some of them, moral all of some of them, immoral all of some of them, lazy all of some of them, very energetic always some of them, then there are samenesses in the looks of many of them that m
akes kinds of them to some and sometime some one will know all the ways there are for people to be resembling, some one sometime then will have a completed history of all of them.

  There are all these ways then and many more of them of feeling knowing people to be resembling and then there is the way that I am always seeing, the resembling that makes the two kinds of them, independent dependent kind of them who have attacking as their natural way of winning fighting and the dependent independent kind of them who have resisting in them as their natural way of winning and then there are so many complicated kinds of these two kinds of them so many ways of mixing, disguising, complicated using of their natures in many of them, so complicated that mostly it is confusing to me who know it of them that there are these kinds of them and always more and more I know it of them and always it is confusing for sometimes a resisting one spends most of living in attacking, an attacking one spends most of the living in resisting, sometimes some one is mostly all attacking and just at the bottom there is a contradiction of the whole nature of them, there are so many complications then in all this that I am knowing, it is all a very difficult thing to be really understanding. I know very much about these ways of being in men and women, I know it and I can say it, I know it and I can write it, it is a very complex mixing the being in all men and in all women, I do not know yet the whole of it, I do know now very much of it, I cannot yet say all I know of it.

  Mostly everybody now is like some one else to me, like many others to me, in some ways like some in other ways like others and now more and more there are to me some of each kind of them that are mostly only of that kind of them, and so more and more there come to be to me clearly a certain number of kinds of men and women.

  Kinds in men and women then are to many always in men and women and in many different ways of feeling and thinking. Mostly to every one there are kinds in men, kinds in women, kinds in men and women.

  There are then as I was saying many ways of feeling kinds in men and women, every way of feeling kinds in men and women must be in such a one that sometime has in that one all the history of all men, of all women.

  Kinds in men and women then are existing to mostly every one. To many feeling kinds in men and women is a part of learning men and women, to some kinds in men and women are parts of learning men and women, to some feeling kinds in men and women is to have sometime each one such a one is ever knowing a completed whole one to that one. To such a one always there is continually more variation and more resembling and sometimes it is so confusing that such a one must stop looking. Then when some one is a whole one and a complete one of a kind of one or the kinds in one are complete to one knowing that one, then it is very satisfying.

  Everybody then is mostly a real one to me, everybody is now like some one and like some other one and then again like some other one and each one sometimes is a whole one to me.

  This being resembling, this seeing resemblances between those one is knowing is interesting, defining, confusing, uncertain and certain. You see one, the way of looking at any one in that one that is like some one, the way of listening, a sudden expression, a way of walking, a sound in laughing, a number of expressions that are passing over the face of that one, it is confusing, too many people have pieces in them like pieces in this one, it began as a clear resemblance to some one, it goes on to be a confusing number of resemblances to many then, some resemblance that is very clear one is not remembering then it is baffling, more and more resemblances come out in that one, perhaps that one is not independent dependent and yet that was so clear in the beginning, more and more then with knowing resemblances are multiplying and being baffling and confusing and always each one of all these resemblances one who sometime wants to have this one as a whole one, wants to really know kinds in men and women must completely feel, admit, remember and consider and realise as having meaning. This is then a beginning of learning to make kinds of men and women. Slowly then all the resemblances between one and all the others that have something, different things in common with that one, all these fall into an ordered system sometime then that one is a whole one, sometimes that one is very different to what was in the beginning the important resemblance in that one but always everything, all resemblances in that one must be counted in, nothing must ever be thrown out, everything in each one must be included to know that one and then sometime that one is to some one a whole one and that is then very satisfying.

  Sometimes as I was just saying everything in any one, all the resemblances in that one point to that one being one kind of men and women and then, say an independent dependent kind of one, and then when one looks more and more closely at that one the bottom nature in that one is a contradiction to all the rest in that one, is so to say dependent independent being and everything one ever was knowing of that one has to be always still remembered but now it all has a new direction. Knowing completely then any one gives a solid basis for seeing the meaning of any being that has in it resemblances to that one. Always then it is important with each one that sometime that one is to the one learning kinds in men and women a whole one, a complete one so that there can then be a solid basis of comparison of understanding the meaning of the being in some one who is resembling in any way to that one who is to the one learning, then a whole one. Sometime as I was saying there are so many ways of seeing, feeling resemblances in some one, some one resembles so many men and women that it is confusing, baffling, then the one learning kinds in men and women is despairing, nothing then to that one has any meaning, it is then to that one all of it only an arbitrary choosing and then that one must stop looking, that one then must begin again then and always never forgetting anything that one ever has seen as a resemblance in the one that one is then learning. Sometime really each one will then be a complete one to that one. Sometime really each one will be a completed, understood person, understood in kinds of men and women. This is a real way of learning, sometime then there will be a complete history of every one, everything then they do in living, each one, will be clear then to the one that has really learned all the kinds there are of men and women, all will be understood then in them, their living, loving, eating, working, resting, pleasing, smoking, scolding, drinking, dancing, walking, talking, sleeping, beginning, ending, attacking, resisting, winning, losing, everything. There are whole beings always, they are themselves inside them, they will be whole ones then to the others who have learned to know them, they will be each understood by being known as their kind of them.

  I do know very much of the being in men and women. I do know very many of them. I do know the resemblances in them and the kinds of them, the divisions into kinds of them that is important for the understanding of them. I do know many of them, I know them, I understand, I explain them, they are themselves then to me, they are whole ones to me, I know it and I tell it, I know it more and more and more and more I tell it. Always I am thinking about it, always I feel the being the whole being sometime in each one, I know it sometime and I tell it sometime. I learn it as I see it and feel it and hear it as they repeat it, I understand it and then I understand in another one that is like the one that has then become a whole one to me, I learn new variations in it then from this now one and then sometime this one is a whole one to me and I begin again then with this one to know kinds in men and women and so on and always there is more to learn about it, there is more to know about it, there is more to tell about it.

  This will be clearer now in a description of how several men and women each one came to be a whole one to me, a kind of men and women to me and then by resemblances between them and others of them there came to be more understanding of each kind in men and women in me and then other kinds in them to me. Later there will be more description of the knowing of all the kinds there are of men and women, of the resembling that makes kinds of them around one. Now there will be a little description of some, of the kinds they are, of learning by resemblances between men and women the being in them.

  The way I think of every
one is like this. This is the way they come to be in groups to me, in groups that have in them to be that those in them are resembling each one to the other one. The way I know them as resembling, that I have been just explaining, in every way that any one can see any one of them. The way I think of each one is like this that I will now begin describing.

  In recognizing them as being of one group or of another group of them, that is one kind or another kind of men and women, everything in them, anything in them, their looks, their feelings, their expressions, their way of doing anything, their way of doing everything, everything, anything in them is to be noticed in its resemblance to something in another one. So then there come to be groups of kinds of men and women. So then as I was saying I come to know them, sometime all of them I am ever knowing, as kinds in men and women. Sometimes it is very confusing, sometimes very simple, sometimes very certain, sometimes very uncertain, sometimes for a long time baffling. There are then kinds in men and women. Sometime there will he a description of all the kinds of them.

  The way I think of each one is like this. I think of them as having a bottom nature in them, as having sometimes mixed up in them other nature or natures with the bottom nature in them. This is now to be a little description of the way I always think of each one of them to lead later to a description of some of the kinds of men and women.

  I think of each one I am ever knowing. Each one sometime is a whole one to me. Each one has a bottom nature in them of one kind of men and women. Each one may have in them other nature or natures in them mixed with each other or separate together in them. This is the way I think of men and women.

  This is now a description of the way I feel and think the natures in them.

  As I was saying each one has a bottom nature in them. Each one is one of a kind of men and women.

  Each one has a bottom nature in them, each one has or has not another nature or other natures in them besides the bottom nature in them. These may be of the same kind as the bottom nature, they may not. This is now then a description of the way I feel and think the nature and natures in men and women.