The Biography of Alice B. Toklas - Softcover

Simon, Linda

3.74

47 ratings by Goodreads

9780720605303: The Biography of Alice B. Toklas

Softcover

ISBN 10: 072060530X ISBN 13: 9780720605303

Publisher: Peter Owen Publishers, 1978

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

A lively and intensively researched biography that takes Alice B. Toklas out of the shadows for the first time and places her alongside Gertrude Stein.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author:

Linda Simon is the author of Gertrude Simon: A Composite Portrait, Genunie Reality: A Life of William James, and many more. She is Professor of English and Chair of the English Department at Skidmore College in New York.

Review:

"It's fitting that Alice B. Toklas, 'wife' and literary impresario of Gertrude Stein, should be the subject of a biography . . . and this is a good one, sensitive and lively. . . . it’s clear from this portrait that through her possessive affection she not only had a dominant influence on Stein's life but (for good or ill) on her highly idiosyncratic prose. With her acid tongue, shrewd judgment, vitality, and intense loyalty she was a fairly remarkable person in her-self."—Publishers Weekly (Publishers Weekly)

"Linda Simon writes beautifully of Alice's early years in California, of her Polish-Jewish family, of her growing alienation from her surroundings and gravitation toward artists, of her awareness of the isolating burden homosexuality would force on her. . . . entertaining, thoroughly researched. and well-written. . . . with a clear gaze fixed on undistorted truth."—Saturday Review (Saturday Review)

"A study that shows Toklas as she must have been, not 'Miss Stein's obedient shadow,'. . . but a multifaceted and complex creature with her own tastes and standards. . . . [her story] is an emotionally stirring experience."—Washington Post Book World (Washington Post Book World)

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.