Finnegan's Wake

[Cal McInvale]

"Bonnie Surfus (ENG)" <surfus at chuma.cas.usf.edu> writes:
>Ok.  I'm not a Joycean scholar by any stretch.  I thought PORTRAIT was
>dull and transparent and couldn't get past the first paragraph in ULYSSES
>before shelving it for post-grad work.

In the words of John Gardner to Raymond Carver (regarding Robert Penn
Warren's "Blackberry Winter"), "You'd better read it again."

>But I have glanced at the text of
>FINNEGAN'S WAKE, on recommendation, noting in particular the circular
>orientation of the text, esp. the end-beginning feedback.
>
>I find a similar structure in GR.  Has this been beat to death?  I could
>try to explain but first thought to check it out.

I'd like to hear a bit more about where you see the circular structure to
GR.  It is obvious in FW

        A way 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.

the '//' symbol designating the *end* of the book, so the beginning and end
are the same (or cancel one another out, whichever way you view it), making
the tale a circle.  The referents in the opening sentence ("back to Howth
Catle") imply that the reader has been here before.  Joyce's working
structrural theory was from Vico's theory of circular history; the novel
almost entirely is a dream of the history of the world, told of course in
the guise of allegory.  (It is probably the richest novel on Earth, in
terms of referents, symbols, etc.)

I see almost no evidence of this in GR; the structure seems to begin and
later end.  This is not to say that the structure is linear -- certainly
not.  More like a string with knots & kinks & twists & turns.  But I do not
see the ends of the string as attached to one another.





Cal McInvale
godot at rt66.com
------------------------
What is most appealing about young folks, after all, is the changes, not
the still photographs of finished character but the movie, the soul in
flux.  -- Thomas Pynchon