Finnegans Wake

[Yulehesays]

Plan on reading this, or at least trying.

Should I read it cold or with a guide? Might be too difficult cold but generally I find guides irritaing because I need to have 2 books to read one. I don't mind using a guide/annotations the second time around but would rather try it cold first.

Any experiences with this book?

[ashulman]

I got about 100 pages into it. It's amazing but mere humans aren't equipped to deal with the meaning and resonances of its puns and allusions.

[Yulehesays]

Is it really that bad? I imagine the answer is yes. Just as a barometer, how much of a slog was ulysses for you?

[ashulman]

Ulysses is one of my favorite books. It was tough but I reveled in it. I'm also a big Pynchon fan so there's that. The Wake is just too learned and too deep, for me anyway. I'm fairly well read by today's standards - not like Harold Bloom or someone who does it for a living, but for an amateur. I think it requires a deep understanding of literary history, particularly the Classics and mythology. I just don't have it. But the pleasure of the language is there no matter what. I do hope to tackle it whole one day

[cacian]

Ever wondered what FINNEGAN mean? It sound like VENGANCE to me. The wake of the VENGEANCE or the perhaps the Avengers.

[Yulehesays]

Ulysses is one of my favorite books. It was tough but I reveled in it. I'm also a big Pynchon fan so there's that. The Wake is just too learned and too deep, for me anyway. I'm fairly well read by today's standards - not like Harold Bloom or someone who does it for a living, but for an amateur. I think it requires a deep understanding of literary history, particularly the Classics and mythology. I just don't have it. But the pleasure of the language is there no matter what. I do hope to tackle it whole one day

A fair appraisal! Never read Pynchon yet. I'd be similar to you, well read but never studied literature formally. If the pleasure of the language is enough to keep me going then I'll keep on trucking, but that's unlikely.

[Yulehesays]

Finnegan is an irish surname, but i take it you mean what it means on a deeper level?

[cacian]

Finnegan is an irish surname, but i take it you mean what it means on a deeper level?

Yes I do. Every word has a meaning. For example POTTER from Harry potter. It means loopy from potty. Harry can be slightly hairy haha.

[Jassy Melson]

Does he mean this, or does he mean that? Joyce was an exception, in every sense of the word. His writing does not make sense to the "uninitiated." You have to be "especially equipped" to understand Joyce. Give me a break. Joyce was a sloppy slobby writer whose fans go out of their way to find all kinds of meaning in his writing.

[Yulehesays]

Yes I do. Every word has a meaning. For example POTTER from Harry potter. It means loopy from potty. Harry can be slightly hairy haha.

Well Finnegan is a diminutive of the Irish name Fionn, which means fair. The book is named after the 1850s Irish ballad Finnegans Wake. It has also been suggested hat the name is a pun suggestng the cyclical nature of history. Fin being french for finished, egan meaning again, and wake meaning awakening. So finished and then awakening again.

[cacian]

Does he mean this, or does he mean that? Joyce was an exception, in every sense of the word. His writing does not make sense to the "uninitiated." You have to be "especially equipped" to understand Joyce. Give me a break. Joyce was a sloppy slobby writer whose fans go out of their way to find all kinds of meaning in his writing.

Interesting and I think and a for minute Joyce would have understood it himself. It is anybody guess.
I think is like the casanova of his time. At some stage in time he needed to redeem himself having felt under pressure from leisure and so he tossed a coin and decide to write a wake that may never happen. It is like a preceding of something. If you write about you would wish it to be.
The more there is to the piece and the more condensed the ideas written becomes. It is not about a dream but about a wish that eventually should turn out to be true. Only a dream is usually after you wake up and not before. This wake is after he has woken up meaning the dream would have to happen after he has written about it. We all know realisty it is not going to and so it stagnates and the longer you live and the more it will turn back and haunt whatever whoever wanted to understand it. Let's call the nightmare. It is the curse of the dubby dubious. It is better left to it I say.
After Ulysses one is not expected to write another epic. One writes epics once and that Ulysses for Joyce.

to quote this from Google:
a letter from his patron Harriet Weaver:

Having completed work on Ulysses, Joyce was so exhausted that he did not write a line of prose for a year. On 10 March 1923 he wrote a letter to his patron, Harriet Weaver: "Yesterday I wrote two pages—the first I have since the final Yes of Ulysses. Having found a pen, with some difficulty I copied them out in a large handwriting on a double sheet of foolscap so that I could read them."[17] This is the earliest reference to what would become Finnegans Wake.[18]

He mentions ''completing the work''. Should he not have said completed the story? the work usually means a job.
''A line of prose'' means poetry in this context . One speaks of lines when one speaks of poetry. Why is he mixing prose and poetry together?

Why was he exhausted? writing is a hobby is not a marathon and it feels already that he was under some pressure. He did not write for a year. And then he wrote Finnegan. Does that mean he was under a haze a dream for a whole year and then after that he woke up from it with a finnegan wand?

He then says: ''he wrote two pages''.
But that is not right because he has to take into account that he has written already ONE letter on top of the TWO Pages. That makes it total THREE pages.
He then mentions he found a pen. Does that mean he only had one pen? for a writer it sounds rather random.
Or does it mean he stumbled on a pen it was by accident that he found a pen which could mean that he was not thinking of writing anything. Had he said I took the pen or picked a pen then that would have given the idea that he was intending to write.

the he mentioned copying the two pages in a large handwriting. Is he saying that that was not his work and that what he had found was not handwritten? Ah it was photocopied from another source.
Then he mentions he had to handwrite them in order to be able to read them. But one cannot copy what one cannot understand? one must understands what one copies if he is to read them aLL. This makes no sense.
The other thing is what did he mean by the 'final yes' of Ulysses?

In the quote he says he wrote a letter to his patron who happens to be a female. All patrons in Ireland are men.

[islandclimber]

Does he mean this, or does he mean that? Joyce was an exception, in every sense of the word. His writing does not make sense to the "uninitiated." You have to be "especially equipped" to understand Joyce. Give me a break. Joyce was a sloppy slobby writer whose fans go out of their way to find all kinds of meaning in his writing.

Well this is one of the more absurd statements I've read. A "sloppy slobby writer"? You might say that Joyce wove labyrinths far too confusing and arcane with his writing; that he was purposefully obfuscatory; that he spent years hiding his meaning behind layer upon layer of language; you might say all this... However, to suggest that a man who spent 17 years carefully crafting one of the most unique, profound and multilayered narratives ever written, well, this is entirely inane. Congratulations on that.

I suggest such statements would fit better in that rather amusing thread about a make-believe world where Hidy the Clown has actually been published.

[Charles Darnay]

What the **** did I just read? No, that's not my reaction to reading Finnegan's Wake, it's my reaction to reading this thread up to this point.

[islandclimber]

Cacian. Have you read Ulysses or Finnegan's Wake? If not, what version of reality are your statements arriving from?

All patrons are not male. Joyce is referring to a "patron of the arts" which can be a male or a female.

Charles, this thread might be more incomprehensible than the Wake itself!

[cafolini]

Cacian. Have you read Ulysses or Finnegan's Wake? If not, what version of reality are your statements arriving from?

All patrons are not male. Joyce is referring to a "patron of the arts" which can be a male or a female.

Charles, this thread might be more incomprehensible than the Wake itself!

Well, there is no in-itself. But this thread is garbage compared to Joyce's carefully crafted writings.

[cacian]

Well, there is no in-itself. But this thread is garbage compared to Joyce's carefully crafted writings.

''Crafted writing''. You said it!!. It is a bit like crafting the icing on the cake. You may not have the cake but you shall have the icing.
One crafts only when something has been done made. Just like the icing on the cake. There I said!

[Jassy Melson]

Well this is one of the more absurd statements I've read. A "sloppy slobby writer"? You might say that Joyce wove labyrinths far too confusing and arcane with his writing; that he was purposefully obfuscatory; that he spent years hiding his meaning behind layer upon layer of language; you might say all this... However, to suggest that a man who spent 17 years carefully crafting one of the most unique, profound and multilayered narratives ever written, well, this is entirely inane. Congratulations on that.

I suggest such statements would fit better in that rather amusing thread about a make-believe world where Hidy the Clown has actually been published.

If it took Joyce seventeen years to write a book, then he was wasting a great deal of time and not writing. Joyce thought too much and didn't write enough. He needed to write a work clarifying Finnegan's Wake. Actually, I think Joyce was insane. Your comment about Hidy the Clown simply shows your jealousy.

[cacian]

If it took Joyce seventeen years to write a book, then he was wasting a great deal of time and not writing. Joyce thought too much and didn't write enough. He needed to write a work clarifying Finnegan's Wake. Actually, I think Joyce was insane. Your comment about Hidy the Clown simply shows your jealousy.

I could not agree more Jassy. I think you put your finger on it. Insanity is the word for it. Seventeen to work on a wake that is supposed to be a dream is a twisted backward felony. I don't think he thought I think he frought more like. I mean what was going on in his head?!!:frown2:
Hidy the clown however would have done a better awakening. Imagine what he could have done with the red nose of his. A big red nose awakening more like :smash:

[Pierre Menard]

If it took Joyce seventeen years to write a book, then he was wasting a great deal of time and not writing. Joyce thought too much and didn't write enough. He needed to write a work clarifying Finnegan's Wake. Actually, I think Joyce was insane. Your comment about Hidy the Clown simply shows your jealousy.



What? Since when was there a time limit on writing a book? Wouldn't the fact that he spent 17 years go against your assertion that he was sloppy? I mean, it's clear a monumental amount of effort went into crafting that work.

[Emil Miller]

What? Since when was there a time limit on writing a book? Wouldn't the fact that he spent 17 years go against your assertion that he was sloppy? I mean, it's clear a monumental amount of effort went into crafting that work.

This is true, but when somebody takes 17 years to write a book that nobody except the author understands, it would seem the height of self-indulgence and designed for those who want to claim the cachet of having 'read' the unreadable.

[Lykren]

I have a contribution to make to this thread: what do we mean when we say 'to understand'? If I look at the Grand Canyon I know it is beautiful; does that mean it must also have a meaning I must find? And why should works created by a human be any different?

[cacian]

I have a contribution to make to this thread: what do we mean when we say 'to understand'? If I look at the Grand Canyon I know it is beautiful; does that mean it must also have a meaning I must find? And why should works created by a human be any different?

canyon is nature. a bit of the wake is man. No comparing there.

[Lykren]

I don't understand. Why can't we compare the two?

[cacian]

I don't understand. Why can't we compare the two?

Hi Lykren.
I think there is no comparison because of the following:
The Canyon is nature at work and no one knows how it designs it just does. Nature creates for enhancement an other factors necessary for it to prosper. Nature does not wait for men to do it for her it does it herself. That is a not a dream or a long sleep one wakes up from it is a realisation a fact of life.
Finnegan is a monumental task like a brick wall cemented and man made. No one can see through bricks but one can the cement because it eventually cracks. It is called erosion. Acid in the mix eroses. Nature washes it away and then the barricade falls to rubble just like the East Germany wall.
That is a good comparison for it. No one really knows why germany suddenly split apart from the war and so in its glory of falling out they erected a wall instead. Germany could have gone to rubble if it was not for the wall. Call that it the nightmare dream. The Finnegan's nightmare dream. And then one day in the late 90s there was a sudden wake. Germany woke up and decided the wall must come down. And by jingo it did. One could compare that to to Joyce's awakening. The wall falling was the wake.
To recap the beauty of nature is iridescent and progressive. It enhances to protect.
Man creates thinking he can fly. The issue here is that flying is not a book you write it is an act you perform. Finnegan's wake was not performed it was laid on a piece of paper.
Our natural instinct is to dream and then wake up and then talk about the dream there is no writing it. Finnegan performed it an act of words but ended up loosing the sound and therefore its understanding lays as dormant as he.

The Canyon is part of the natural design and Finnegan's part of a past that lays still on a piece of paper that no one really gets. The less understanding of it and the less chances of it to perform.

[Lykren]

Cacian, I'll ignore your metaphors for the moment.

You used the word 'get' which I think signifies that you misunderstand me. I'm questioning the existence of anything to 'get' at all. Does art have to be a method of communicating something? Why can't the beauty of the Wake merely consist of the splendor of its sounds? By the way, I find your statement that the Wake "ended up loosing (sic) the sound" amusing. The Wake's main appeal could be to said to reside in its sounds.

[cacian]

Cacian, I'll ignore your metaphors for the moment.

You used the word 'get' which I think signifies that you misunderstand me. I'm questioning the existence of anything to 'get' at all. Does art have to be a method of communicating something? Why can't the beauty of the Wake merely consist of the splendor of its sounds? By the way, I find your statement that the Wake "ended up loosing (sic) the sound" amusing. The Wake's main appeal could be to said to reside in its sounds.

Well there is no sound to Winnegan because sound usually means understanding. When someone understands something they make a sound they sigh laugh or say something out of happiness. Yippee could be one sound of happiness because one has realised they have understood something.
I think where you are perhaps laying it misleadingly is that you are looking at Finnegan as art. It is not art. It is a collection of words and sentences that is trying to outperform an understanding of something else. You and I have no idea what it is.
If one has prompted the question and asked why did Joyce write Finnegan he would propably tell you something.That something I could not tell you.
It is make up mind time.
There is no splendour in density especially if the words are as they are and the whole piece is not. If you take each word out of Finnegan they will all have one meaning each.
But if you put them back together like they were in Finnegan their meaning is lost.
If now ask him to take Finnegan apart and rewrite it again I guessing he would not be able to. One must always double check about writing something. If you write something then you should be able to take it apart and re write it again. If you do not then something is not right.

[islandclimber]

Cacian. That's complete nonsense.

Criticizing a book you have obviously not read is ridiculous. The irony of you suggesting that Joyce wrote for sound without meaning or possible understanding is terribly amusing. Your posts are next to incoherent with a dearth of proper spelling, syntax, and a jumble of misplaced and mixed metaphors. Your own poetry rings more like deranged nonsensical nursery rhyme, it makes the english language arbitrary with no regard at all for spelling or sense, and there can be no understanding of it by any but the initiate.

To suggest that the Wake is not art...well that's quite amusing. Who are you to decide this?

You seem to live in a fantasy world where all art should conform to this safe, clean, easy, free idea you have in your head. If it was up to you everyone would get the same meaning from a novel, books would not challenge their readers, would not take some effort to understand ever. Why? I enjoyed studying the Wake. I enjoyed reading it through cold, without a guide, but also reading it again guided in order to study it and its labyrinthine narrative and endless layers. Joyce would much more likely to have the ability to deconstruct the Wake and put it back together again then most authors of easily accessible penny dreadfuls, although I'm unsure as to what this has to do with anything. The ability to rewrite a work from scratch identically is a pointless semiotic experiment. Borges wrote an interesting story on this. Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote.

Authorial identity is not stable, and the idea of an author having a single, easily discernible intent is a fictional construct. Every individual reader creates a new purpose, meaning, existence for any given text. If you choose to ignore a certain text like the Wake, and divest it of any value for yourself so be it; however, it is far past absurd to suggest that this is an objective statement, to suggest that others cannot see its value as both art and scholarship.

[Lykren]

Cacian, I feel as though I am discussing the Wake with an online version of Gertrude Stein: "It is up make up mind up time". Your prose is garbled to the point of incomprehensibility, and your arguments, as far as I can make them out, are totally insubstantial.

Firstly, do you really want to get into an argument over the definition of art? Okay. Art originally meant craft or skill, and what was Joyce doing all those seventeen years if not crafting? The Wake is NOT an example of automatic writing; in other words, we know Joyce made a conscious decision to use each word in a particular way.

Secondly, what on earth can you mean by saying sound implies understanding?

Thirdly, I believe that your assertion that words have meaning independent of context represents a trivial understanding of language.

[cacian]

Criticizing a book you have obviously not read is ridiculous. The irony of you suggesting that Joyce wrote for sound without meaning or possible understanding is terribly amusing. Your posts are next to incoherent with a dearth of proper spelling, syntax, and a jumble of misplaced and mixed metaphors. Your own poetry rings more like deranged nonsensical nursery rhyme, it makes the english language arbitrary with no regard at all for spelling or sense, and there can be no understanding of it by any but the initiate.
I am sorry read Finnegan? I am mean a sore head more like.
I tried Finnegan and then I thought I'd rather my sanity then a pile of 17 years of grim comedy.There is an English speaker so called and yet he still manages to miss the meanings and his readers are left in tatter.
Please do not criticise my poetry. If you have nothing better to say then slag it off then do not read it. It is not up to your taste but for you to put it down is a bit childish. It is like a childish throwing a tantrum because it is not its way. Or it is because it is mispelled and does not conform
I may not be English speaker but at least it see me try it . I write in my own language an others including English . I am more tried and initiated then you ever will.
I don't syntax semantics or spellings. I do not see them a priority. You however do so stick to your jumble and I stick to mine.
A deranged my dear is a retard who think they can read and write and speak English and then so call read Finnegan and come back to quizz you about how dare they do not take to it. What a pile of dread.

[Lykren]

Cacian, I speak only English, and appreciate your attempt to use a foreign language. However, unless your English is at a very high level, I do not see the point of conversing about such complicated topics as the relationship between beauty and meaning and the definition of art.

[cacian]

Cacian, I feel as though I am discussing the Wake with an online version of Gertrude Stein: "It is up make up mind up time". Your prose is garbled to the point of incomprehensibility, and your arguments, as far as I can make them out, are totally insubstantial.


Ok ''it is make up mind time''. My argument? I have no argument. You asked why could one not compare the two? That is your argument not mine

Firstly, do you really want to get into an argument over the definition of art? Okay. Art originally meant craft or skill, and what was Joyce doing all those seventeen years if not crafting? The Wake is NOT an example of automatic writing; in other words, we know Joyce made a conscious decision to use each word in a particular way.

You make a statement as if you were there? were you actually present at the time? Because if you were not you better not assert what you do not know for sure. I would keep it speculative.
Finnegan is not art. That is my opinion. It is your are then so be it. I am entitled my opinion.


Secondly, what on earth can you mean by saying sound implies understanding?
What you mean you do not understand the meaning of this but you do understand Finnegan??

Thirdly, I believe that your assertion that words have meaning independent of context represents a trivial understanding of language.
Explain how is that trivial? how does one begin to pick words if they had no prior understanding on their own? How does one formulate a sentence if the words meant nothing at the first place?

[cacian]

Cacian, I speak only English, and appreciate your attempt to use a foreign language. However, unless your English is at a very high level, I do not see the point of conversing about such complicated topics as the relationship between beauty and meaning and the definition of art.
I know tell me about it .and what a mischief. You ain't seen beyond the word yet. Appreciate nothing learn something.
Conversation is not complex it is about what is easy and manageable. You have neither. You seem to stick at a page and not look beyond it and you are thrown.
There is no relationship between beauty and meaning. Beauty is a word and a meaning is its colour its figurative. I know you won't understand that.
Art does not define it refines. A definition by design is a fixed meaning that you will find in the dictionary gathering dust and then you come along and you flick its page. Dust rises the meaning awakes and the word appears. Not before. Very slow indeed. In the meantime words huddle up awaiting the hand to shake then about . Dust does them food in the meantime.
I'd have my words turned inside and out not one speckle of dust about their be. Syntax troubles? I know.
But then you converse beauty art Finnegan all in one go and then for good measure you thrown a tantrum because someone else said what a lot of toss. That an achievement deserving of another book of its own. Try a new dictionary.
Now in the meantime get on with your complex and let me get on the perplexe. I'd like to shake a few .

[YesNo]

Criticizing a book you have obviously not read is ridiculous. The irony of you suggesting that Joyce wrote for sound without meaning or possible understanding is terribly amusing. Your posts are next to incoherent with a dearth of proper spelling, syntax, and a jumble of misplaced and mixed metaphors. Your own poetry rings more like deranged nonsensical nursery rhyme, it makes the english language arbitrary with no regard at all for spelling or sense, and there can be no understanding of it by any but the initiate.

Here's a link to Finnegans Wake: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/j/joyce/james/j8f/episode1.html

I am proud to report that I have read only a few "words" from it.

Anyone who likes Finnegans Wake should have no problem with "incoherent" writing "with a dearth of proper spelling, syntax, and a jumble of misplaced and mixed metaphors". They should have no problem with "deranged nonsensical nursery rhyme" that "makes the english [sic] language arbitrary with no regard at all for spelling or sense" for which "there can be no understanding of it by any but the initiate".

[Emil Miller]

I have a contribution to make to this thread: what do we mean when we say 'to understand'? If I look at the Grand Canyon I know it is beautiful; does that mean it must also have a meaning I must find? And why should works created by a human be any different?

Consulting my dictionary, I note that 'understand' is given as ' to have or exercise the power of comprehension.'

[Lykren]

Consulting my dictionary, I note that 'understand' is given as ' to have or exercise the power of comprehension.'

The point I am trying to make is that understanding also implies the existence of something to be understood. The question of definitions, by the way, is not so simple as the makers of dictionaries would have you believe.

[Desolation]

I've never worked up the courage or stamina to sit down and try to read the Wake as a whole, so I can't really defend it to fervently...However, I really like to pull it off the shelf every few days and read passages from it.

It reminds me of listening to Miles Davis, especially at his most avant-garde...I have no idea what the hell he's trying to say, what messages or arcs (which I know seems like an odd thing to say, but jazz and other instrumental music does often have an arc in the way the notes are put together) are to be found in the pieces, and I don't particularly care - I find it beautiful whether I actually understand it or not. The music speaks to me on another level. It creates a certain emotional state, paints strange pictures in my mind. It's a totally visceral, aesthetic experience. You can't listen to Miles the same way you listen to the Beatles (and why would you try?), and you can't look to the Wake the same way you would look to other books. The experience either appeals to you or it doesn't; there's nothing else to be said, is there?

[Lykren]

Oh, Cacian:

That there is no relationship between beauty and meaning is, oh, just EXACTLY WHAT I'VE BEEN ARGUING?

[cacian]

Oh, Cacian:

That there is no relationship between beauty and meaning is, oh, just EXACTLY WHAT I'VE BEEN ARGUING?

Oh dear.
Here is what you said:


I have a contribution to make to this thread: what do we mean when we say 'to understand'? If I look at the Grand Canyon I know it is beautiful; does that mean it must also have a meaning I must find? And why should works created by a human be any different?

Now here is a question for you and try and 'understand' without reaching the dictionary:
How do you know the Canyon is beautiful?
And why do you think there has to have a meaning or Not?

[Jassy Melson]

Well this is one of the more absurd statements I've read. A "sloppy slobby writer"? You might say that Joyce wove labyrinths far too confusing and arcane with his writing; that he was purposefully obfuscatory; that he spent years hiding his meaning behind layer upon layer of language; you might say all this... However, to suggest that a man who spent 17 years carefully crafting one of the most unique, profound and multilayered narratives ever written, well, this is entirely inane. Congratulations on that.

I suggest such statements would fit better in that rather amusing thread about a make-believe world where Hidy the Clown has actually been published.

Your statement about Hidy the Clown only shows your jealousy. As for Joyce, I think he was insane. Any writer who spends seventeen years writing a book and not writing very much at a time is thinking too much and not writing much. Joyce probably went years between writing installments of Finnegan.

[Lykren]

This will be my last post in this thread.

Cacian, my question implied there was no meaning to the grand Canyon.

Then you ask me why I think "there has to [be] a meaning".

...