In literary circles, there is a story from Radcliffe College that is passed around with a sort of delighted disbelief. It includes William James, an opera season, a final exam, and a note. It concludes in a way that raises the question of whether geniuses follow completely different rules than the rest of us.
The 1890s were the time. Gertrude Stein was a student of William James, a psychologist and philosopher, at Radcliffe, Harvard’s women’s annex. According to all accounts, their relationship was unique—a truly fruitful union of two eccentric minds. Stein, who was lively and creative even at the time, was precisely the type of student James seemed to find most fascinating. James was known for encouraging students to think from their own experiences rather than from textbooks. She had previously collaborated with him on motor automatism experiments. When the world contained spirits like his, she once wrote that life was “a thousand times yes” worth living.
As a result, on the day of the philosophy final, Stein either displayed an incredible level of confidence or the kind of innate honesty that only a select few possess—possibly both.
After taking a seat in the exam room and opening the test booklet, she wrote, “Dear Professor James, I am so sorry but really I do not feel a bit like an examination paper in philosophy today.” After that, she departed.
It’s worth taking a moment to consider that. She didn’t pretend to be sick. The room wasn’t empty when she left. She penned a message. A polite, well-written note addressed like a letter, stating that she was just not feeling well. Every night and in the afternoons, she had been going to the opera. The weather had been lovely in the spring. Apparently, there were aspects of life that seemed more urgent than philosophical issues.
The reply she got the next day is now one of those little, lovely anecdotes in literary history. James sent a postcard. “Dear Miss Stein, I completely understand how you feel,” it said. That’s how I frequently feel. After that, he gave her the best grade possible for the course.
It’s really intriguing to consider what to make of this. One interpretation is that James identified a student whose engagement with the material throughout the semester had already shown her comprehension—that exams, for some minds, measure the wrong things. Another interpretation is that James, who was also nonconformist and inclined to challenge institutional structures, perceived something philosophically coherent in Stein’s rejection. She wasn’t being indolent. She was telling the truth.
It’s also important to consider how this moment relates to Stein’s future self. Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and F. Scott Fitzgerald were all hosted in her Paris salon by the woman who skipped a philosophy exam because she didn’t feel like it. She used to write sentences that were so complex and peculiar that they were difficult to decipher. She would, in essence, become someone who navigated the world according to her own terms—not always successfully or without difficulty, but always identifiably herself.
William James might have noticed some of that early. If the note is well-written, accurate, and thoughtful, then choosing to write it rather than take an exam is not a sign of laziness. It exhibits, in a peculiar way, precisely the kind of self-awareness that good philosophy seeks to foster.
Not everyone can get the best grade by skipping an exam. However, not everyone is like Gertrude Stein.
