every time i read

Stein's A Birthday Book, I wonder if she actually wrote it over the course of a year, keeping a small notebook somewhere as a place to deposit a poetic amuse-bouche each day as she passed it.

But knowing what I do know of the woman, I doubt it.

It was probably written in fifteen minutes.

It's a charming little book.

I have it in The Yale Gertrude Stein, a great collection.

Richard Kostelanetz's introduction is classic.

I love how he defines Stein negatively: pointing out all the things she was not, or for which she had use.

This list is prodigious.

And yet.

A Birthday Book is such a funny form of Vanitas.

It's like a Vanitas painting which is actually a gooey, sweet birthday cake you can enjoy.

Because the single vague sentences are pretty much what gets left of the year as time passes.

Strange cues misplaced from contexts, contexts removed from cues, twitterings and smilings and wonderings.

It always makes me laugh.