Jerry Young

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At a Certain Age: Stages of the Sublime

In 1913, Gertrude Stein wrote that a “Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose/Loveliness extreme”

Stein interpreted this as whatever a thing is, as it recedes in memory, loses a degree of identity and it is that which, in the first line, she is trying to recover; she was trying to recall the exact beauty of a particular flower, that a rose is a rose is a rose is a rose in the ideal of its type.

How many times have you heard it exclaimed “what a perfect rose!”  Perfection presumes, even dictates, that for each variety, there is one definitive form, and, in growing them, we aspire to that perfection.  I love roses and have long enjoyed them.  But, in my own long life, I really cannot remember even a single, individual perfect rose.

The word sublime refers to something that is elevated in the mind; perfection and beauty are not the only references.  Living beings—including roses…and humans—change as they move through their life spans, and any stage can produce sublimity, depending on what you are looking for, on what you appreciate.  Sublimity can be achieved by many different forms, by a range of colors, by the fineness and definition of detail.

For the past twenty or so years, I have been photographing a single rose bush in Winslow Green on Bainbridge Island.  Groundskeepers have moved it at least twice but have kept it for much appreciated blossoms in “loveliness extreme.”  This bush especially exhibits quite a variety of such blossoms (see photograph), though similar year-after-year, seldom outside the expected.  My lens, however, has been focused on the stages noted, on those after perfection, on characteristics of blossoms in later stages in the life cycle, changes in blossoms on this bush that are not at all predictable, changes that are unexpected, surprising, intriguing.  To me, sublimity reached after the ideal form is the more interesting.  These images are my attempts to capture that; despite the perhaps unexpected forms, each image depicts a rose that is a rose is a rose is a rose.

Gerald L. (Jerry) Young is an Emeritus Professor of Biology and Environmental Science, and also held an appointment on the graduate faculty of American Studies. A long-time member of the Bainbridge Island Photography Club, he is a former editor of the Club’s monthly Newsletter.