These stream-of-consciousness experiments, rhythmical essays or "portraits", were designed to evoke "the excitingness of pure being" and can be seen as literature's answer to visual art styles and forms such as Cubism, plasticity, and collage. Many of the experimental works such as "Tender Buttons" have since been interpreted by critics as a feminist reworking of patriarchal language. These works were well received by avant-garde critics but did not initially achieve mainstream success. Despite Stein's work on "automatic writing" with William James, she did not see her work as automatic, but as an 'excess of consciousness'.