CLASSIFICATION
Swallow ID:
5778
Partner Institution:
Simon Fraser University
Source Collection Label:
Reading in BC Collection
Sub Series:
Reading in BC Collection
ITEM DESCRIPTION
Title:
George Bowering English 414 Lecture 10 at SFU on October 2 , 1973 #669
Title Source:
cassette and j-card
Title Note:
On J-card: English 414 Lecture 10 Oct. 2, 1973; Gertrude Stein, Composition as Explanation
Language:
English
Production Context:
Classroom recording
Genre:
Speeches: Talks
Identifiers:
[]
Rights
Rights:
Copyright Not Evaluated (CNE)
CREATORS
Name:
Bowering, George
Dates:
1935-
Role:
"Speaker"
CONTRIBUTORS
MATERIAL DESCRIPTION
Image:
Recording Type:
Analogue
AV Type:
Audio
Material Designation:
Cassette
Physical Composition:
Magnetic Tape
Extent:
1/8 inch
Sound Quality:
Excellent
Physical Condition:
Excellent
Other Physical Description:
Black and white clear jewel case with J-card
DIGITAL FILE DESCRIPTION
Channel Field:
Stereo
Sample Rate:
44.1 kHz
Duration:
T00:30:45
Size:
34.7 MB
Bitrate:
32 bit
Encoding:
WAV for master files and .MP3 for online files
Channel Field:
Stereo
Sample Rate:
44.1 kHz
Duration:
T00:30:47
Size:
35.3 MB
Bitrate:
32 bit
Encoding:
WAV for master files and .MP3 for online files
Dates
Date:
1973-10-02
Type:
Performance Date
Source:
J-card
LOCATION
Address:
8888 University Dr, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6
Venue:
Simon Fraser University
Latitude:
49.2784
Longitude:
-122.9231
CONTENT
Contents:
Side
Track
No.
Comments
Two
0000
0025
Lecture on Gertrude Stein begins
0045
Discussion of place of Stein’s writing in relation to William James’
0051
The area of the reading experience that Stein is primarily interested in as a student of William James
0066
Stein saw her writing as a continuation of Henry James’ psychological realism. She tried to move beyond that
0086
William James did not see abstract, logical entities only moving and becoming. This was why he was interested in the process of mind
0095
Discussion of native Indians in California who perceive the world in motion. Their language does not allow for talking about anything at rest. Things are not manifest they are manifesting
0105
How can H.D.’s sense of the past/present which doesn’t have any levels to it be compared to Stein’s sense of time?
0123
Reads first scene of a Stein play
0160
Plays tape of Stein reading “If I Told Him” (her later portrait of Picasso)
0203
Stein reading ends
0219
What does Stein mean when she says that “civilization began with a rose a rose is a rose is a rose”
0230
Stein is stalling that process called reference (allusion or metaphor and even description)
0244
Stein is perhaps attempting to do here what Buddha was trying to do in “The Flower Sutra”. Bowering discusses experience and its representation in language. What is the relationship between the primary experience and its representation? This is discussed at some length
0340
Stein is interested in the conscious mind and its possibilities. Her Poetry works on this as opposed to turn-of-the-century (and later) “mining the unconscious” Stein doesn’t believe in the unconscious
0354
Stein asks about how we can know the unconscious, consciously
0363
In the late-early period of the early portraits on Tender Buttons Stein no longer thinks that words have to be used to refer to a world. She believes that they can fashion a world or become a world. Words do not have to be signs, images, or symbols
0424
Recommends The Third Rose by Malcolm Brinnin (a critical biography of Steins work). “Models’, (Stein reminds us in Brinnin’s book) “were everything until the beginning of the 20th century and now hardly any painter who interests anyone really has any realization that everybody used to have a model.:” This is discussed
0478
Stein said that it was possible to use language in the way that painters could use color. (But color, plane and proportion in painting are not of themselves highly referential in the same way that language is in the “real” world.) Stein was trying to rescue them from their common dulling associations. She makes an assumption about the effect/experience of language
(i.e. under the conventions that we have applied to the way we make language work is a primary language, a primary association with words). She believed (quite rightly) that each society’s syntactic habits are enforced in order to enforce political, economic, tribal preferences on the parts of those in power. In our post-Aristotlean world, we, like the Russians and Chinese put subject-over-object in that order. The subject is taken to exist previous to action. The object is only brought into being when that subject acts upon it. The subject object split maintained by language is the root of our exploitive capitalism. Stein is attempting to see the world previous to that overlay (her use of language is remedial)
0556
The art is one’s primary experience while one is viewing it (“reality”). It doesn’t have to refer to some previous model. Bowering says that he will look at cubism later to further illustrate this
0575
Bowering’s use of the word “order” is to imply a sense of beginning
0594
Stein is interested mainly in “brain” rather than “mind” unlike H.D. brain can be described in terms of energy (and mind in terms of sets for some reason)
0623
Memory in connection to “mind” and “brain” is discussed. Memory, for the purposes of the writer especially (according to Stein) is more fruitful than philosophy or conjecture
0638
Bowering says that whenever words are put together the product is “real”. It is not possible to not do this. The concept of “real” is discussed at some length
0724
A test of Stein’s fiction, says Bowering, would not be whether it is a simulacrum of an experience of the readers’ but whether the reader can remember a character
0740
Conventional 19th century novels (and paintings) are discussed for their process of cause and effect: set of conditions that becomes the environment; the suggestion is, as it is in naturalism, that environment (as well as heredity) shapes character. Environment and character come together and make the event believable. Stein doesn’t bother with this because people do not look back on their lives that way, says Bowering. She takes major characteristics of a character and shows them appearing again and again through a series of actions. She calls this the continuous present
0800
Lecture ends
End of side Two
Notes:
SFU BC Readings formatting
NOTES
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