Primary Stein: Returning to the Writing of Gertrude Stein ed. by Janet Boyd and Sharon J. Kirsch (review)

Abstract

as Pielak persuasively argues, is ultimately an act of strategic ventriloquism: “It is no accident that the animal appears at the end of the human even while masquerading as the voice of life” (133). Admittedly, there are moments of disappointing repetition throughout the book; some portions of chapters read more like annotated inventories of literary works than a cohesive, progressive argument; one wonders about the noticeable absence of an application of Levinasian ethics to this project’s theoretical underpinnings; and the reader is left to consider how Pielak’s argument would play out in less canonical, less male-authored works of Romanticism. But the stunning and elegant readings of, for example, Clare’s “On Seeing a Lost Greyhound in Winter,” Byron’s “Inscription on the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog,” and Wordsworth’s “Fidelity” more than make up for any such quibbles. This book is a welcome addition to research collections focused on animal studies, Romanticism, philosophy of mind, and even posthuman studies. Pielak ultimately presents his readers with a telling fable of how we must continue to engage the animal body as a text against and through which to read ourselves—to return to and remember our humanity.