For all I know, Stein could have been a big (and
bad) influence on Riding, but I very much doubt
that Auden took her "experiments" seriously. Stein
wrote some fine, lively prose narrative, but her
poetry---Jaysus! Very good stuff if you're looking
for a bedtime sedative---better than Nembutal. Which
of Auden's poems, would you say, show any evidence of
Steinian influence? I should think he'd have classed
her with the Surrealists and Dadaists and such, all
of them definitely not his cup of tea. In a letter
to a friend (Spender?) just before he left for Spain,
he wrote, "Oh dear, I do hope I won't meet any
Surrealists."
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