Hi Amethyst,
What a pleasure it is when you find others who’ve read the same books as you! I agree with you re. Stein I think Stein was what you call a big bully, who liked to dominate others. But inside she was soft. I read her Three Lives when I was twenty three and it made me cry. BTW, Nin does not like Stein, finds her too dominating.
My N ex-best friend is a writer who writes about indigenous people. Her book is full of self-references. Like she devotes several pages in her book about how all the men kept flirting with her in jungle!
As for Nin, I think she is a more confident, more productive version of Charlene from Scott Peck’s book. Here are a few more gems from the autobiography. She really does fit the classic profile of an NPD.
“Narcissism is but self-doubt”
“I must always have had a need not to see the ugly side of a person or a place. I must have always created my own world and selected those who fitted in.”
“My work only attracts people I can love in return.”
“And those who wish to come as disciples, to help me, type for me, or cook, or garden, live in my presence. A symbol. So Anais, you are a symbol.”
“Because of ill-health I cannot attend your memorial service for Caresse Crosby, but I am enclosing one of her last letters, a few days before her death, showing her pleasure at the tribute I paid her. I feel it is in this way she always wanted to be remembered.”
What do you think of Hemingway? I think he is more of a misogynist than anything else.
Hi Marta, This is wonderful to go over these books and these authors with someone that is familiar. You are right about Stein...she was a big softie. She also loyal to her partner, Alice Toklas, her whole life through, unlike Nin, who was constantly trying to find different parts of her personality in different relationships. I also believe that Gerty and Alice were very happy together, and that Alice, the wife, was just as happy as Gerty.
Gerty's rather masculine appearing and unadorned prescence would have been anathema to Nin, who was exactly the opposite. I have not truly been able to understand why Nin is considered a feminist hero, unless it is because she explored her own psyche to the extent that it brought to light many things women have struggled with, like how we can mirror ourselves in others.
I am amazed by Stein for several reasons. I think Stein was probably one of the most well-adjusted and goodnatured people I have ever heard of. First of all, she never seemed to have any struggle coming to terms with being a lesbian, which is incredible, considering the times she lived in. She was comfortable with her sexuality and because
she was comfortable with it, everyone else was too. During the WWI, the couple drove a vehicle that was equipped as an ambulance and delivered medical supplies to French hospitals, so they certainly were not prima donnas. Far from it. During WWII, Toklas and Stein had to leave Paris because of the German occupation (they were Jewish). In the south of France there was always the threat of being interned in a concentration camp. However, their relationships with their neighbors were so good that the neighbors protected them. When they returned to Paris, they became very close to some regular GI's and welcomed them into their home and their lives, almost like surrogate mothers or grandmothers. Gerty obviously did not have a snobbish bone in her body.
I have a real fondness for Gerty. Because of her, I learned to turn the tables on a bully. I look like Gertrude Stein. My N ex, who was an art historian, went out of his way to put me down for that, calling Gerty "ugly and masculine," after pointing out the resemblance. I was supposed infer that I was also "ugly and masculine." When I saw her photos, I had to agree that my N ex was right about the resemblance, which is very strong. However, my reaction to Gerty's photos was that she was handsome, striking and unadorned, a real presence. Because of the "teasing", and because I am interested in writing, I began to read everything about and by Gerty that I could get my hands on. All I had really known about her before being "teased" were the phrases "a rose is a rose is a rose" and "there is no there there." The more I read, the more I liked her. I was surprised to discover that we shared the same birthdate, February 3rd, and that I was born about six months after her death. From the reading, I also realized that my paternal grandmother and her family had been friends with some the same families that Gerty had known in Baltimore and that my grandmother and I had paid a visit to some of them when I was about four or five. I thought,"Man, I am going to have some fun with this." I practically was rolling on the floor with laughter.
Soooo....I told my ex that not only did I look like Gerty, but that I shared her birthday and had been taken to visit her "friends" when I was a little girl. I told him that he'd better watch out, that I might be the reincarnation of Gertrude Stein, and that if he kept saying that she was ugly and masculine, he might be terribly sorry, especially careerwise...lol. I said this quite seriously, with a straight face, and I think it scared him; he could be a silly and superstitious N. I also told him that it was horrible of him, as an art historian, to say such things about a woman who had informed the world about so much art. Anyway, the "teasing" about that particular issue stopped, but being who he was, he always found new stuff to pick on. I often used what I called the "Gerty technique" to turn the tables and will still use it if need be in dysfunctional situations. The kicker is that I am now married to a Stein (no relation to Gerty) who thinks my resemblance to Gerty is just terrific.
Now about Hemingway, who also met and was influenced in his writing style by Stein, btw. Probably an N. Ernest was a relationship junkie and maybe a sex addict, married four times, became an alcoholic later in life, a suicide, an excitement addict, an adventure junkie. I have read most of his books but they have never resonated with me, although some of them are beautifully written. I always felt there was a muscular shell surrounding and almost protecting his work from getting too deep, of becoming vulnerable. I have the feeling that Hemingway was a homophobe, very concerned about his physical prowess, and may have been a misogynist because he was cut off from his tenderness. He was also a projective personality. What negativity he saw in himself, he put onto others.
On the other hand, I loved everything F.Scott Fitzgerald, a raving drunk, but the opposite of N, ever wrote. Fitzgerald seemed to have a great sympathy and tenderness for his characters. His stories are romantic, and yet his stories are very cautionary about being misled by romance, by appearances, by the dream, the glamour, the stardust. Look how Gatsby, an outsider, is totally schnookered, undone, and destroyed by the carelessness and the callousness of Tom and Daisy. FSF is also very sympathetic to women. When Nichole, in Tender is the Night, leaves Dick Diver (another outsider) for Tommy, even though Diver is the protagonist and has "put up" with Nichole's bouts of insanity, he clearly feels that she is right to leave Diver, who is of course a thinly disguised autobiographical figure. In everything I have ever read, FSF's humanity comes shining through, and I don't feel that with Hemingway. It's obvious that FSF is very aware of his character flaws and is full of self doubt....not an N. An introjective personality.
FSF stayed married to his insane, probably schizophrenic, institutionalized wife Zelda and paid for her care. He was in Hollywood working to pay for his child's schooling when he died of heart disease which was probably brought on by a lifetime of alcoholism. The tragedy of Fitzgerald is that he was a genetic and hardcore alcoholic...a true drunk...and couldn't stop. It's very sad; even though he knew that the stardust and the romance was a lie, he looked for it every day in the bottle. If he hadn't suffered from the disease of alcoholism, which certainly cut short his life, can you imagine what he could have written?
