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"The time came when there was a birthday. Every day was no excitement and a birthday was added, it was added on Monday, this made the memory clear, this which was a speech showed the chair in the middle where there was copper.<br /><br /> "A kind of green a game in green and nothing flat nothing quite flat and more round, nothing a particular color strangely, nothing breaking the losing of no little piece.<br /><br />"The teasing is tender and trying and thoughtful."<br /><br />Extracts from <i>Tender Buttons</i>.

2Geography and Plays

By Gertrude Stein

Geography and Plays is a 1922 collection of Gertrude Stein's "word portraits," or stream-of-consciousness writings. These stream-of-consciousness experiments, rhythmical essays or "portraits", were designed to evoke "the excitingness of pure being" and can be seen as literature's answer to Cubism, plasticity, and collage. Although the book has been described as "a marvellous and painstaking achievement in setting down approximately 80,000 words which mean nothing at all," it is considered to be one of Stein's seminal works. (summary by wildemoose and Wikipedia)

3Gabriel and the Hour Book

By Evaleen Stein

Brother Stephen has the heart of an artist and wishes to leave the abbey to travel and see the world. However, King Louis has decreed that an "hour book" be made for his bride, Lady Anne, which in turn causes the Abbott to refuse Brother Stephen's request to leave the brotherhood as his illuminations are the most beautiful, and as such, he desires that Brother Stephen should be the one to make the hour book. This decision angers Brother Stephen. Will Brother Stephen stay at the abbey and carry out his task or will he refuse and bring about a ban against him, a serious matter indeed. Or will he choose to stay? And how does Gabriel, the little colour grinder with such a beautiful disposition help him to decide? (Summary by Laura Victoria)

4Three Lives

By Gertrude Stein

<em>Three Lives</em> tells the stories of three women from the same fictitious town of Bridgeport. The first story is of Anna, a servant to the wealthy, or those who seem to be wealthy. She finds herself taking on "projects" in an effort to better the people around her. Story number two is of Melanctha, a mixed-race character who is looking for ways to increase her knowledge and power over others, but mostly finds herself dealing with rejection and betrayal. The final story is of Lena, a German immigrant who leads a rather ordinary life as a married woman. - Summary by KHand

5Among the Trees Again

By Evaleen Stein

This is a volume of poetry by Evaleen Stein. Special about this volume is, among other things, that many of the poems point to certain seasons and months. This volume thus refers to each part of the year. - Summary by Carolin

6Hooded Detective: 6 Action Packed Pulp Detective Stories

By Cliff Campbell, J. Lloyd Conrich, T. W. Ford, Roy Giles, David Goodis, Wilbur S. Peacock, Matt Rand and Harry Stein

Evil lurks in the hearts and minds of men and many nefarious schemes are hatched by these gangsters, mob bosses and super villains. But thankfully, equally brave, talented detectives (some of them hooded) are there to track them down and thwart their twisted plans. These six stories, along with two "true fact detective shorts" were in the magazine Hooded Detective, January 1942. Are they well written? well, no, but they are fun. Here are a few of the blurbs: "They had expected spaghetti with meat sauce for dinner, but were served instead, hot lead, with a little bit of blood on the side...." (A Dinner Date with Murder) "Wilson Lamb cuddled his automatic to play "Mr. Death" and fingered little Louis Engel for coffin cargo. But when he pulled the trigger, Whisper the gun-cobra from Chi spilled out of Doom's deck.." (Candidate for a Coffin). How can you top that last sentence? - Summary by Phil chenevert

7Child Songs of Cheer

By Evaleen Stein

This is a little volume of children's poetry by Indiana poet Evaleen Stein. The poems in this volume concern really anything that could be fun for children, from picking flowers to learning things in school to sledding in the winter. - Summary by Carolin

LibriVox volunteers bring you 11 recordings of Roast Beef by Gertrude Stein.<br> This was the Weekly Poetry project for January 19, 2020. <br> ------<br> The last stanza of the prose poem Roastbeef, part of 'Food', taken from Stein's book Tender Buttons (1914), consisting of three sections titled "Objects", "Food", and "Rooms". While the short book consists of multiple poems covering the everyday mundane, Stein's experimental use of language renders the poems unorthodox and their subjects unfamiliar. - Summary by David Lawrence Roastbeef by Gertrude Stein

9Katharine von Bora: Dr. Martin Luther's Wife

By Armin Stein

This is a fictionalized biography of the wife of the reformer Dr. Martin Luther. In the author's words, he hopes that "people may learn to know the wife of its greatest man,—not by name only, but as her husband's 'helpmeet,' in the truest sense of the word, as a pattern of domestic virtue, and as a pearl among women." - Summary by Dory Smith

The Making of Americans is a novel written by Gertrude Stein over a long period of time (1906-1911) and finally published in 1925. It is subtitled “Being a History of a Family’s Progress.” In many places in the work, Stein expresses her desire to know everything about everything! She also tells the reader that she loves the repeating that everyone does. She demonstrates this love by repeating, with only slight variations, her most important themes. In some passages, she is convinced that she really does understand all of the different kinds there are in men and women. In other passages, she is not sure that she has or will ever have a complete understanding of anything or anyone. She laments the fact that few people are willing to listen to her. While exploring the “being” of others, she frequently presents as a conflicted individual who is happy yet sometimes despairing. In addition to her use of repetition, Stein loves lists and the reader can sense the exuberance with which she plays with her text. The text is generally challenging. It does not fit into our typical expectations of either a novel or a history. Bit by bit, we learn a few details about the lives of the members of the Dehning and Hersland families and some of the people they knew. Stein, however, seems to present details only in support of her classification of kinds and kinds within kinds of men and women. Many of her observations are fascinating, if you can accept the unusual style of presentation. This is an experimental work and is not something for a casual read. There are only a few divisions in the text and no chapters. Stein has a style of writing that is frequently tedious to the modern ear. I think I hear a Germanic sentence structure. She loves long sentences and is inconsistent in the use of punctuation. In narrating this work, I frequently had to reread a passage several times in order to speak the text so that it could be understood. It is likely that I have misinterpreted some sentences, but since she repeats herself again and again, overall the meaning comes through. I recommend listening to or reading at least part of this very long work. In case someone is studying Stein and her works, I have included page numbers for each section recorded. They refer to the version available at archive.org. Summary by Martha Weller