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James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays
This book contains eighteen original essays by leading Joyce scholars on the eighteen separate chapters of Ulysses. It attempts to explore the richness of Joyce's extraordinary novel more fully than could be done by any single scholar. Joyce's habit of using, when writing each chapter in Ulysses, a particular style, tone, point of view, and narrative structure gives each contributor a special set of problems with which to engage, problems which coincide in every case with certain of his special interests. The essays in this volume complement and illuminate one another to provide the most comprehensive account yet published of Joyce's many-sided masterpiece.
447 pages, Paperback
First published October 3, 1977
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October 24, 2017
có việc phải đọc lại vài bài trong cuốn cẩm nang này mà đọc đi đọc lại vẫn như nuốt từng lời mật ngọt. cung cách nghiên cứu ngày xưa có gì đó thật khác biệt, như của một thời đại vĩnh viễn không bao giờ trở lại vì đời sau đã ô uế vì đủ loại nhảm nhí mang tên theory.
một tập hợp 18 bài essay về 18 chương trong Ulysses do các chuyên gia hàng đầu viết, chỉ có thể đọc mà học hỏi. mong một ngày được dịch sang tiếng Việt =))
một tập hợp 18 bài essay về 18 chương trong Ulysses do các chuyên gia hàng đầu viết, chỉ có thể đọc mà học hỏi. mong một ngày được dịch sang tiếng Việt =))
July 22, 2015
A few years ago some Twitter wit, I forget whom, suggested that the eighteen episodes comprising James Joyce's Ulysses might be conceived of as more-or-less independent scrolls; that the compounded tome represents a collection of said scrolls compiled in a manner like unto how Homer might have aggregated The Odyssey from the efforts of pre-existing raconteurs, imparting his own authorial stamp to the collective work. While I've no indication that such was Joyce's intent, I've ever since found the mental image of a disheveled pile of scrolls to be a useful model for thinking about Ulysses and its (in)famously radical shifts of style and emphasis from one episode to the next. This could also account for Joyce referring to said independent components as episodes rather than the conventional chapters.
Taking on Ulysses episode by episode, James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays, edited by Hart and Hayman, is so stuffed with invaluable insights that never before in my life have I filled up a book with so many Post-It notes for later review. Having already been though Ulysses about seven or eight times in the last few years, and beginning ― so I innocently believed ― to acquire a certain panoramic vision and appreciation of its sweeping narrative and vast multitude of characters, Hart and Hayman humbled me, revealing that in some ways I am only just beginning to break down through the superficial crust of the book and to plunge into the true and unexpected allusive ocean of dimly-lit psychopoetics which broods beneath. Some of the episodes I now must fundamentally rethink; others I now suspect I perceive only through the darkest glass most obscurely.
Of course this is the great fun* of reading James Joyce, and what you find in no other writer: as soon as the words "I understand" occur to you, the solid earth crumbles from beneath your feet. It's not so much a matter of coming to understand Joyce's stories as it is learning how to read, and reconsidering what the act of reading is, or can, or may be.
Some of the eighteen essays to be found in Hart and Hayman ― one essay for each of the episodes in Ulysses ― are more mind-blowing than others. Robert Kellogg on Scylla and Charybdis is something of a revelation. Clive Hart on Wandering Rocks is nothing less than astonishing. Jackson I Cope is a most helpful guide through the musicality of Sirens, providing a number of useful guideposts. David Hayman shows us how the text of Cyclops is nested in a way I hadn't picked up on before, and also here sets out his critical Arranger theory of narration throughout Ulysses, which by itself makes this particular essay a vital one. Likewise while JS Atherton may not be the last word on Oxen of the Sun, he probably comes close; at a minimum, Atherton's essay is unquestionably required reading.
Reading and carefully reflecting on Gifford's Ulysses Annotated and Gilbert's James Joyce's Ulysses: A Study are of secondary importance only to successive re-readings of Joyce's original text if one hopes to begin to garner something approaching a respectable comprehension of Ulysses. James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays is likewise an important reference work, though perhaps a bit less so for the layman than for the academic scholar, but only a bit. If Gifford and Gilbert and Joyce were required reading for a 400-level course, then you'd expect to encounter Hart and Hayman in a graduate course. It's not too much for the layman to come to terms with. I am myself such a layman, and I find this book to be masterful and helpful in the extreme.
*Some might object to my use of the word "fun" here . . . until they've made their first conceptual breakthrough and acknowledged that Joyce's conception of fiction is unlike anything they've encountered before.
Taking on Ulysses episode by episode, James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays, edited by Hart and Hayman, is so stuffed with invaluable insights that never before in my life have I filled up a book with so many Post-It notes for later review. Having already been though Ulysses about seven or eight times in the last few years, and beginning ― so I innocently believed ― to acquire a certain panoramic vision and appreciation of its sweeping narrative and vast multitude of characters, Hart and Hayman humbled me, revealing that in some ways I am only just beginning to break down through the superficial crust of the book and to plunge into the true and unexpected allusive ocean of dimly-lit psychopoetics which broods beneath. Some of the episodes I now must fundamentally rethink; others I now suspect I perceive only through the darkest glass most obscurely.
Of course this is the great fun* of reading James Joyce, and what you find in no other writer: as soon as the words "I understand" occur to you, the solid earth crumbles from beneath your feet. It's not so much a matter of coming to understand Joyce's stories as it is learning how to read, and reconsidering what the act of reading is, or can, or may be.
Some of the eighteen essays to be found in Hart and Hayman ― one essay for each of the episodes in Ulysses ― are more mind-blowing than others. Robert Kellogg on Scylla and Charybdis is something of a revelation. Clive Hart on Wandering Rocks is nothing less than astonishing. Jackson I Cope is a most helpful guide through the musicality of Sirens, providing a number of useful guideposts. David Hayman shows us how the text of Cyclops is nested in a way I hadn't picked up on before, and also here sets out his critical Arranger theory of narration throughout Ulysses, which by itself makes this particular essay a vital one. Likewise while JS Atherton may not be the last word on Oxen of the Sun, he probably comes close; at a minimum, Atherton's essay is unquestionably required reading.
Reading and carefully reflecting on Gifford's Ulysses Annotated and Gilbert's James Joyce's Ulysses: A Study are of secondary importance only to successive re-readings of Joyce's original text if one hopes to begin to garner something approaching a respectable comprehension of Ulysses. James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays is likewise an important reference work, though perhaps a bit less so for the layman than for the academic scholar, but only a bit. If Gifford and Gilbert and Joyce were required reading for a 400-level course, then you'd expect to encounter Hart and Hayman in a graduate course. It's not too much for the layman to come to terms with. I am myself such a layman, and I find this book to be masterful and helpful in the extreme.
*Some might object to my use of the word "fun" here . . . until they've made their first conceptual breakthrough and acknowledged that Joyce's conception of fiction is unlike anything they've encountered before.
September 17, 2011
I used three companion books alongside reading Ulysses, and this was always the last of the three to be read, and often was skimmed. Each chapter corresponds with a chapter of the novel, and is written by a different scholar. Some of them seem to feel they need to go deeper than is really necessary (one memorable example is the assertion that Joyce chooses the roundness of words depending on which characters are in the room), and it is clear that several had scholar-envy and wished they were writing about the Circe chapter instead (that did help me know it was important when I finally got there). I did appreciate the alternate viewpoints and some of the charts and graphs, while I made fun of them at first, really helped me understand what the heck was going on.
December 6, 2018
This is a collection of 18 essays, one per chapter and each by a different author. The course guide for Heffernan's Ulysses lecture series describes this book as "essential"—a term it also uses for Hugh Kenner's commentary (which I'll separately review) and for Gifford & Seidman's "Ulysses Annotated" (which I have not read).
Having a different author for each essay is both a weakness and a strength. The weakness is that the book is not cohesive, and the various essays are uneven in quality. For example, I could have done without the commentary on the last chapter ("Penelope") by a Fr. Robert Boyle, S.J., which contains such insightful gems as:
But I think the strengths outweigh the weakness, because having different authors means that each chapter provides a unique voice and take on Ulysses. For example, chapter 10 in Ulysses ("Wandering Rocks") takes the form of 19 separate episodes told from different quasi-simultaneous perspectives around Dublin and covers about an hour of real time. The corresponding commentary chapter here, by Clive Hart, includes a foldout chart listing the 29 characters covered in Wandering Rocks on one axis and minute-by-minute timestamps on the other. Hart then spent a day walking around Dublin with a stopwatch recreating the activities described in Wandering Rocks and filled out the chart to show how all the various actions intersect during the hour of real time.
If you decide to tackle Ulysses and only wanted to pick up a single supplemental book, this would be my recommendation of the four that I read. That is not because I liked it the most, but because it is the most comprehensive. A book like this may not be as useful if you are using one of the other "Introduction to Ulysses" commentaries—Heffernan's course guide appears to particularly recommend the version by Blamires for that purpose—but I haven't read any of those so can't comment.
I give this four stars rather than five, because most of the commentary chapters had something insightful and interesting to recommend them, but a few were pretty big duds.
Having a different author for each essay is both a weakness and a strength. The weakness is that the book is not cohesive, and the various essays are uneven in quality. For example, I could have done without the commentary on the last chapter ("Penelope") by a Fr. Robert Boyle, S.J., which contains such insightful gems as:
In the eight sentences of this chapter, I suspect that Joyce is using the shape and structure of the figure 8, so frequently repeated, for sexual symbolism, analogous to the familiar treatment of the figure 69. If this is so, and if the 8 symbolizes Molly's genital area, as I think it does, then Bloom, who worships woman particularly in her life-giving and regenerative role, is here ritually approaching the source of human life. Since, as I see it, the black dot at the end of the "Ithaca" chapter signifies not only darkness but Molly's anus as well, Bloom is at present allowed to approach only the bottom half of the total eight which represents Molly's mesial groove.
But I think the strengths outweigh the weakness, because having different authors means that each chapter provides a unique voice and take on Ulysses. For example, chapter 10 in Ulysses ("Wandering Rocks") takes the form of 19 separate episodes told from different quasi-simultaneous perspectives around Dublin and covers about an hour of real time. The corresponding commentary chapter here, by Clive Hart, includes a foldout chart listing the 29 characters covered in Wandering Rocks on one axis and minute-by-minute timestamps on the other. Hart then spent a day walking around Dublin with a stopwatch recreating the activities described in Wandering Rocks and filled out the chart to show how all the various actions intersect during the hour of real time.
If you decide to tackle Ulysses and only wanted to pick up a single supplemental book, this would be my recommendation of the four that I read. That is not because I liked it the most, but because it is the most comprehensive. A book like this may not be as useful if you are using one of the other "Introduction to Ulysses" commentaries—Heffernan's course guide appears to particularly recommend the version by Blamires for that purpose—but I haven't read any of those so can't comment.
I give this four stars rather than five, because most of the commentary chapters had something insightful and interesting to recommend them, but a few were pretty big duds.
August 3, 2016
Joyce was 40 yrs old when Ulysses was published, it is a day in the life of a husband and father of Joyce's age (at publication). Joyce loved Dublin and Ireland and though the book was written on the European continent - he wanted to memorialize his birth home (Ireland). The framework of Ulysses is Homer's Odyssey - The Roman (Ulysses: 1 Telemachus, 2 Nestor, 3 Proteus, 4 Calypso, 5 Lotus Eaters, 6 Hades, 7 Aeolus, 8 Lestrygonians, 9 Scylla And Charybdis, 10 Wandering Rocks, 11 Sirens, 12 Cyclops, 13 Nausicca, 14 Oxen Of The Sun, 15 Circe, 16 Eumaeus, 17 Ithaca, and 18 Penelope.
Ulysses is the tale of a Modern-day Odysseus, Leopold Bloom in his personal existential/sexual quest. The conclusion of this quest is the quintessential affirmation of humanity, the fundamental family unit - the father, mother, son, and daughter. Like Odysseus, absent from Penelope, traveling the world, for many long years, Leopold Bloom is also absent from his Penelope (in Dublin). Like a traveler (Odysseus), Bloom is sexually absent (abstinent) from Molly “10 years, 5 months and 18 days” (736). Unlike Odysseus, the obstacles Bloom faces are psychological (modern) - internal travails instead of Odysseus' external travails. Bloom's only son’s death has become a psychological barrier; as Molly reflects: “we were never the same since” (778). Yet Bloom is optimistic throughout the work - in regard to the possibility of another child, again Molly: ”Ill give him one more chance” (780). Affirmatively (as we grow to know Molly) we find she has given and is willing to continue to give Bloom “one more chance”. Through the course of the (Dublin) day, Bloom experiences “deep frustration, humiliation, fear, punishment and catharsis” (Herring, p.74). Bloom needs to lead himself back, out of self-deception, fantasy, and frustration to Molly’s (and his marriage) bed.
Bloom’s travails come in the Circe chapter and it is imperative (for Joyce) that as readers, we recognize Joyce’s change from Homer's Odyssey - this is Joyce's major rework, deviating from his Greek predecessor. For Odysseus: insight, understanding, enlightenment, and all importantly direction come to Odysseus in his journey to the (ancient Greek) Underworld. For Bloom, the Hades chapter or “the other world” represents an “emptiness of mind”; Joyce was a man grounded (and devoted) to the present world of man's consciousness and unconsciousness. In Ulysses enlightenment comes in the Circe chapter: described though the Joycean technique of hallucination or the discoveries of the "unconscious mind”. Joyce's Circe chapter (a surrealistic one-act Ibsen-like play) is where Bloom finds self-possession - (Joyce makes) Bloom encounter his own psycho-sexual existential questions, rather than finding life's answers in the dead ghosts of his life (the ancient Greek Hades chapter of the dead past).
In the Circe chapter, Bloom confronts and overcomes every major obstacle in his existential/sexual quest: the Molly he serves in Calypso reappears as Bello the whoremistress, Molly’s letter from Boylan and his from Martha are reworked into a series of seductive letters ending in a trial, his sexual infidelities beginning with Lotty Clarke and ending with Gerty McDowell are relived (importantly balanced by Molly’s infidelities) and reconciled, and lastly, Bloom triumphs over whore, Virgin-Goddess, and most importantly himself. Joyce equanimously gives both Molly and Bloom extramarital sexual infidelities - infidelities known by each of the other (as early as the Calypso chapter) Bloom was conscious of what was to come. Of course there will be resolution in marriage, for Molly only needs to feel that Bloom is willing. As we read, Bloom has undergone the travails of his own mind and has emerged Victorious. He has succeeded in his psycho-sexual existential quest. He has arrived at Molly’s bed. Self-possessed. Victorious. Eager.
Molly "I saw he understood or felt what a woman is and I knew I could always get round him...then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down in to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes. (END)".
After publishing Ulysses, Joyce began FINNEGANS WAKE (FW) - Joyce largely stepped out of one work into his next (and last work). The change Joyce made in FW was instead of using Homer's Ulysses as a framework - FW's framework is Giambattista Vico's "La Scienza Nuova's" 4 cyclic stages of history.
Joyce realized that he ended Ulysses wrongly (not in accordance with the Universe) in Molly's bed - Joyce corrects his mistake in FINNEGANS WAKE by incorporating Vico's revelation of restart / recirculation. "HCE day" similar to Bloomsday (roughly 24 hrs): Chronologically FW starts with memories in "book I:3" of HCE arrested in front of his tavern/home, like Bloom unable to enter his front door (but HCE does not enter his home through the back door) - instead HCE is arrested for disturbances in hours before dawn. Then memories "book I:4" HCE's conscious/musings or unconscious/dream psychological travails of past guilts (underworld coffin, Ulysses ch Hades) while incarcerated in early hours of morning. Followed by memories "book I:2" HCE walks home through Phoenix Park accosted for the time of day (12 noon) which threatens (real/unreal memories, Ulysses ch Nausicaa) his innocent well-being. These 3 chapters in FW are Joyce's major rework to incorporate Vico's revelation of restart / recirculation into FW - Joyce rewrites 3 chapters of Ulysses: When He is denied Her front door, He is in Hell (on earth), when released (from Hell) His odyssey to Her begins again (with His ever-present accompanying internal travails) for She always knows when He is worthy of Her acceptance (their Paradise).
Then "book I:1" Finnegan's afternoon wake at HCE's tavern and retelling memories (books I:2-4). Inside HCE's tavern (his ship) his patrons talk about his family (Norwegian Captain and the Tailor's Daughter), truthful letters (ALP) and fabricated stories (books I:5-8 & II:3); while the children (Shaun, Shem and Iseult) are in and out of the family tavern/home all day taking their lessons (book II:2) and playing about with their friends (Shem's closing dream, book II:1); HCE, as proprietor, defends himself with a self-deprecating apologia before his intoxicated collapse late night (book II:3). HCE dreams on his tavern floor (book II:4); then dreams in his bed (books III:1-3); before intercourse with his wife ALP (book III:4). HCE & ALP's lovemaking dissolution dream (book IV) to awaken to a new day, Joycean Nirvana is attained by ALP's (& HCE's) unification with the Unmanifest (Creation, Incarnate conception) and Reincarnation (the baton has been passed on again), awaiting Joyce's God "thunderclap" at the beginning of FW's "book I".
FW is aural (oral) history like Homer's Odessey and Celtic folktales - when one pronounces (phonology) FW's words (aloud) there are more languages than just English; also, when one reads (morphology) FW's words almost all the words are "portmanteaus / neologisms" which gives each of FW's "poly-syncretic" words many meanings (universal impermanence, Heisenberg uncertainty/obscurity), each FW syncretic sentence dozens of possible messages, each FW syncretic paragraph hundreds of possible readings, Joyce's rendering of a more expansive English language and multiplicating universal book with coalescing syncretic themes/stories (that responds/opens to each reader's inquiries). Joyce schooled in Christian Jesuit metaphysics (pushed down into the mindfulness of human consciousness) breathes in the spirit of expansive Celtic (Irish) democratic community tavern life where man's stories of life are told. Tavern life teaches the evolution of Joyce's ten God "thunderclaps" (one hundred lettered words) pushing man's evolution forward from cave man's tales to modern tv media tales. Inside the tavern man learns of the purely human (animal) fall, taken down by another human(s) - like animal taken down on the African savanna. A granular reading of FW can render FW as an updated John Milton's Paradise Lost (regurgitated knowledge from the tree, to affirm man's damnation); however, Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species was published in 1859 and Joyce in FW book II clearly walks Shaun, Shem and Iseult through their earthly evolutionary lifetime travails, our mortality is a consequence of Life's evolution. Every page of FW speaks to man's evolution (unconscious biological, conscious social, aspirational personal) and to Life recirculating (West meets Dzogchen East a "meeting of metaphysical minds") that binds humanity together into the future. Dzogchen (beyond all dualistic polarities) the heart of human consciousness - Joyce's underlying (subcutaneous) arguments refute the "Western curse of metaphysical/mythological damnation", the curse does not exist in the Eastern mind. Like "counting the number of angels on the head of a pin" (Aquinas 1270) Joyce provides a granular/expansive reading of FW as a "defense against all Western adversity" for our conscious and unconscious Western travails. HCE's angst is caused by his community that imposes a Western curse (damnation) upon him that man is not guilty of...to experience Joycean Nirvana, a defense against this man-made guilt is required - for as Zoroaster revealed cosmogonic dualism, evil is mixed with good in man's universal everyday travails (even the Dalai Lama must defend Nirvana rigorously from the most populous authoritarian state in human history).
Joyce's FW celebrates the Joys of Christian/Buddhist diversity of humanity (expansive human consciousness: Gnostic Norwegian Captain, Shem, Archdruid), Brahma (Finnegan, HCE, Shaun), Divine Women (ALP, Iseult, Nuvoletta), his family - and the Sufferings of the inescapable "evil" of Shiva (Buckley), the debilitating harmful sterile intrusive authoritarian institutionalizing damnation (MaMaLuJo, St. Patrick) by Augustine, the manufactured clerical corruption identified by Luther (since 367 AD) and the burdens of "survival of the fittest" anxiety (modern commerce) met with a Dzogchen Buddhist stance. The (innocent infant) Norwegian Captain (Krishna, HCE), occasionally defensive (Shiva, HCE), though concretized (Brahma, HCE) by community family life (MaMaLuJo) - through spirits (drink) HCE can access his spirituality (dreams) and through spiritual (cutting through) love-making with ALP (direct approach) can access (their Krishnas) unification with the Unmanifest. Joyce was a Prophet who consumed Man's conscious and spiritual "thoughts and dreams, history and gossip, efforts and failings" - to reveal the joys (Nirvana) and sufferings (Saṃsāra) of Mankind.
Joyce's FW message: Christian/Buddhist omniscient compassion (Christ/Krishna) is eternally joyful and recirculating. Affirmative family (HCE/Brahma, ALP/Divine woman & children) existentiality: life's biological evolution (sex), modern survival (money), constraining community (Dharma, social evolution) are constantly assaulted by inescapable "aggressive insidious vile" corrupt soul(less/sucking) ossified demonic antipathetic attacks. Joycean Nirvana is attained via the Christian/Buddhist affirmative middle way, "beyond polar opposites" the path of Christ/Buddha.
JCB
Ulysses is the tale of a Modern-day Odysseus, Leopold Bloom in his personal existential/sexual quest. The conclusion of this quest is the quintessential affirmation of humanity, the fundamental family unit - the father, mother, son, and daughter. Like Odysseus, absent from Penelope, traveling the world, for many long years, Leopold Bloom is also absent from his Penelope (in Dublin). Like a traveler (Odysseus), Bloom is sexually absent (abstinent) from Molly “10 years, 5 months and 18 days” (736). Unlike Odysseus, the obstacles Bloom faces are psychological (modern) - internal travails instead of Odysseus' external travails. Bloom's only son’s death has become a psychological barrier; as Molly reflects: “we were never the same since” (778). Yet Bloom is optimistic throughout the work - in regard to the possibility of another child, again Molly: ”Ill give him one more chance” (780). Affirmatively (as we grow to know Molly) we find she has given and is willing to continue to give Bloom “one more chance”. Through the course of the (Dublin) day, Bloom experiences “deep frustration, humiliation, fear, punishment and catharsis” (Herring, p.74). Bloom needs to lead himself back, out of self-deception, fantasy, and frustration to Molly’s (and his marriage) bed.
Bloom’s travails come in the Circe chapter and it is imperative (for Joyce) that as readers, we recognize Joyce’s change from Homer's Odyssey - this is Joyce's major rework, deviating from his Greek predecessor. For Odysseus: insight, understanding, enlightenment, and all importantly direction come to Odysseus in his journey to the (ancient Greek) Underworld. For Bloom, the Hades chapter or “the other world” represents an “emptiness of mind”; Joyce was a man grounded (and devoted) to the present world of man's consciousness and unconsciousness. In Ulysses enlightenment comes in the Circe chapter: described though the Joycean technique of hallucination or the discoveries of the "unconscious mind”. Joyce's Circe chapter (a surrealistic one-act Ibsen-like play) is where Bloom finds self-possession - (Joyce makes) Bloom encounter his own psycho-sexual existential questions, rather than finding life's answers in the dead ghosts of his life (the ancient Greek Hades chapter of the dead past).
In the Circe chapter, Bloom confronts and overcomes every major obstacle in his existential/sexual quest: the Molly he serves in Calypso reappears as Bello the whoremistress, Molly’s letter from Boylan and his from Martha are reworked into a series of seductive letters ending in a trial, his sexual infidelities beginning with Lotty Clarke and ending with Gerty McDowell are relived (importantly balanced by Molly’s infidelities) and reconciled, and lastly, Bloom triumphs over whore, Virgin-Goddess, and most importantly himself. Joyce equanimously gives both Molly and Bloom extramarital sexual infidelities - infidelities known by each of the other (as early as the Calypso chapter) Bloom was conscious of what was to come. Of course there will be resolution in marriage, for Molly only needs to feel that Bloom is willing. As we read, Bloom has undergone the travails of his own mind and has emerged Victorious. He has succeeded in his psycho-sexual existential quest. He has arrived at Molly’s bed. Self-possessed. Victorious. Eager.
Molly "I saw he understood or felt what a woman is and I knew I could always get round him...then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down in to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes. (END)".
After publishing Ulysses, Joyce began FINNEGANS WAKE (FW) - Joyce largely stepped out of one work into his next (and last work). The change Joyce made in FW was instead of using Homer's Ulysses as a framework - FW's framework is Giambattista Vico's "La Scienza Nuova's" 4 cyclic stages of history.
Joyce realized that he ended Ulysses wrongly (not in accordance with the Universe) in Molly's bed - Joyce corrects his mistake in FINNEGANS WAKE by incorporating Vico's revelation of restart / recirculation. "HCE day" similar to Bloomsday (roughly 24 hrs): Chronologically FW starts with memories in "book I:3" of HCE arrested in front of his tavern/home, like Bloom unable to enter his front door (but HCE does not enter his home through the back door) - instead HCE is arrested for disturbances in hours before dawn. Then memories "book I:4" HCE's conscious/musings or unconscious/dream psychological travails of past guilts (underworld coffin, Ulysses ch Hades) while incarcerated in early hours of morning. Followed by memories "book I:2" HCE walks home through Phoenix Park accosted for the time of day (12 noon) which threatens (real/unreal memories, Ulysses ch Nausicaa) his innocent well-being. These 3 chapters in FW are Joyce's major rework to incorporate Vico's revelation of restart / recirculation into FW - Joyce rewrites 3 chapters of Ulysses: When He is denied Her front door, He is in Hell (on earth), when released (from Hell) His odyssey to Her begins again (with His ever-present accompanying internal travails) for She always knows when He is worthy of Her acceptance (their Paradise).
Then "book I:1" Finnegan's afternoon wake at HCE's tavern and retelling memories (books I:2-4). Inside HCE's tavern (his ship) his patrons talk about his family (Norwegian Captain and the Tailor's Daughter), truthful letters (ALP) and fabricated stories (books I:5-8 & II:3); while the children (Shaun, Shem and Iseult) are in and out of the family tavern/home all day taking their lessons (book II:2) and playing about with their friends (Shem's closing dream, book II:1); HCE, as proprietor, defends himself with a self-deprecating apologia before his intoxicated collapse late night (book II:3). HCE dreams on his tavern floor (book II:4); then dreams in his bed (books III:1-3); before intercourse with his wife ALP (book III:4). HCE & ALP's lovemaking dissolution dream (book IV) to awaken to a new day, Joycean Nirvana is attained by ALP's (& HCE's) unification with the Unmanifest (Creation, Incarnate conception) and Reincarnation (the baton has been passed on again), awaiting Joyce's God "thunderclap" at the beginning of FW's "book I".
FW is aural (oral) history like Homer's Odessey and Celtic folktales - when one pronounces (phonology) FW's words (aloud) there are more languages than just English; also, when one reads (morphology) FW's words almost all the words are "portmanteaus / neologisms" which gives each of FW's "poly-syncretic" words many meanings (universal impermanence, Heisenberg uncertainty/obscurity), each FW syncretic sentence dozens of possible messages, each FW syncretic paragraph hundreds of possible readings, Joyce's rendering of a more expansive English language and multiplicating universal book with coalescing syncretic themes/stories (that responds/opens to each reader's inquiries). Joyce schooled in Christian Jesuit metaphysics (pushed down into the mindfulness of human consciousness) breathes in the spirit of expansive Celtic (Irish) democratic community tavern life where man's stories of life are told. Tavern life teaches the evolution of Joyce's ten God "thunderclaps" (one hundred lettered words) pushing man's evolution forward from cave man's tales to modern tv media tales. Inside the tavern man learns of the purely human (animal) fall, taken down by another human(s) - like animal taken down on the African savanna. A granular reading of FW can render FW as an updated John Milton's Paradise Lost (regurgitated knowledge from the tree, to affirm man's damnation); however, Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species was published in 1859 and Joyce in FW book II clearly walks Shaun, Shem and Iseult through their earthly evolutionary lifetime travails, our mortality is a consequence of Life's evolution. Every page of FW speaks to man's evolution (unconscious biological, conscious social, aspirational personal) and to Life recirculating (West meets Dzogchen East a "meeting of metaphysical minds") that binds humanity together into the future. Dzogchen (beyond all dualistic polarities) the heart of human consciousness - Joyce's underlying (subcutaneous) arguments refute the "Western curse of metaphysical/mythological damnation", the curse does not exist in the Eastern mind. Like "counting the number of angels on the head of a pin" (Aquinas 1270) Joyce provides a granular/expansive reading of FW as a "defense against all Western adversity" for our conscious and unconscious Western travails. HCE's angst is caused by his community that imposes a Western curse (damnation) upon him that man is not guilty of...to experience Joycean Nirvana, a defense against this man-made guilt is required - for as Zoroaster revealed cosmogonic dualism, evil is mixed with good in man's universal everyday travails (even the Dalai Lama must defend Nirvana rigorously from the most populous authoritarian state in human history).
Joyce's FW celebrates the Joys of Christian/Buddhist diversity of humanity (expansive human consciousness: Gnostic Norwegian Captain, Shem, Archdruid), Brahma (Finnegan, HCE, Shaun), Divine Women (ALP, Iseult, Nuvoletta), his family - and the Sufferings of the inescapable "evil" of Shiva (Buckley), the debilitating harmful sterile intrusive authoritarian institutionalizing damnation (MaMaLuJo, St. Patrick) by Augustine, the manufactured clerical corruption identified by Luther (since 367 AD) and the burdens of "survival of the fittest" anxiety (modern commerce) met with a Dzogchen Buddhist stance. The (innocent infant) Norwegian Captain (Krishna, HCE), occasionally defensive (Shiva, HCE), though concretized (Brahma, HCE) by community family life (MaMaLuJo) - through spirits (drink) HCE can access his spirituality (dreams) and through spiritual (cutting through) love-making with ALP (direct approach) can access (their Krishnas) unification with the Unmanifest. Joyce was a Prophet who consumed Man's conscious and spiritual "thoughts and dreams, history and gossip, efforts and failings" - to reveal the joys (Nirvana) and sufferings (Saṃsāra) of Mankind.
Joyce's FW message: Christian/Buddhist omniscient compassion (Christ/Krishna) is eternally joyful and recirculating. Affirmative family (HCE/Brahma, ALP/Divine woman & children) existentiality: life's biological evolution (sex), modern survival (money), constraining community (Dharma, social evolution) are constantly assaulted by inescapable "aggressive insidious vile" corrupt soul(less/sucking) ossified demonic antipathetic attacks. Joycean Nirvana is attained via the Christian/Buddhist affirmative middle way, "beyond polar opposites" the path of Christ/Buddha.
JCB
June 5, 2018
Useful and sometimes quite good, but often frustrating for unproductive reasons (specifically sexism, cult of personality weirdness, and some pretty bad writing at times.
July 13, 2018
A different critic discusses each chapter of Ulysses. Best critical analyses I know of.
November 16, 2023
Definitely a worthwhile read, but man are there some essays that were odd or shallow. Range of quality too wide to give it anything more than three stars.
July 27, 2011
Having completed Ulysses, the New Bloomsday Book, Ulysses: Annotated, and Stuart Gilbert's Ulysses prior to reading Hart's collection of critical essays, I will admit that I had built up a fairly high level of expectation for all-things-Ulysses. With that said, I entered James Joyce's Ulysses: Critical Essays with high hopes but an open mind.
I was profoundly disappointed with nearly every single essay. I relished the concept of a different literary expert tackling a single episode of Ulysses and thus thereby adding to the collective font of knowledge about one of the greatest works of the 20th century. Unfortunately, for me, the reality fell far short of what I had expected.
To say that each writer tackles AN episode is misleading at best. Most, if not all, of the essays jump around the book, flitting to and fro from its seventeen sister episodes, in some cases spending more time in them than in the one originally being investigated. This was, at worst, obnoxious and dispiriting and, at best, an interesting way of providing a comprehensive look at the book as a whole. Sadly, the worst occurred far more frequently and I found myself wondering what the ultimate point was of at least a few of the essays.
The writing itself (in most cases) consisted of the typical, trite scholarly language that one would expect in such a collection of essays. What irritated me, though, was a number of the writers' nasty habit of reusing the same word upwards of a dozen times in any given essay. I'm all for sesquipedality...but to use the word "tumescence" more than a dozen times in an article? A thesaurus would most certainly have helped.
The biggest issue that I had with the essays, en toto, is the lack of any significant direction or overarching point. Though each essay had a clear purpose at its genesis, by the end, said point was often muddled or lost, confounded by a sea of disconnected ideas and pedantic language.
I came to this book hoping to enjoy nearly two dozen new perspectives on Ulysses but what I ultimately found was a disjointed mess of overblown opinions, none of which truly addressed the individual episodes adequately. I'm sure there are some phenomenal essays on Ulysses in numerous other collections, I just did not find any here.
I was profoundly disappointed with nearly every single essay. I relished the concept of a different literary expert tackling a single episode of Ulysses and thus thereby adding to the collective font of knowledge about one of the greatest works of the 20th century. Unfortunately, for me, the reality fell far short of what I had expected.
To say that each writer tackles AN episode is misleading at best. Most, if not all, of the essays jump around the book, flitting to and fro from its seventeen sister episodes, in some cases spending more time in them than in the one originally being investigated. This was, at worst, obnoxious and dispiriting and, at best, an interesting way of providing a comprehensive look at the book as a whole. Sadly, the worst occurred far more frequently and I found myself wondering what the ultimate point was of at least a few of the essays.
The writing itself (in most cases) consisted of the typical, trite scholarly language that one would expect in such a collection of essays. What irritated me, though, was a number of the writers' nasty habit of reusing the same word upwards of a dozen times in any given essay. I'm all for sesquipedality...but to use the word "tumescence" more than a dozen times in an article? A thesaurus would most certainly have helped.
The biggest issue that I had with the essays, en toto, is the lack of any significant direction or overarching point. Though each essay had a clear purpose at its genesis, by the end, said point was often muddled or lost, confounded by a sea of disconnected ideas and pedantic language.
I came to this book hoping to enjoy nearly two dozen new perspectives on Ulysses but what I ultimately found was a disjointed mess of overblown opinions, none of which truly addressed the individual episodes adequately. I'm sure there are some phenomenal essays on Ulysses in numerous other collections, I just did not find any here.
March 31, 2015
A mixed bag, but worth the time. This is not a "guide" to Ulysses, as apparently some have thought. Most of the essays assume that the reader has already consumed and digested the whole hog, not just the breakfast kidney, and with some thought. Highlights for me were Adaline Glasheen on Calypso, Robert Kellogg on Scylla and Charybdis, and Phillip F. Herring on Lotus Eaters. I was a little disappointed in Hugh Kenner's (too) brief essay on Circe, and a couple other essayists try to out-Joyce Joyce, which would have pleased him, I'm sure. But it does nothing for the woebegone student of the book. Worth a gander in any case.
July 21, 2023
These essays on 'Ulysses' are interesting at first blush. Being the Centenary of the novel's publication, I have endeavoured to read these alongside other works on the book, as well as the book itself.
"The Sirens" essay is particularly intriguing for looking at how the book's relationships are manifested in that episode - a part of the book where the convolutions of form start to obscure the content.
"The Sirens" essay is particularly intriguing for looking at how the book's relationships are manifested in that episode - a part of the book where the convolutions of form start to obscure the content.
June 27, 2008
A pretty good selection, actually. Nothing's on par with Wilson's historic essay in Axel's Castle, but it's largely solid.
April 2, 2015
Like most anthologies, it's a mixed bag. Some of the best essays are at the beginning. I got a kick out of some of the essays, and barely survived the others.
February 17, 2016
This book is an essential company to James Joyce's Ulysses.
July 16, 2012
Heavily recommended if you're reading "Ulysses".
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