A Little Monkey Goes Like A Donkey

 

Gertrude Stein never ceases to make me laugh. In a prose poem of Stein's entitled, "A Dog"--which is found in the Objects section of Tender Buttons--I found myself particularly seized in a giggle fit. The poem is short: "A little monkey goes like a donkey that means to say that means to say that more sighs last goes. Leave with it. A little monkey goes like a donkey". Take your time. Read it again. Read it again. Again, read it. It read again... uh, confused?  I am. Confused, but amused. Can't you just see Gertrude on rue de Fleurus, lumbering around, knocking the Picassos and Renoirs off the wall, and clucking after her beloved dogs, "Little Monkies! Comment je vous adore!"? Well, I can. 

Here is some semblance of logic that I can find in "A Dog": It is a linguistic portrait of movement. Stein's whole shtick is to create an emotional relation by suggestion. In that, by using word combinations that seem senseless upon first inspection she creates a portrait by suggestion. So, she doesn't literally mean a monkey goes like a donkey thus a dog. She seeks a set of nouns that we have an intuitive emotional reaction to and sets them on their head (or their paws, hooves... whatever) to suggest another picture... i.e. now for something completely different! 

Here's what Stein herself said on the matter in A Transatlantic Interview: " 'A little monkey goes like a donkey...' That was an effort to illustrate the movement of a donkey going up a hill, you can see it plainly." Right. 

What are your thoughts? Commentary on other Stein works?