SOURCE: “‘Melanctha’ and the Psychology of William James,” in Modern Fiction Studies, Vol. 28, No. 4, Winter, 1982–83, pp. 545–56.

In the following essay, Ruddick discusses the “buried psychological allegory” in “Melanctha” that owes much to the psychological studies of William James.

Since the fifties, Gertrude Stein's critics have been alert to the possibility that her work owes something to the psychology of William James.¹ Stein hinted at a debt; James, her college professor and a mentor of sorts, was one of “the strongest scientific influences that I had.”² But it has been difficult to establish a concrete point of likeness between Stein's handling of personality and James's mental theory. The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to a buried psychological allegory in “Melanctha” that imports its figures from James.

“Melanctha” is a version of Q.E.D., Stein's early novel sometimes known by its posthumous title, Things As They...