There's these fellows in a Martello tower. Buck Mulligan has a shave. There is some chat about milk and Irishness. They go out and lock the door with a big key. Buck Mulligan has a swim. Stephen Dedelas teaches schoolboys Latin. And sums. In the headmaster's room, under the watchful eye of a portrait of Albert Edward Prince of Wales, British parsimony is praised. Dedelas walks on the crunchy shore with his eyes closed. When he opens them, the world is still there. He thinks of a visit to his bedridden uncle. He thinks about a time in Paris, with the Absinthe and the gunpowder cigarettes. A dog sniffs at a dead dog like a dog.Joyce: "History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake."
Joyce: "the garish sunshine bleaching the honey of his illdyed head";
Joyce: "Listen: a fourworded wavespeech: seesoo, hrss, rsseeis, ooos."
I always intended to read Ulysses. I have finally started. I don't understand it. There is Latin & French, as well as Joyce's own idiolect. I've been reading chapter one for a week. But I am surrendering to it. It is compelling, divine. Some descriptive paragraphs leap vividly from the page, making me feel that this is the only way such a thing can be rendered in words. I'll post each chapter as I get through it. My coarse summary cannot begin to indcate the luscious, voluptuous, ineffable dark brilliance of the book.
6 comments:
You're a braver woman than I! I remember reading The Dead in school, but I haven't managed any other Joyce since. Glad you're enjoying it.
I went to a reading, some years ago on Bloomsday, by the Professor of English from Dublin University. He read from Ulysses for about an hour without pause. It was an amazing revelation. Suddenly we were in a pub in Ireland, hearing the lads talking around us, swept up in the ambience, following the story with no problem at all.
Lesson: do not attempt to read the book. Simply hire some Irish backpackers and make them read it to you.
So it's a should read? I have a Joyce-freak buddy who has been pestering me about Joyce for a while. Did you ever read Trinity by Uris(?)? I have gotten that mentioned to me a lot.
The story about how Ulysses was written and published has always fascinated me- so much so that I tried to read it once and got a page and a half in.
Perhaps I should try again. Is it better to read it with or without a Guinness on hand?
My dear friends. I'm not recommending this as a 'must read'. All I can say is that I am finally embarking on it, and though it is a wonderful experience, it also feels like a chore. (Or perhaps - it is a chore that is wonderful?)
I saw Andy Warhol's "film" Chelsea Girls all the way through. It is eight hours long. Nothing happens. (I remember Nico trimming her fringe). At interval, my friend Kate & I were tempted to run. But then, we realised we were half way there and if we left, we could never say "I've seen all eight hours of Chelsea Girls".
Ulysses is more rewarding, but I wonder if reading it is that kind of "because it's there" thing.
I leave it to each of you to decide. Pil's suggestion is far more sensible.
And maybe I'll try Chapter 2 with a Guinness.
Joyce was Irish, right?
Drunk, probly.
Thats a idiolect, ainit?
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