The second sentence, or not quite a sentence, the first of three, clauses shall we call them, each separated by a colon. (Grammatical structures are a bit fluid in the Wake.)
Sir Tristram, violer d’amores, fr’over the short sea, had passen-core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war:
"Sir Tristam" is both Tristam Shandy--the 18th century novel that most resembles Joyce in its scope and it's stylistic and linguistic playfulness--and Tristam (Tristan) of the medieval romance Tristan and Isolde. (Isolde will maker her appearence in a few paragraphs.) The "violer d' amores" is a stringed instrument, the tenor of the violin family, having six or seven stopped strings and an equal number of sympathetic strings, according to the dictionary. More literally it is the viol of love, and seems to stand in apposition to Tristam. "The short sea," the north sea? The British Channel? "Passen-core" recalls "passenger" but also passage, pass--I am sure I am missing some pun on another language. "Core," of course, means that it is central, this passage, re-arriving, having arrived and left and arrived again from "North Armorica."
"Armorica:" armor, amore, America, at least a three part pun. But what does it all mean? It supplies Tristam with his armor and his love, it may also express a complex attitude toward America, the home of so many Irish expatriots.
"Just as the Isthmus of Sutton separates Howth from the rest of Ireland, so the Bosphorus separates Europe and Asia..." (http://www.finnegansweb.com/wiki/index.php/Europe_Minor)
"wielder fight:" wield, fight, also, perhaps, welter weight as in a boxer. "penisoltate:" penis o late, pen isolate, peninsula.
The gist: Tristam is back to fight his war.
Showing posts with label FWake. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FWake. Show all posts
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Finnegans Wake: First Sentence
riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.
The first sentence of Finnegan's Wake by James Joyce, though, actually, it is the end of the last sentence of the book:
A lone a last a loved a long the riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.
And so the beginning is the end in this infinite circle of a book ( "a commodius vicus of recirculation")
The question arises why one should read this book, this book of the night, that revels in it's own obscurity, a book that focuses on the confused, vague images of a mind in various stages of sleep. Personally, I would say don't read it unless it entertains or amuses you. I am not a big advocate of must reads or should reads. Despite, or perhaps because, I received a classical education, I have very little respect for traditional educational paradigms. I rather like the wilderness of Internet learning, where each person can develop their own idiosyncratic path, their own canon. I feel no need to defend the classics. If they are indeed classic, if they still speak, they will find audience; if not, let the chaff fall where it will.
That being said, Finnegan's Wake amuses and entertains me. I intend to work through it sentence by sentence in this blog. I won't catch everything, in fact, I will probably miss more than I find. But I will entertain myself, at least. Consider it my form of sodoku. A mental exercise to stave off eventual Alzheimer's.
It won't be the only thing in the blog and I will label each blog that focus on the wake "FWake" so they can be asiduously avoided.
So, the first sentence. . .
Stephen's name, from Ulysses is hidden here: "st Eve and." And also Eve and Adam, according to Genesis, our progenitors, and the first of us to take the fall.
"riverrun," "swerve of shore to bend of bay, " refer to the landscape of Dublin, the river being the Liffey. A vicus was a civilian Roman settlement, but more importantly, it recalls Vico Giambattista an Italian thinker from the 1660s who wrote a book called "The New Science" that contains speculation on many things including the origins and evolution of human language. Commodius just means spacious, a settlement that can accommodate many--one such as Dublin perhaps. The use of the Latin terms for a settlement along side modern Dublin binds the past to the present in a circle of time.
Howth Castle lies close to the village of Howth, Fingal County in Ireland. It is the ancestral home of the line of the St Lawrence family (see: Earl of Howth) that died out in 1909. From 1425 to 1767 the title had been Lord Howth, holding the area since the Norman invasion of 1180. It is now held by their heirs, the Gaisford St. Lawrence family.
So Wikipedia.
The initials HCE in "Howth Castle and Environs" appear in many forms though out the book. Appropriate that the first appearance should be in the first sentence.
The first sentence of Finnegan's Wake by James Joyce, though, actually, it is the end of the last sentence of the book:
A lone a last a loved a long the riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.
And so the beginning is the end in this infinite circle of a book ( "a commodius vicus of recirculation")
The question arises why one should read this book, this book of the night, that revels in it's own obscurity, a book that focuses on the confused, vague images of a mind in various stages of sleep. Personally, I would say don't read it unless it entertains or amuses you. I am not a big advocate of must reads or should reads. Despite, or perhaps because, I received a classical education, I have very little respect for traditional educational paradigms. I rather like the wilderness of Internet learning, where each person can develop their own idiosyncratic path, their own canon. I feel no need to defend the classics. If they are indeed classic, if they still speak, they will find audience; if not, let the chaff fall where it will.
That being said, Finnegan's Wake amuses and entertains me. I intend to work through it sentence by sentence in this blog. I won't catch everything, in fact, I will probably miss more than I find. But I will entertain myself, at least. Consider it my form of sodoku. A mental exercise to stave off eventual Alzheimer's.
It won't be the only thing in the blog and I will label each blog that focus on the wake "FWake" so they can be asiduously avoided.
So, the first sentence. . .
Stephen's name, from Ulysses is hidden here: "st Eve and." And also Eve and Adam, according to Genesis, our progenitors, and the first of us to take the fall.
"riverrun," "swerve of shore to bend of bay, " refer to the landscape of Dublin, the river being the Liffey. A vicus was a civilian Roman settlement, but more importantly, it recalls Vico Giambattista an Italian thinker from the 1660s who wrote a book called "The New Science" that contains speculation on many things including the origins and evolution of human language. Commodius just means spacious, a settlement that can accommodate many--one such as Dublin perhaps. The use of the Latin terms for a settlement along side modern Dublin binds the past to the present in a circle of time.
Howth Castle lies close to the village of Howth, Fingal County in Ireland. It is the ancestral home of the line of the St Lawrence family (see: Earl of Howth) that died out in 1909. From 1425 to 1767 the title had been Lord Howth, holding the area since the Norman invasion of 1180. It is now held by their heirs, the Gaisford St. Lawrence family.
So Wikipedia.
The initials HCE in "Howth Castle and Environs" appear in many forms though out the book. Appropriate that the first appearance should be in the first sentence.
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