Ida a Novel

by Gertrude Stein

  February 20, Bilignin

  Stein to Van Vechten: “I am so xcited about Ida, it has not come yet and I am so pleased you like it. I am working steadily on a new one, Mrs. Reynolds, Ida and Mrs. Reynolds both were each one suggested by somebody in the village, and when you come they will pose for you, Mrs. Reynolds is turning out to be a bit of a mystic, it goes slowly I have about 50 pages done, Ida you know was done over and over again, before it finally became what it is” (CVV 705).

  March 5, Bilignin

  Stein to Cerf: “My dearest Bennett, / The first two copies of Ida have come and it is the very prettiest book that was ever made, I am mad about it [Figure 12], I think the title page with its powdered color and the lettering is marvelous [Figure 13], who did it, will you thank them for me and thank them again and the printed page with the lovely dancing three letters of Ida on top [Figure 14] and the really heavenly color of the binding, I do really believe it to be the prettiest book I ever saw, it is really a museum piece, and the shape, do tell me who designed it, it is too lovely, and then I am reading it and I do think it is awfully funny, really funny, it is a nice ushering in of spring-time, because the prim roses are in blossom over in the woods and meadows, and I feel very Wordsworthian indeed, bless you Bennett” (Bennett Cerf Collection, box 2, Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University).

  Figure 12: Book jacket for Ida A Novel (Random House, 1941). The inset box color is light blue.

  Figure 13: Title page of Ida A Novel (Random House, 1941). The “powdered color” (as Stein says) is green. Having Ida’s name in powder or sand captures her evanescent aspect.

  Figure 14: First page of Ida A Novel (Random House, 1941).

  March 6, Bilignin

  Stein to Wilder: “[A]nd now there is Ida. Have you seen the book, it has just come and I am all xcited because it is a novel it really is, and it has characters just like a real novel” (TW 284).

  March 6, Bilignin

  Stein to Van Vechten: “Ida has just come and they have made a lovely book of it, I am so pleased and happy about it and it is funny, funnier than I remembered it” (CVV 706).

  March 13, New York

  Van Vechten to Stein: “Ida is getting some fine reviews” (CVV 710).

  March 19, New York

  Cerf to Stein: “I wonder if you have seen any of the reviews of IDA. If not, please let me know, and I will make a collection of the more important ones to send to you. There have been, of course, the usual number of smart alecks who have tried to imitate your style but, on the whole, I think that you will be really pleased with the reception that has been accorded the book. / And I am still waiting to hear how you like the looks of the volume” (YCAL 101.1950).

  March 25, New York

  Cerf to Stein: “I am so very, very happy that you liked the looks of IDA. It has been reviewed beautifully all over the country and it is selling very nicely. People seem to have been vastly amused that a publisher should admit in print that he doesn’t understand one of his own books, and they laugh still harder when I tell them that you said from the very start that I was ‘nice but dumb’” (YCAL 101.1950).

  April 1, Medellín, Colombia

  Wilder to Stein: “You should have seen the beauty and wit and thoroughness and dignity of the Exhibition at Yale [University Library]. / And forgive me if I say I spoke all right. The Librarian says it was the best speech he ever heard. Many said that you were in the room: wise, good, beautiful, earnest, playful and great. [. . .] From Ecuador, I hope to write to you [. . .] a letter about Ida” (TW 285–286).11

  [April], Bilignin

  Stein to Cerf: “Some one has just sent me the New York Times Book Review of Ida and it does please me, will you thank Marianne Hauser for me I liked her describing Ida as being equipped with beauty conversational charm and herself, and Bennett might one send a copy to the Duchess with the compliments of the author. She was [included?] in an interview I once gave the Paris Herald Tribune, in which I told about the novel I was writing and described the heroine as everything I called a publicity saint, the modern saint being somebody who achieves publicity without having done anything in particular everybody told me I could not do it, without making her do something, but by God I did and I am proud of it and I did it enough so reviewers knew it, so I am proud, bless you Bennett, I was to meet the Duchess a propos of this just before leaving Paris, and then it was put off to our return and then we did not return, so if you think it would be alright to do send her a copy with the compliments of the author” (RHC).12

  May 5, Bilignin

  Stein to Van Vechten: “Bennett says Ida is selling nicely” (CVV 720).

  May 14, New York

  Cerf to Stein: “Of course we will send a copy of IDA at once to the Duchess—and I will let you know immediately how and if she replies” (YCAL 101.1950).

  May 15, Bilignin

  Stein to Wilder: “Everybody says it [his Yale lecture] was like that, just as good as you said it was and helas it was not recorded, it just bloomed like a flower, bless it and you. [. . .] Bennett says Ida is selling quite nicely and that is a pleasure” (TW 288).

  June 13, New York

  Cerf to Stein: “Wally Windsor was evidently very pleased to receive a copy of IDA. In her note of thanks she wrote: ‘I hope to emerge from the literary labyrinth with some idea of Ida’s thoughts and ways! Will you say to Miss Stein how pleased I am that she should have thought of sending me the book, and how fortunate I think she is still to be in her own villa. We had to leave ours and all our possessions last June’” (YCAL 101.1950).

  September 16, New York

  Cerf to Stein: “IDA has sold over 1700 copies so far, and we think that is mighty good” (YCAL 101.1950).

  October 7, New York

  Cerf to Stein: Random House owes Stein $406.69 (YCAL 101.1950).

  Intertexts

  These texts represent some of the family relations of Ida A Novel. Included are two older texts that Stein incorporated, in modified form, into the novel, one that indirectly relates to the novel, and three that grew out of the Ida manuscripts and returned to them.

  The eponymous character in “Hortense Sänger” suffers from a lack of what she calls “sufficient company.” She prefers her own company—she likes reading and walking—but the overall insufficiency of that relationship leads to misbehavior in the eyes of her family. Stuck between her desire to be with others and her short temper with those who moralize, she may be, by the end, permanently adrift. One point of difference between Hortense and Ida is that the former is “dark-skinned” and the latter would appear to be white. For instance, Ida encounters a racist woman who, we can assume, would say what she says only if she believed Ida shared her prejudice:

  A woman said to Ida, I only like a white skin. If when I die I come back again and I find I have any other kind of skin then I will be sure that I was very wicked before.

  This made Ida think about talking.

  Ida’s silence implies that she regarded this woman as yet another who was not “sufficient company.”

  Stein’s use of “Film Deux Soeurs Qui Ne Sont Pas Soeurs” puts Ida in front of an audience, as the winner of a beauty pageant. Moreover, because the original text is a movie scenario, Stein connects Ida’s emerging celebrity status with that of movie stars. On her way home from the pageant, Ida walks into a movie, as it were: “[S]he saw a woman carrying a large bundle of wash. This woman stopped [. . .], Ida stopped too.” “Film Deux Soeurs” also plays, as Ida does, with the twin figure (two washerwomen, two poodles, two ladies, two parcels), the repetition of action, and the sudden, inexplicable encounter. In “Film Deux Soeurs,” even when a live poodle replaces the photographic version, “they understand nothing.” By coincidence, not long after Stein incorporated “Deux Soeurs” into the “Arthur And Jenny” version of Ida, she was asked for “a text in French that could be set to music” (LR 422–427). She wrote “Les Superstitions.” Stein did not write in French very often, but two primary inter
texts for Ida were originally in that language.

  “The Superstitions Of Fred Anneday, Annday, Anday A Novel Of Real Life” combines a portrait of a man who acquires fame with a meditation on the difference between fiction and real life. An American, Fred moves to Europe and eventually becomes a celebrated topic of conversation: “[E]verybody had to say or do something about Fred Annday.” Unfortunately, the fame he had hoped for, once in hand, made him ill at ease (as was true for Stein). Because Fred has had an experience that affirmed the superstition of the cuckoo, that if it sings when you have money in your pocket “you will have money for all that year,” he has become subject to a world of overwhelming significance. Anything might mean something. He “loved superstition,” but this habit of reading everything as predictive of his future is now a burden. Fred is saved by love for a woman whose name we do not learn, which suggests that the privacy of their relationship is part of what revives his health. As the narrator unfolds her depiction of Fred, she also tells us that a novel is far more selective than real life. Whereas in everyday life one “meet[s] everyone,” a novel should be “like a dream at night” where one “comes to know relatively few persons.” Like the novelist for whom not everything is foreshadow, Fred learns how to be selective.

  While writing Doctor Faustus Lights The Lights, Stein received a request from Page Cooper on May 9, 1938, to contribute to “a witty, satirical book expressing feminine viewpoints on some aspect of the dominant male or, perhaps, some other subject near the woman’s heart—should I say nerves. [. . .] There are no inhibitions as to form or content except that it be light satire and from a definitely feminine angle. It may be verse, drama, essay, or fiction. Perhaps you already have something you have written just for your own delight” (YCAL 27.539). Stein immediately drafted some of “Ida” on Cooper’s letter, and the finished piece was in New York by the end of May. “Ida” quite literally follows Cooper’s request for women characters who offer, or at least contemplate offering, resistance to the “dominant male”: “And then well then the question came should you do what they tell you or should you not.” While Ida eventually becomes the very essence of popularity (“think of anything to eat, there was only Ida”), she also has the ability to “rest,” which allows her to slip away from the trap of gendered or familial identity.

  The references to Jenny in Lucretia Borgia A Play date its composition to 1938–1939, when Stein was writing the “Arthur And Jenny” version of Ida. The latter year has been chosen because “A Portrait Of Daisy To Daisy On Her Birthday” shares so much with Lucretia Borgia, and the birthday of Daisy Fellowes was April 29; as well, Stein copied some of Lucretia Borgia onto a 1939 typescript of “Arthur And Jenny.” The textual intimacy between Lucretia and “Portrait” makes them an excellent example of Stein’s working method in this period, her use of already existing texts as she made new ones. In “do be careful of eights” (from Lucretia and “do be very careful of fives” (from “Portrait”), we see more evidence of Stein’s interest in superstitions and prophecies, which leads to “Les Superstitions” a couple of months later, in June 1939. Like the Duchess of Windsor, Lucretia Borgia and Daisy Fellowes enjoyed the marriage bond for its status and within its confines were able to pursue other romances. The Ida of the novel (not the story) has her own multiple marriages and affairs in common with these women, but like Fred Anneday she ultimately enjoys the mutual love in companionship.

  Hortense Sänger 1

  (1895)

  *

  Chapter I

  In the Library 2

  It was an ideal library for literary browsers, out of the noise and bustle of the city and yet within easy reach. The books were all in one vast room with high ceilings and great windows that let in a flood of sunshine. The place was undisturbed save for some ten or twelve habitual readers, who each sought out his favorite nook on some leathern lounge or great arm-chair, out of sight between tall rows of books. Occasionally an unwary stranger would inadvertently enter and disturb the silence by his resounding footsteps, but soon he would withdraw awed by the stillness and emptiness of the vast room. Sometimes the strains of Chopin’s funeral march would reach the ears of the quiet readers, as a military band, accompanying some local celebrity, on his last journey, passed down the street.

  One day as the last long sad notes of the march died on the air, a young girl who had been listening intently, threw down her book with an impatient gesture, and dropped her face on the arm of the leathern couch. She was screened from all view by the heavy book-cases in front of her. There she sat in the full-glare of the noon-day sun, her book at her side, motionless. Finally with a resigned shrug she picked up her book, once more curled herself on her sofa and tried to go on reading. It was useless, a wild impatience possessed her. She was a dark-skinned girl in the full sensuous development of budding woman-hood. Her whole passionate nature had been deeply stirred by those few melancholy strains and with the sun-light heating her blood, she could not endure to rest longer. “Books, books” she muttered, “is there no end to it? Nothing but myself to feed my own eager nature. Nothing given me but musty books.” She paused her eyes glowing and her fists nervously clenched. She was not an impotent child, but a strong vigorous girl, with a full nature and a fertile brain that must be occupied, or burst its bounds.

  At last she rose and left the library where most of her young life had been passed. As she passed out of the quiet retreat, the east wind struck her, and increased the tumult in her soul. “I will walk it down” she said aloud. “I must escape from myself.” She started up over the hills at a quick pace, but even that did not satisfy her, faster and faster she went, panting as she climbed the steep hills, but utterly oblivious of her bodily strain, anxious only to escape from self. At last she reached the top-most hill climbed it and paused for breath. Below her lay the blue ocean; the fresh breeze blew on her. She took off her hat and stood there bathed in sunshine, drinking in deep breaths of ocean air, and muttering her satisfaction to herself. At last she turned and now more slowly retraced her steps down the long hills until she reached her home.

  Circumstances had forced Hortense Sänger to live much alone. For many years this had suited her completely. With her intense and imaginative temperament, books and her own visions had been sufficient company. She had been early inured to heavy responsibilities, and had handled them firmly for, though a dreamer by nature she had a strong practical sense.

  She had now come to a period of her life, when she could no longer content herself with her own nature. She fairly lived in her favorite library. She was motherless and so at liberty to come and go at her own pleasure. Now the time had come when her old well-beloved companions began to pall. One could not live on books, she felt that she must have some human sympathy. Her passionate yearnings made her fear for the endurance of her own reason. Vague fears began to crowd on her. Her longings and desires had become morbid. She felt that she must have an outlet. Some change must come into her life, or she would no longer be able to struggle with the wild moods that now so often possessed her.

  Just at this critical time her father died and thus the only tie that bound her to her old home was snapped. Not long after she accepted the invitation of some relatives and left her old haunts and, she hoped her old fears, to lead an entirely new life in a large family circle.3

  *

  The Temptation

  As they drew near the church the crowd in the streets increased. All Baltimore seemed to have turned out to hear the new preacher. They pressed through the throng and entered the church but as soon as they got within the door they were brought to a halt. The place was packed, every nook and corner was filled with its full allowance of uncomfortable humanity. (So closely were they crowded, that no one could see anything except the persons directly in front of them.)

  After waiting a while, the crowd gradually, with that peculiar indefinable movement there is in even the densest throng, began to loosen. The pressure on the door was slightly lessened
and our party by dint of pushing, waiting, squeezing, waiting again and so managing to insert themselves between the people, succeeded in forcing their way to the steps leading up to the choir-loft. Hortense who was ahead mounted two of the steps and then turned to look at the crowd below her.

  Never had she seen a more motley assembly. Negroes and whites, working men and elegant youths all together. A beautiful girl with a graceful figure and dressed in those light-veil-like gowns that add so much to the charm of a Southern city was forced close up to a villainous looking Italian who was trying to push past her.

  On the other side were some nuns in their long black gowns, whispering kindly to each other, frightened at finding themselves in the midst of such a thing. One delicate little woman had fainted and the crowd were forced back enough to let her husband support her out.

  Other women with that rudeness peculiar to their sex, were abusing their neighbors and impatiently trying to see over their heads. An old woman barely able to totter, was trying to kneel before the central aisle, as is the custom on passing the figure of Christ. At last she succeeded but was almost crushed by a sudden movement in the throng around her.

  All those strange and curiously assorted types were there, that are always to be found in a Catholic church where all ranks and conditions find a common mother. The impressive ceremonies, the wealth and imagery displayed in the building, the poetic and mystic emblems, in the church particularly in the dim evening light attract alike the ignorant and the cultured. The passivity of obedience that the church teaches is an inestimable boon in this hurried struggling life of ours.