6. Gertrude Stein, "If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso"

The image above shows a portion of a portrait of Gertrude Stein painted by Pablo Picasso. They were friends. Each thought he/she was a genius. Stein admired Picasso's cubist mode of painting, so she thought she'd try to write a cubist portrait of Picasso - to do with pen and words what Picasso was doing with brush and paint.

1. read the poem (along with Ulla Dydo's comment): link to text
2. listen to Stein perform the poem: link to PennSound
3. read/listen to a text-audio alignment: link to PennSound
4. listen to critic Marjorie Perloff talk about Stein's verbal portrait: link to audio
5. watch video of dance choreographed to Stein's "If I Told Him": link to YouTube
6. watch a 20-minute discussion of Stein's poem: link to video