Gertrude and Alice:

A Likeness to Loving

Middlebury Co||ege’s Wright Theatre
on April 3 and 4
For tickets, call 802-443-6433

Dartmouth C0|lege’s Moore Theater
on April 6 and 7
For tickets, call 603-646-2422

Passion & Creativity

BY MARIA TRUMPLER

Nearly a century before
Vermonters debated civil mar-
riage for same-sex couples,
Gertrude Stein asked Alice B.
Toklas to be her wife. Gertrude
had followed her brother to
Paris after failing out of med-
ical school and escaping a
painful lesbian love triangle.
Alice came to Paris as a respite
from caring for her ailing
father in San Francisco and
was introduced to Gertrude by
a family friend. For the next
39 years, they were lovers and
constant companions. They
hosted famous salons at their
apartment that included
Picasso, Matisse, and

‘Hemingway, as well as many

lesser known and up-and-com-
ing young writers and artists.
They bought a Ford motorcar
in 1917 and spent the last year
of WWI transporting medical
supplies around France. In
1929, they bought a country
home in Bilignin where their
neighbors later helped them
hide from the occupying Nazi
forces. A

All the while, Gertrude was
writing poetry and prose with a
new attention to the words and
their arrangement in a sen-
tence. Her repetitions and

each other ‘pussy’ and ‘dar-
ling’ and expressing concern
for each other’s “cows.” At the
bottom of the manuscript ver-
sion of Stein’s famous “A rose
is a rose is a rose” is the line
“She is my rose,” referring to
Alice.

But they also fought. One
episode dramatized in this
piece occurred when Alice dis-
covered a packet of old love
letters written to Gertrude by
another woman. Alice was
furious and burned the letters.
Yet, the overriding image of
their relationship is one of
intense engagement, profound
understanding, and deep com-
mitment that generated and
supported creativity and pas-
sion.

The show, which opened
off—Broadway at the Foundry
Theatre in New York City in
the spring of 1999, is directed
by Anne Bogart. Obie Award-
winning actress Lola
Pashalinski and New York

Theatre Workshop’s associate
artistic director, Linda
Chapman, perfonn the work
they created. The two women,
themselves partners for 19
years, developed the piece
using Stein’s own words, col-
laborating with Stein scholar
Ulla Dydo. For those who
have found Stein’s language
challenging in the past: be
aware that the skilled delivery
of Pashalinski reveals the
music, playfulness, and acces-
sibility of Stein’s speech.

At Middlebury, the two per-
formances will be the center-
piece of a week long “Gertrude

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and Alice Symposium,” which
will highlight various aspects
of the two women’s lives.

On Monday, April 2, at 8
pm, there will be a screening of
the documentary, Paris was a
Woman, directed by Greta
Schiller, which portrays the
lively lesbian culture of
American expatriates in Paris
in the l920’s. On Tuesday,

.April 3 at 4 pm, students will
lead a workshop in interpreting
Stein poems. On Wednesday at
12:30 pm, Linda Chapman and
Lola Pashalinski, the two
actresses and writers, will lead
a lunch-time discussion of their

work in Wright Theatre with

lunch provided. On Thursday

afternoon, Maria Trumpler,

Dean of Ross Commons, will

speak on “Passion .and

Creativity in the Lesbian Love
Letters of Gertrude Stein,
Emily Dickinson, Rachel
Carson, Radclyffe Hall and
Margaret Mead,” at 4:15 pm.
Throughout the week, there
will be a display of works relat-
ing to Gertrude Stein at the
Starr Library Special

Collections.

Affiliated with TZELL New England
edwardd@tne.tze|l.com

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small variations revealed
nuances of meaning and ambi-
guity to the attentive and per-
sistent reader. Her earlier
works, however, met with only
rejection letters from publish-
ers.

Alice, convinced from their
first meeting of Gertrude’s
genius, finally set out to pub-
lish Gertrude’s works herself.
Alice also ran the household,
planned meals, controlled the
flow of guests, and typed and

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work, The‘ Autobiography of
Alice B. Toklas, was written by
adopting Alice’s voice and per-
sona.

In their private lives,
Gertrude and Alice were pas-
sionate and playful, calling

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