When I wrote my blog entry for the Nausicaa episode I anticipated that an interesting contrast between Gerty and Molly's perspectives would emerge in this chapter. The contrasts are definitely there, but I was surprised by how similar the two women are. They are both fiercely competitive with other women. They both make enormous mistakes about the subjects of their sexual fantasies. And they both have sentimental perspectives on sexuality.
On the other hand, Molly is much more honest with herself than Gerty is. Sometimes strikingly so. She hates it when people skip over dirty words and doesn't seem to care if her sexual episodes are revealed to others. Both put down other women. But Molly is more lucid about it. She mocks older women and their futile attempts to remain attractive. But she almost simultaneously acknowledges that she will one day be in the same boat.
Molly's misunderstandings about Stephen are very similar to the mistakes Gerty makes about Bloom. Molly hilariously fantasizes about Stephen swimming in the bay, unaware that he is terrified of water. She presumes that he is clean, but he hasn't bathed in months. She thinks she might impress him if she reads books that he likes or if she teaches him Spanish. She hates atheists without realizing that Stephen is an avid one.
This pattern of misunderstandings about desired objects is really important to the book. Many of the narrative styles that Joyce takes on function on false presumptions and misunderstandings. The "climactic anticlimax" of the novel in the Eumaeus episode is what it is because Bloom fundamentally misunderstands Stephen, defying the empathy that is the source of his heroism.
Molly's candidness about sexuality puts her in stark contrast to Gerty. Gerty doesn't directly mention Blooms masturbation, her approaching menstruation or her limp in her own thoughts. Molly greets this kind of material readily in her consciousness, including her own faults. But Molly's sexual appetite isn't all that different from Gerty's. Both characters focus on long kisses. They don't merely seek pure sexual gratification. They want to be watched and admired. It's significant that Molly wishes her garters were hanging up for Stephen to see. Gerty orgasmic experience took place when she revealed her underwear to Bloom. Molly's thoughts dwell on Gibraltar, Moorish sailors, and other centers of foreignness. Bloom appeals to Gerty because of his foreign features.
I'm not sure what to make of all this except that it's not too admirable for Joyce to attribute these stereotypes to both major female characters. But I like these coincidences anyway. Maybe its because I read them as symbols connectivity throughout Dublin. The fact that Gerty and Molly both menstruate within hours of each other testifies pretty strongly to this. The women in Bloom's life...are...consubstantial?
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Ithaca
This chapter is really beautiful. The detached fact-listing interview actually lends a lot of intimacy and emotion to the scene. Sometimes reading through the entire contents of Bloom's drawer can be tedious, but we've badly needed a perspective in this novel that at least tries to be comprehensive. And the lists that whisk us away from the setting of the story connect these insignificant events to the rest of the universe. When Bloom turns the water on, the whole infrastructure of Dublin participates. Bursting suns in the distant universe are a part of Bloom and Stephen's pissing contest. It's not a coincidence that Bloom has Spinoza in his library. Bloom's view of the world strives towards the one that Spinoza advocates: the perspective of eternity. He sees both sides and wants the best for everyone, not just his friends and family.
Bloom and Stephen as a pair aren't hopeless anymore. Joyce brings them together, but in an unexpected way. By emphasizing their differences, Joyce reconciles them in a way. It endows them with a kind of symmetry. Bloom writes out Hebrew. Stephen writes out Irish. Bloom sips his cocoa faster than Stephen, but in a consistent proportion: 3 to 1. Their educational histories may differ, but each would have excelled in the other's shoes. Stephen turns down Blooms offer to stay - mirroring Bloom's decline to Stephen a decade earlier.
I can't remember where, but I remember hearing that his was Joyce's favorite episode in the book. That's not surprising. Everything fits into place here without being predictable. This is modernist structure at its most poetic; a nonsensical kind of order that liberates and humanizes these characters. Nonsense words slip in towards the end like "handtouch" and "lonechill" as if the narrator is nodding off with Bloom. The scientific style gives way to the absurd rhymes that characterized earlier narratives: "plump mellow yellow smellow melons..." and "Sinbad the Sailor and Tinbad the Tailor...", etc.
Bloom and Stephen as a pair aren't hopeless anymore. Joyce brings them together, but in an unexpected way. By emphasizing their differences, Joyce reconciles them in a way. It endows them with a kind of symmetry. Bloom writes out Hebrew. Stephen writes out Irish. Bloom sips his cocoa faster than Stephen, but in a consistent proportion: 3 to 1. Their educational histories may differ, but each would have excelled in the other's shoes. Stephen turns down Blooms offer to stay - mirroring Bloom's decline to Stephen a decade earlier.
I can't remember where, but I remember hearing that his was Joyce's favorite episode in the book. That's not surprising. Everything fits into place here without being predictable. This is modernist structure at its most poetic; a nonsensical kind of order that liberates and humanizes these characters. Nonsense words slip in towards the end like "handtouch" and "lonechill" as if the narrator is nodding off with Bloom. The scientific style gives way to the absurd rhymes that characterized earlier narratives: "plump mellow yellow smellow melons..." and "Sinbad the Sailor and Tinbad the Tailor...", etc.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Eumaeus
The first thing I noticed about this episode was its resemblance to the Nausicaa episode. Bloom shifts out of his heroic role and back into his social obliviousness. Like Gerty, Bloom makes more of his relationship to Stephen than is actually there. Like Bloom in Nausicaa, Stephen does little to correct this misunderstanding. The narrator and perhaps Joyce's ideal reader also makes this mistake: "Thought they didn't see eye to eye on everything, a certain analogy there somehow was, as if both their minds were travelling, so to speak, in the one train of thought." Stephen, who barely utters a word the whole time, does not appear to share this sentiment.
One especially obvious moment is when Bloom hears Italian in the streets and comments on the language's beauty. He asks Stephen why he doesn't write poetry in Italian and Stephen somewhat cruelly tells him: "They were haggling over money." Bloom takes know notice when Stephen points out that he is looking at things shallowly.
The narrative seems to be an approximation of what Bloom's writing would be like if he followed through with his periodic impulses to submit something. Joyce jokingly alludes to this fact in Bloom's consciousness. "My Experiences in a Cabman's Shelter" could be what we are actually reading. The narrative also seems like a convergence between the styles of the earlier episodes and the storyteller style implied by the sailor.
One thing I couldn't really figure out was the significance of the sailor's Odysseus-ness. He wanders the sea and hasn't seen his wife or son in seven years - a lover of adventures. Maybe this is just another device to emphasize the difference between Bloom and the traditional hero - an assertion that's made quite a lot in this strangely anticlimactic episode.
One especially obvious moment is when Bloom hears Italian in the streets and comments on the language's beauty. He asks Stephen why he doesn't write poetry in Italian and Stephen somewhat cruelly tells him: "They were haggling over money." Bloom takes know notice when Stephen points out that he is looking at things shallowly.
The narrative seems to be an approximation of what Bloom's writing would be like if he followed through with his periodic impulses to submit something. Joyce jokingly alludes to this fact in Bloom's consciousness. "My Experiences in a Cabman's Shelter" could be what we are actually reading. The narrative also seems like a convergence between the styles of the earlier episodes and the storyteller style implied by the sailor.
One thing I couldn't really figure out was the significance of the sailor's Odysseus-ness. He wanders the sea and hasn't seen his wife or son in seven years - a lover of adventures. Maybe this is just another device to emphasize the difference between Bloom and the traditional hero - an assertion that's made quite a lot in this strangely anticlimactic episode.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Circe
This chapter is quite a mouthful. It isn't just long, it interacts pretty blatantly with every episode so far. A lot of ideas that appeared between the lines earlier in the book are voiced overtly in this chapter - almost to the point of vulgarity. Bloom's femininity is explicitly realized in one of the fantasies. His sympathy to animals, the flirtatious side of his acquaintanceship with Mrs. Breen, and his figurative impotence are also physically described where they were only hinted at before. The idea that Stephen is intentionally concealing his talents emerges in Zoe's oblivious jeer ("The bird that can sing but won't sing"). Stephen's guilt about his mother literally flies up out of the ground in what may be the only fantasy that is actually experienced by either Stephen or Bloom.
At first I was disheartened that Joyce started shouting what seemed like secrets before. But with these exposures, a new level of subtlety appears. We get some pretty contradictory messages. Bloom sways between birthing children and receiving penetration from a masculinity woman to callously critiquing Bello's appearance. The fantasies towards the beginning of the episode portray Bloom as soft and pathetic. But this episode is also the climax of Bloom's heroism. He takes charge of Stephen's money. His insight into other points of view saves Stephen from an arrest. Bloom's cowardice and empathy give way to patience and compassion. We're tempted to read Bloom as hallucinating and lost in his shameful desire, but he is actually quite lucid - at least when Stephen needs him. The fantasies divide him into different people: Bloom in various points of his life, the weak cuckolded Bloom, Virag who is Bloom's hyperlogical alter ego, and Henry Flower. But Bloom has never been more put together. Most importantly, Bloom is no longer an idle thinker or a wanderer. He is an agent; without his agency having to compromise his sensitive, empathetic character.
At first I was disheartened that Joyce started shouting what seemed like secrets before. But with these exposures, a new level of subtlety appears. We get some pretty contradictory messages. Bloom sways between birthing children and receiving penetration from a masculinity woman to callously critiquing Bello's appearance. The fantasies towards the beginning of the episode portray Bloom as soft and pathetic. But this episode is also the climax of Bloom's heroism. He takes charge of Stephen's money. His insight into other points of view saves Stephen from an arrest. Bloom's cowardice and empathy give way to patience and compassion. We're tempted to read Bloom as hallucinating and lost in his shameful desire, but he is actually quite lucid - at least when Stephen needs him. The fantasies divide him into different people: Bloom in various points of his life, the weak cuckolded Bloom, Virag who is Bloom's hyperlogical alter ego, and Henry Flower. But Bloom has never been more put together. Most importantly, Bloom is no longer an idle thinker or a wanderer. He is an agent; without his agency having to compromise his sensitive, empathetic character.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Oxen of the Sun
In this chapter, the narrative breaks down into a series of imitations which are supposed to map the genealogy of Irish English. There's a lot to be said about this strange "birth" with all its trimesters and the retelling of evolutionary history in womb. But I think it's more interesting (and a little harder) to look at how the narratives interact with events in the plot (imagine that).
In Aeolus we were regularly interrupted by goofy headlines and useless rhetoric. It was pretty clear that Joyce was making a point about the relationship between the language that journalists use and their intentions. He reminded us that our knowledge of the events and characters that make up this book - and the knowledge we have about anything at all - is only as good as the point of view Joyce allows us to take.
In Oxen of the Sun, Joyce tests the limit of this premise. In Cyclops, Nausicaa, and Aeolus we were challenged to look behind the deceptive styles to find an underlying reality. Or at least that seemed like something that one could and should do. Gerty's syrupy narrative left things out explicitly for us to pick up on, like masturbation and menstruation. There seemed to be a concrete reality behind the rhetoric that could be revealed.
But in Oxen of the Sun, the narratives begin to constitute reality. It gets pretty hard to read into Bannon's intentions as he gazes at Milly's portrait. The style of an Irish cleric glosses over what seemed to be indicators of maliciousness in our previous encounters with this character. In Naussicaa, Joyce provided Bloom's stream-of-consciousness to counter Gerty's romantic imaginings. But in this chapter, important information often only gets touched by a single not-so-trustworthy voice. "Thrice happy will he be whom so amiable a creature will bless with her favours." The language doesn't allow Bannon to slip up much. Even conversations with Mulligan about condomns are cloaked in slang and innuendo. Umbrellas, coats "in the French fashion", and fairy mushrooms form a barrier of innocence that makes the most important information - what they are going to do to Milly - harder to discern.
Another moment of fractured reality occurs when Haines makes his absurd appearance - suddenly the murderer of Samuel Childs. It looks like a lot of these plot-points were written around the narrative styles not the other way around. The intellectual buffon of Britain becomes a mysterious ghostly character. Mulligan is "overcome with emotion."
These are flourishes of style that dramatically effect character development and action in the plot. Again, Joyce wants us to recognize the role that our point of view plays in the construction of reality.
This episode was really hard.
In Aeolus we were regularly interrupted by goofy headlines and useless rhetoric. It was pretty clear that Joyce was making a point about the relationship between the language that journalists use and their intentions. He reminded us that our knowledge of the events and characters that make up this book - and the knowledge we have about anything at all - is only as good as the point of view Joyce allows us to take.
In Oxen of the Sun, Joyce tests the limit of this premise. In Cyclops, Nausicaa, and Aeolus we were challenged to look behind the deceptive styles to find an underlying reality. Or at least that seemed like something that one could and should do. Gerty's syrupy narrative left things out explicitly for us to pick up on, like masturbation and menstruation. There seemed to be a concrete reality behind the rhetoric that could be revealed.
But in Oxen of the Sun, the narratives begin to constitute reality. It gets pretty hard to read into Bannon's intentions as he gazes at Milly's portrait. The style of an Irish cleric glosses over what seemed to be indicators of maliciousness in our previous encounters with this character. In Naussicaa, Joyce provided Bloom's stream-of-consciousness to counter Gerty's romantic imaginings. But in this chapter, important information often only gets touched by a single not-so-trustworthy voice. "Thrice happy will he be whom so amiable a creature will bless with her favours." The language doesn't allow Bannon to slip up much. Even conversations with Mulligan about condomns are cloaked in slang and innuendo. Umbrellas, coats "in the French fashion", and fairy mushrooms form a barrier of innocence that makes the most important information - what they are going to do to Milly - harder to discern.
Another moment of fractured reality occurs when Haines makes his absurd appearance - suddenly the murderer of Samuel Childs. It looks like a lot of these plot-points were written around the narrative styles not the other way around. The intellectual buffon of Britain becomes a mysterious ghostly character. Mulligan is "overcome with emotion."
These are flourishes of style that dramatically effect character development and action in the plot. Again, Joyce wants us to recognize the role that our point of view plays in the construction of reality.
This episode was really hard.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
Nausicaa
This is the first episode with explicit sexual action, a turning point in the book. In it, a number of themes take on new dimensions. Hats up until this point were primarily associated with men, agency, courtesy, and reverence (for the dead in Hades for example). But in this chapter, a hat is used in an erotic display. It hides Gerty's face and is part of her-as-an-object for Bloom. It is united with Gerty's passivity as being-watched. Joyce and Bloom both understand that this passivity is really not so passive. Gerty's mind reveals that although she wants to think of herself as idle and passive, she is deliberately putting on a show for Bloom and making subtle changes to her behavior in responce to Bloom's look.
This new development in the implications of the hat is indicative of a larger development in the theme of ideal vs. real. Gerty has an idealized sense of love and sex. She envisions a perfect, passionate and exciting love in her future. She wants a good Catholic marriage, but with many of the elements you'd find in an affair - like in "Sweets of Sin." Bloom, when he is masturbating idealizes Gerty in a similiar way. This is why Bloom is glad when he sees her limp that he didn't see it while he was masturbating. "See her as she is spoil all," he thinks.
Once he's finished, Bloom provides a kind of reality check to counter these complementary fantasies. He guesses many of her thoughts, including her excitement that he might be married but still love her ("That's what they enjoy. Taking a man from another woman.") Bloom demonstrates in this chapter that he can break through sexual idealism as easily he can political idealism. In a way, what we know of Bloom already by itself provides a counter to Gerty's fancies. Molly, who's thoughts on sex and love appear in the last chapter is the real to Gerty's ideal. Bloom doesn't not hesitate to see Molly and Gerty - she reminds him of the early years of his marriage.
It's significant that Gerty's hat is straw like Boylans. Gerty seems like she'd be fair game for Boylan. He exploits these kinds of sexual ideals in other women. We don't know if the techniques he used on the cashier in "The Wandering Rocks" are the reasons why Molly is compelled to sleep with Boylan. It certainly doesn't seem like it's the cause of her infidelity in general. But, having lightly read Penelope in the past, I think that chapter and this one will be complementary. This chapter would voice the Irish woman's sexual ideal and Molly's chapter sexual reality for women.
This new development in the implications of the hat is indicative of a larger development in the theme of ideal vs. real. Gerty has an idealized sense of love and sex. She envisions a perfect, passionate and exciting love in her future. She wants a good Catholic marriage, but with many of the elements you'd find in an affair - like in "Sweets of Sin." Bloom, when he is masturbating idealizes Gerty in a similiar way. This is why Bloom is glad when he sees her limp that he didn't see it while he was masturbating. "See her as she is spoil all," he thinks.
Once he's finished, Bloom provides a kind of reality check to counter these complementary fantasies. He guesses many of her thoughts, including her excitement that he might be married but still love her ("That's what they enjoy. Taking a man from another woman.") Bloom demonstrates in this chapter that he can break through sexual idealism as easily he can political idealism. In a way, what we know of Bloom already by itself provides a counter to Gerty's fancies. Molly, who's thoughts on sex and love appear in the last chapter is the real to Gerty's ideal. Bloom doesn't not hesitate to see Molly and Gerty - she reminds him of the early years of his marriage.
It's significant that Gerty's hat is straw like Boylans. Gerty seems like she'd be fair game for Boylan. He exploits these kinds of sexual ideals in other women. We don't know if the techniques he used on the cashier in "The Wandering Rocks" are the reasons why Molly is compelled to sleep with Boylan. It certainly doesn't seem like it's the cause of her infidelity in general. But, having lightly read Penelope in the past, I think that chapter and this one will be complementary. This chapter would voice the Irish woman's sexual ideal and Molly's chapter sexual reality for women.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Cyclops
This episode is probably the hardest we've read so far. I had a hectic weekend and not too much time to soak in the nuances of Cyclops. But I'll do my best.
Joyce is highly concerned with points of view throughout Ulysses, but in this episode the obsession is more obvious than ever before. In Aeolus Joyce provoked us to distrust the narrative by interrupting the story with newspaper headlines. This chapter takes this technique to a new extreme. The narrator is a character who we have never met - one with a very narrow point of view. And we get interrupted again, this time with whole passages that sometimes span pages. Like the headlines in Aeolus, their relevance to the plot is pretty thin. They demonstrate how the style of the writer is indicative of his point of view. If there is a goal to convey the truth clearly in any of these passages, it is completely undermined - usually because the rhetoric is trying to entertain. Joyce is trying to remind us that journalists and others have allegiances other than the truth.
It seems like everyone except for Bloom is cycloptic - that is, one-eyed and unable to put themselves in other people's shoes. This trait of Blooms is becoming more and more important to the idea of a "modern epic". A few characters that we don't really like that much are called heroes in this chapter. All together Bloom is pushed around by the guy who's giving us the information. I think Joyce is prompting us to respond by noticing Bloom's heroism. He's given tangible adversaries in this episode and Bloom shows some courage (kind of). But what's important is that Bloom is pitted against people who can't consider other perspectives.
This makes Bloom's empathy seem less like a quirk and more like a magic power.
Joyce is highly concerned with points of view throughout Ulysses, but in this episode the obsession is more obvious than ever before. In Aeolus Joyce provoked us to distrust the narrative by interrupting the story with newspaper headlines. This chapter takes this technique to a new extreme. The narrator is a character who we have never met - one with a very narrow point of view. And we get interrupted again, this time with whole passages that sometimes span pages. Like the headlines in Aeolus, their relevance to the plot is pretty thin. They demonstrate how the style of the writer is indicative of his point of view. If there is a goal to convey the truth clearly in any of these passages, it is completely undermined - usually because the rhetoric is trying to entertain. Joyce is trying to remind us that journalists and others have allegiances other than the truth.
It seems like everyone except for Bloom is cycloptic - that is, one-eyed and unable to put themselves in other people's shoes. This trait of Blooms is becoming more and more important to the idea of a "modern epic". A few characters that we don't really like that much are called heroes in this chapter. All together Bloom is pushed around by the guy who's giving us the information. I think Joyce is prompting us to respond by noticing Bloom's heroism. He's given tangible adversaries in this episode and Bloom shows some courage (kind of). But what's important is that Bloom is pitted against people who can't consider other perspectives.
This makes Bloom's empathy seem less like a quirk and more like a magic power.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Sirens
This might be my favorite episode so far. Bloom's mind seems exhausted. He's tired from his long day. He's drinking. And most importantly, he's growing more and more anxious as Molly's affair approaches. His thoughts jump from Molly to Keye's advertisement to religious exploitation to Martha and back to Molly.
Where Bloom's curiosity and empathy would normally be idle and wandering, now they seem more cynical and direct. In the Lotus-Eaters and Hades episodes his critique of Catholicism was sometimes jovial or melancholic at the most. But here he condemns Father Cowley as a false prophet. The thought of the rat at the cemetery used to creep him out. But now the rat haunts him as he thinks of his own death and his family line.
Bloom reflects on himself more intensely in this chapter then ever before. He even ponders his own name. The barmaids giggling about some old ugly man might as well be laughing at Bloom. Crippled by his growing inconfidence, Bloom turns to Martha to defend himself against Molly's infidelity. But he knows that such an affair would never materialize. Ultimately Martha is very boring to Bloom. He even wonders if he should feel guilty about Martha - an odd thought considering Molly's much more severe violation of their marriage.
Music finds its way into everything in this episode. It seems to muddy up the whole scene and add to the chaos, yet the emotional plot of Dedalus' song is perfectly synchronous with the Boylan's encounter and climax with Molly. Sounds and songs are strongly connected with sexual organs in this episode. The "throbbing" tuning fork is one of the more blatant phallic images we've seen in the entire book so far. Bloom contemplates musical talent as yet another thing other men have that he doesn't. The jingle jangle of Boylan's car is not just a literary but a musical theme that the entire composition returns to as if it were a chorus.
It looks like Kevin might have been right about associating the playful narrative style I pointed out in Scylla with the omniscient narrator - not Stephen. It appears in the beginning of this episode in Stephen's absence. Mr. Dedalus asks the barmaid to bring him a drink with "alacrity". A ridiculous paragraph ensues where everything thing the barmaid does, from running the tap to reaching for the glass is done with "alacrity". But I do think that the fact that it coincides with Stephen's father and no one else is significant. This may be an inherited sarcasm, if it is not literally in the minds of the Dedalus's.
Where Bloom's curiosity and empathy would normally be idle and wandering, now they seem more cynical and direct. In the Lotus-Eaters and Hades episodes his critique of Catholicism was sometimes jovial or melancholic at the most. But here he condemns Father Cowley as a false prophet. The thought of the rat at the cemetery used to creep him out. But now the rat haunts him as he thinks of his own death and his family line.
Bloom reflects on himself more intensely in this chapter then ever before. He even ponders his own name. The barmaids giggling about some old ugly man might as well be laughing at Bloom. Crippled by his growing inconfidence, Bloom turns to Martha to defend himself against Molly's infidelity. But he knows that such an affair would never materialize. Ultimately Martha is very boring to Bloom. He even wonders if he should feel guilty about Martha - an odd thought considering Molly's much more severe violation of their marriage.
Music finds its way into everything in this episode. It seems to muddy up the whole scene and add to the chaos, yet the emotional plot of Dedalus' song is perfectly synchronous with the Boylan's encounter and climax with Molly. Sounds and songs are strongly connected with sexual organs in this episode. The "throbbing" tuning fork is one of the more blatant phallic images we've seen in the entire book so far. Bloom contemplates musical talent as yet another thing other men have that he doesn't. The jingle jangle of Boylan's car is not just a literary but a musical theme that the entire composition returns to as if it were a chorus.
It looks like Kevin might have been right about associating the playful narrative style I pointed out in Scylla with the omniscient narrator - not Stephen. It appears in the beginning of this episode in Stephen's absence. Mr. Dedalus asks the barmaid to bring him a drink with "alacrity". A ridiculous paragraph ensues where everything thing the barmaid does, from running the tap to reaching for the glass is done with "alacrity". But I do think that the fact that it coincides with Stephen's father and no one else is significant. This may be an inherited sarcasm, if it is not literally in the minds of the Dedalus's.
Friday, March 28, 2008
The Wandering Rocks
Sparknotes suggests that the wandering rocks in this episode appear as literary devices meant to "capsize" the reader. It's hard for me to pin down what exactly are the "rocks" and what is supposed to be the narrow route that I am supposed to navigate. Maybe the sharp shifts in perspective are the rocks and the small connections between these characters are supposed to form a safe path through the episode. On the other hand, the objects that reappear (hats, coins, the poster of Mary Kendare) are meant to distract us from the more relevant milestones in the development of Bloom and Stephen.
I for one was capsized by the thoughts of Stephen as he decided to leave his sister to her own devices. Capsized in so far as I had to get up and pace around until I wasn't as sad. The moment of recognition ("She is drowning. Agenbite. Save her") is a surprising return to the ecstatic revelations that pop up in Portrait of the Artist from a narrative that seems otherwise mundane. It pulls the veil off the "regularness" of the day, revealing the divine aspects of average folk that Joyce is so obsessed with in their naked beauty.
That passage also reminds us of the sharp divide between Stephen and Catholic values (and by an odd but valid extention, between Stephen and Bloom). The moral Christian law would demand that Stephen help his sister. But Stephen takes a consequentialist position. He cannot help his family very much and doing so would undermine all of his goals. He pushes Dilly's troubles back to where they've been this whole time - in the back of his mind. It looks like Joyce is going to do the same. As significant as this brother-sister element seems, I cannot help but presume that it will fade into the background of Stephen's story.
I for one was capsized by the thoughts of Stephen as he decided to leave his sister to her own devices. Capsized in so far as I had to get up and pace around until I wasn't as sad. The moment of recognition ("She is drowning. Agenbite. Save her") is a surprising return to the ecstatic revelations that pop up in Portrait of the Artist from a narrative that seems otherwise mundane. It pulls the veil off the "regularness" of the day, revealing the divine aspects of average folk that Joyce is so obsessed with in their naked beauty.
That passage also reminds us of the sharp divide between Stephen and Catholic values (and by an odd but valid extention, between Stephen and Bloom). The moral Christian law would demand that Stephen help his sister. But Stephen takes a consequentialist position. He cannot help his family very much and doing so would undermine all of his goals. He pushes Dilly's troubles back to where they've been this whole time - in the back of his mind. It looks like Joyce is going to do the same. As significant as this brother-sister element seems, I cannot help but presume that it will fade into the background of Stephen's story.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Scylla and Charybdis
In this episode we get a closer look at Stephen's struggle to realize his talent. He spends the whole chapter making an argument that he himself is not convinced by. Like Odysseus, he navigates toward one regret to avoid a much greater one. When Stephen admits his lack of conviction the others chastise him. It's unclear whether he might have published his Hamlet theory had he lied and said he believed it. But that moment of honesty is bound to the disappointment that follows.
Many of Stephen's arguments, which he assumes for the sake of argument, end up revealing truths in himself. As he comments on Shakespeare's self-constructed image, Stephen inwardly contemplates his own appearance to others in the mode of genius poet. Speeches about Shakespeare's wife and lovers remind Stephen and show us that he is in pursuit of love himself - not just as a means for gratification but as a muse. The idea of "meeting oneself" haunts him till the very end ("If Socrates leave his house today, if Judas go forth tonight. Why? That lies in space which I in time must come to, ineluctable").
Stephen being a writer, Joyce appoints him as pseudo-narrator for this episode, as he did in the Proteus episode. Stephen's thoughts, often the most jeering and cynical ones, bleed into the narrative - especially in the descriptions of how characters make statements: "Gentle Will is being roughly handled, gentle Mr. Best said gently". Stephen spitefully ties the statements and arguments of the newsmen around him to their behavior and character. Does he doubt their sincerity? Or does he think they should not be sincere? Does he envy their conviction in what they say? It may be a combination of all three.
Regardless, Stephen has a strong air of resentment for most of this episode. He doesn't seem to like arguing points that he disagrees with as much as he lets on. Towards the end we get a striking lucid moment like when Stephen is "shielding his gaping wounds" in Telemachus: "He laughed to free his mind from his mind's bondage." In one sense, this brings us back to Stephen's unique manifold of torment. His dead mother haunts him, as does his stunted ambition as a poet and Buck Mulligan's coercion. In another sense, this line brings Stephen closer than he ever has been to Bloom. We're reminded that communicating in academic speeches is not that far from being unable to speak at all. Stephen is spectacled by his peers while Bloom is shouldered. But they both have to fake their dispositions to overcome their social obstacles - Stephen with his seriousness and Bloom with his indifference to Jewishness.
Many of Stephen's arguments, which he assumes for the sake of argument, end up revealing truths in himself. As he comments on Shakespeare's self-constructed image, Stephen inwardly contemplates his own appearance to others in the mode of genius poet. Speeches about Shakespeare's wife and lovers remind Stephen and show us that he is in pursuit of love himself - not just as a means for gratification but as a muse. The idea of "meeting oneself" haunts him till the very end ("If Socrates leave his house today, if Judas go forth tonight. Why? That lies in space which I in time must come to, ineluctable").
Stephen being a writer, Joyce appoints him as pseudo-narrator for this episode, as he did in the Proteus episode. Stephen's thoughts, often the most jeering and cynical ones, bleed into the narrative - especially in the descriptions of how characters make statements: "Gentle Will is being roughly handled, gentle Mr. Best said gently". Stephen spitefully ties the statements and arguments of the newsmen around him to their behavior and character. Does he doubt their sincerity? Or does he think they should not be sincere? Does he envy their conviction in what they say? It may be a combination of all three.
Regardless, Stephen has a strong air of resentment for most of this episode. He doesn't seem to like arguing points that he disagrees with as much as he lets on. Towards the end we get a striking lucid moment like when Stephen is "shielding his gaping wounds" in Telemachus: "He laughed to free his mind from his mind's bondage." In one sense, this brings us back to Stephen's unique manifold of torment. His dead mother haunts him, as does his stunted ambition as a poet and Buck Mulligan's coercion. In another sense, this line brings Stephen closer than he ever has been to Bloom. We're reminded that communicating in academic speeches is not that far from being unable to speak at all. Stephen is spectacled by his peers while Bloom is shouldered. But they both have to fake their dispositions to overcome their social obstacles - Stephen with his seriousness and Bloom with his indifference to Jewishness.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Lestrygonians
In the Odyssey, Odysseus is able to flee what would otherwise be a desperate situation. He owes this good fortune entirely to intuitive suspicion and nearly unconscious foresight. In chapter nine of Ulysses, we see bad omens and bad feelings everywhere. On the first page, as Bloom reads a flyer for an evangelist he either thinks or reads "Is coming! Is coming!! Is coming!!!" The context is celebratory, but the phrase is panicked. An exclamation point is added each time. It's hard not to connect this line to an image of Odysseus' men fleeing the Lestrygonians. The phrase also foreshadows the advances of a single man: Boylan, who Bloom flees in terror at the end of the chapter. The gulls "pouncing on prey" "from their heights" also resemble this epic attack. The annotations point out that the Lestrygonians "spear men like fish" further linking the birds that Bloom identifies with at first with the cannibals. Mrs. Breen, who is also a candidate for the decoy-daughter of the king in the Odyssey, tells Bloom of about her husband's cryptic encounters. He received a mysterious note that reads "u.p." and has dreams about an "ace of spades" - popularly recognized as a bad omen. Bloom flees the Burton on a bad feeling and revisits a vision-like memory of policemen attacking protesters.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Hades
in Hades, Joyce subjects small and seemingly irrelevant objects to absurd repetition.
Hats, for example, appear throughout the episode, and when they don't their absence is explicitly described. Their significance looses some of its vagueness at the funeral - they are symbols of polite respect for the dead when they are removed. They also seem to be a comforting sort of distraction for Bloom as evidenced by his preoccupation with the engraving on his own hat in the Calypso episode. Bloom's hat seemed to interrupt his tension with and exclusion from his wife. Bloom's exclusion from Menton's memory is somewhat challenged when, at the end of the episode, Bloom points out Menton's dented hat. The hat-as-distraction symbology isn't perfect though. Boylan enters the scene and Bloom's troubled mind with a flash of his "white saucer".
Statues litter the route of the funeral carriage as it makes its way to the cemetery. They serve as landmarks not only for the journey into the underworld but for Blooms' thought, and in some instances, the conversation of the four men in the carriage. They are monuments of dead men, like the shades that approach Odysseus in his journey. There is a lot to uncover here.
The color white also pervades the episode. White horses are demanded by traditional Irish funeral rites. On page 100, "Dark poplars, rare white forms. Forms more frequent, white shpes thronged amid the trees, white forms and fragments streaming by mutely, sustaining vain gestures in the air." Ghosts inhabit this chapter; in the statues, in Bloom's thought of his dead father and son, in Boylan's white hat, and even in the "white" rotting organs of the corpses.
On a somewhat separate note, there is a prevalent theme in this episode of appropriateness versus the opposite of that. The context of a funeral imposes unnatural social restrictions on these characters - especially Bloom. At Bloom's prodding, the four men discuss the shameless behavior of Reuben Dodd until Cunningham cuts their laughter short; reminding them that they should be in mourning. The caretaker tells a joke, and Bloom thinks of the clown-gravediggers in Hamlet as the coffin is lowered. Aside from comedy, Bloom's mind brings other seemingly irreverent things to the death rite. He is preoccupied with practicality and makes comments to himself and others on the engineering of funerals as if they were products or a business. They should use trams instead of carriages to prevent spills. They should bury the dead standing up. Cremation is better. The money for these expensive headstones should be spent on more important things. These thoughts, whether Bloom expresses them to his peers or not, seem to align themselves with his isolation. When he suggests that a sudden death is better than a slow one, the other three immediately see his non-Catholicism. It does not occurred to Bloom that a man who dies suddenly cannot repent for his sins.
Bloom continues to be supernaturally linked to Stephen. Proteus and Hades both begin at 11AM. This allows for the possibility that Stephen's rejection of his father and Bloom's longing for fatherhood occur simultaneously. The same could be said of Stephen's thoughts on "seadeath" and Bloom's silent proposal that drowning is the better way to die.
Hats, for example, appear throughout the episode, and when they don't their absence is explicitly described. Their significance looses some of its vagueness at the funeral - they are symbols of polite respect for the dead when they are removed. They also seem to be a comforting sort of distraction for Bloom as evidenced by his preoccupation with the engraving on his own hat in the Calypso episode. Bloom's hat seemed to interrupt his tension with and exclusion from his wife. Bloom's exclusion from Menton's memory is somewhat challenged when, at the end of the episode, Bloom points out Menton's dented hat. The hat-as-distraction symbology isn't perfect though. Boylan enters the scene and Bloom's troubled mind with a flash of his "white saucer".
Statues litter the route of the funeral carriage as it makes its way to the cemetery. They serve as landmarks not only for the journey into the underworld but for Blooms' thought, and in some instances, the conversation of the four men in the carriage. They are monuments of dead men, like the shades that approach Odysseus in his journey. There is a lot to uncover here.
The color white also pervades the episode. White horses are demanded by traditional Irish funeral rites. On page 100, "Dark poplars, rare white forms. Forms more frequent, white shpes thronged amid the trees, white forms and fragments streaming by mutely, sustaining vain gestures in the air." Ghosts inhabit this chapter; in the statues, in Bloom's thought of his dead father and son, in Boylan's white hat, and even in the "white" rotting organs of the corpses.
On a somewhat separate note, there is a prevalent theme in this episode of appropriateness versus the opposite of that. The context of a funeral imposes unnatural social restrictions on these characters - especially Bloom. At Bloom's prodding, the four men discuss the shameless behavior of Reuben Dodd until Cunningham cuts their laughter short; reminding them that they should be in mourning. The caretaker tells a joke, and Bloom thinks of the clown-gravediggers in Hamlet as the coffin is lowered. Aside from comedy, Bloom's mind brings other seemingly irreverent things to the death rite. He is preoccupied with practicality and makes comments to himself and others on the engineering of funerals as if they were products or a business. They should use trams instead of carriages to prevent spills. They should bury the dead standing up. Cremation is better. The money for these expensive headstones should be spent on more important things. These thoughts, whether Bloom expresses them to his peers or not, seem to align themselves with his isolation. When he suggests that a sudden death is better than a slow one, the other three immediately see his non-Catholicism. It does not occurred to Bloom that a man who dies suddenly cannot repent for his sins.
Bloom continues to be supernaturally linked to Stephen. Proteus and Hades both begin at 11AM. This allows for the possibility that Stephen's rejection of his father and Bloom's longing for fatherhood occur simultaneously. The same could be said of Stephen's thoughts on "seadeath" and Bloom's silent proposal that drowning is the better way to die.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Calypso
The first Bloom chapter sharply contrasts the elder hero with Stephen. Bloom seems to be much cheerier all around. When we were introduced to Stephen in the first chapter, he was described as "sleepy and displeased". Bloom is introduced with a persistent trait in his character: he "ate with relish". The Proteus episode left Stephen self-consciously unhealthy, whereas the first thing we know about Bloom is that he is well-fed - and is really happy about it.
Of course Bloom is not immune to dark thoughts, but he seems to resist the deepening gloom that consumes Stephen when bad things come up. It's significant that Bloom and Stephen react so differently to their misfortunes because they seem to have similar problems. Both characters are being "usurped". Bloom's husbandry is threatened by Blaze and Stephen's tower is threatened by Mulligan and Haines.
Bloom doesn't get caught up in these things the way Stephen does. When Stephen is "trembling from his soul's cry" as he is assailed by ghastly images of his mother, he needs an external event to break out of it. When Bloom frets over his ancestry, the images of horror are just as intense in his imagination. But he has the will and optimism to escape those thoughts. He resolves to exercise.
Stephen does seem to be more self-aware than Bloom in a certain sense. When he concedes to Mulligan's demands he knows that he is giving something up. When Bloom strangely pampers Molly, the notion that this might fuel his misfortunes only comes up on a sub-conscious level. "Give her too much meat she won't mouse," he thinks - not about his wife, but of his cat. The cat does get the meat though and so does the wife.
Of course Bloom is not immune to dark thoughts, but he seems to resist the deepening gloom that consumes Stephen when bad things come up. It's significant that Bloom and Stephen react so differently to their misfortunes because they seem to have similar problems. Both characters are being "usurped". Bloom's husbandry is threatened by Blaze and Stephen's tower is threatened by Mulligan and Haines.
Bloom doesn't get caught up in these things the way Stephen does. When Stephen is "trembling from his soul's cry" as he is assailed by ghastly images of his mother, he needs an external event to break out of it. When Bloom frets over his ancestry, the images of horror are just as intense in his imagination. But he has the will and optimism to escape those thoughts. He resolves to exercise.
Stephen does seem to be more self-aware than Bloom in a certain sense. When he concedes to Mulligan's demands he knows that he is giving something up. When Bloom strangely pampers Molly, the notion that this might fuel his misfortunes only comes up on a sub-conscious level. "Give her too much meat she won't mouse," he thinks - not about his wife, but of his cat. The cat does get the meat though and so does the wife.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Proteus
Stephen's thought covers a lot of ground in this episode. Fleeting memories of the events of the last two chapters mix with images that we haven't seen before. This makes this episode difficult to critique effectively without getting as fragmented as the prose is.
I think Amelia gets pretty close to a major theme in Proteus. Stephen IS grappling with appearances and things in themselves. But I think it gets even broader than that. Stephen is trying to reconcile his thoughts with the physical world. The episode begins with a solipsist argument. Stephen contemplates the legitimacy of the world as he experiences it through his senses. These two things, mind and world, seem to act independently of each other and yet perpetually interweave. This paradox is the allegorical shape-shifting Proteus. In order for Stephen to mature as a writer, he has to resolve this mind-world duality even as it rapidly dilates and switches forms.
And this problem takes on many forms. Joyce explicates Stephen's train of thought in a way that makes the world and consciousness interrupt each other. Stephen's imagination pokes out into the real world: "dogskull, dogsniff, eyes on the ground, moves to one great goal." Mr. Deasy's determinism impresses itself onto the unsightly scene that presents itself to Stephen, surfacing amid simple sense-images to interpret the world. But he thought of Deasy because he thought of death. He thought of death because the living dog scared him and reminded him of his cowardice. This thought reminds him of a drowning man, who Stehen knows he would not have the courage to save. And that thought makes him wonder at his refusal to pray for his dead mother. Stephen seems to be just as unable to make sense of these twists and turns as we are.
There seems to be some kind of a resolution towards the end, because Stephen writes something. As he writes he thinks: "I throw this ended shadow from me, manshape ineluctable, call it back." Maybe he is trying to bring his mind and body closer together, by pushing and pulling at the latter with his thoughts. The speed at which thought bounces off memory and physicality seems to increase as Stephen becomes inspired. By the end, the trains of thought slow down and clear sections of sensation and introspection emerge. This is a real hard chapter. Hopefully I'll be able to make something more out of it when we talk in class.
I think Amelia gets pretty close to a major theme in Proteus. Stephen IS grappling with appearances and things in themselves. But I think it gets even broader than that. Stephen is trying to reconcile his thoughts with the physical world. The episode begins with a solipsist argument. Stephen contemplates the legitimacy of the world as he experiences it through his senses. These two things, mind and world, seem to act independently of each other and yet perpetually interweave. This paradox is the allegorical shape-shifting Proteus. In order for Stephen to mature as a writer, he has to resolve this mind-world duality even as it rapidly dilates and switches forms.
And this problem takes on many forms. Joyce explicates Stephen's train of thought in a way that makes the world and consciousness interrupt each other. Stephen's imagination pokes out into the real world: "dogskull, dogsniff, eyes on the ground, moves to one great goal." Mr. Deasy's determinism impresses itself onto the unsightly scene that presents itself to Stephen, surfacing amid simple sense-images to interpret the world. But he thought of Deasy because he thought of death. He thought of death because the living dog scared him and reminded him of his cowardice. This thought reminds him of a drowning man, who Stehen knows he would not have the courage to save. And that thought makes him wonder at his refusal to pray for his dead mother. Stephen seems to be just as unable to make sense of these twists and turns as we are.
There seems to be some kind of a resolution towards the end, because Stephen writes something. As he writes he thinks: "I throw this ended shadow from me, manshape ineluctable, call it back." Maybe he is trying to bring his mind and body closer together, by pushing and pulling at the latter with his thoughts. The speed at which thought bounces off memory and physicality seems to increase as Stephen becomes inspired. By the end, the trains of thought slow down and clear sections of sensation and introspection emerge. This is a real hard chapter. Hopefully I'll be able to make something more out of it when we talk in class.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Nestor
This episode opens with a reflection on memory; sparked by Cochrane's forgetfulness: "The boy's blank face asked the blank window." Stephen is struggling with his past and as he half-heartedly teaches history to the class, that struggle extends to all that has past. He plays at an interpretation of Blake that would vindicate him: one day all existence becomes infinitely condensed and history will become inconsequential. This hope plays a big role in Stephens pity for the forgetful students in his class like Cochrane, Armstrong, and Sargent. He sees a validity in the blankness of their minds.
Stephen's thought on historical philosophy is resistant to Deasy's fatalism. But he can't manage to shake determinism all together. When he asks in thought: "Or was that only possible which came to pass?" he mockingly replies to himself, "weave, weaver of the wind." This is an allusion to prophecy through the mode of an allusion to Irishness. The wind, he thinks, might be guided but to us it is unknowable.
This doesn't stop Stephen from confidently contradicting Deasy: "The same room and hour, the same wisdom: and I the same. Three times now. Three nooses round me here. Well. I can break them in this instant if I will." At least part of Stephen is disdainfully indifferent
to Deasy along with theological determinism and a money-driven outlook on life. When Deasy motions for order, Stephen replies with chaos. To his history? "History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake." God's plan? "God is a shout in in the street." The world seems to bend in Stephen's favor in these arguments. When Deasy insists: "All history moves towards one great goal," a goal is scored in the students' hockey game outside. This undermines Deasy's argument with a meaningless random coincidence that ties itself to his stubborn point. But a different reading suggests that Stephen's destiny is calling him, and that God gives signs.
These contradictions play out towards the end of the chapter when Stephen's indifference to Deasy softens. He agrees that he "was not born to be a teacher". And Stephen agrees to help Deasy publish his paper, not only because Deasy is Stephen's boss, but because of a self-conscious decision on Stephen's part: "Still I will help him in his fight. Mulligan will dub me a new name: the bollockbefriending bard." Stephen seems to be giving up his struggle against fate.
Deasy makes an interesting Nestor. Homer's Nestor often gave advice to unwilling listeners in the form of tiresome anecdotes about his own achievements as a warrior. Deasy has similar traits, but his claims to greatness have to do with financial wisdom and elderly experience, both of which Stephen rejects. Ironically, he is both a lover of money and an avid anti-semite. His age and experience testifies only to his stubborn and narrow interpretation of history. What Deasy himself believes is a wealth of wisdom and knowledge is actually flawed and inaccurate. Stephen often has to correct him.
Stephen's thought on historical philosophy is resistant to Deasy's fatalism. But he can't manage to shake determinism all together. When he asks in thought: "Or was that only possible which came to pass?" he mockingly replies to himself, "weave, weaver of the wind." This is an allusion to prophecy through the mode of an allusion to Irishness. The wind, he thinks, might be guided but to us it is unknowable.
This doesn't stop Stephen from confidently contradicting Deasy: "The same room and hour, the same wisdom: and I the same. Three times now. Three nooses round me here. Well. I can break them in this instant if I will." At least part of Stephen is disdainfully indifferent
to Deasy along with theological determinism and a money-driven outlook on life. When Deasy motions for order, Stephen replies with chaos. To his history? "History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake." God's plan? "God is a shout in in the street." The world seems to bend in Stephen's favor in these arguments. When Deasy insists: "All history moves towards one great goal," a goal is scored in the students' hockey game outside. This undermines Deasy's argument with a meaningless random coincidence that ties itself to his stubborn point. But a different reading suggests that Stephen's destiny is calling him, and that God gives signs.
These contradictions play out towards the end of the chapter when Stephen's indifference to Deasy softens. He agrees that he "was not born to be a teacher". And Stephen agrees to help Deasy publish his paper, not only because Deasy is Stephen's boss, but because of a self-conscious decision on Stephen's part: "Still I will help him in his fight. Mulligan will dub me a new name: the bollockbefriending bard." Stephen seems to be giving up his struggle against fate.
Deasy makes an interesting Nestor. Homer's Nestor often gave advice to unwilling listeners in the form of tiresome anecdotes about his own achievements as a warrior. Deasy has similar traits, but his claims to greatness have to do with financial wisdom and elderly experience, both of which Stephen rejects. Ironically, he is both a lover of money and an avid anti-semite. His age and experience testifies only to his stubborn and narrow interpretation of history. What Deasy himself believes is a wealth of wisdom and knowledge is actually flawed and inaccurate. Stephen often has to correct him.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Telemachus
This is about the third time I've read this chapter and it is the reading I've gotten the most pleasure out of so far. Yeats and Elliot were good preludes to this book because they sharpened my sensitivity to excellent wordplay. Ulysses, of course, is a masterpiece on phonetic merits alone. You can't get through more than a few sentences before hitting brilliant strings of syllables like "sullen oval jowl", "smokeblue mobile eyes", and "bowl of bitter waters". Joyce was a prose-poet in the highest sense of the word and much of this chapter benefits from being read out-loud.
It's surprising how much of Joyce's humor still retains its force today. Though much of the puns are rooted in elitist intellectual archetypes, many of them are still appreciable. The annotations point to the mockery of the Catholic mass a number of notes, but this time I saw the parody in fluidity for the first time. It reminded me that the first time I read this chapter I actually believed that Buck Mulligan was a monk and that Daedalus was somehow back in training for priesthood. I saw the parody for what it was immediately during this reading. The razor lays "crossed" on the bowl, signaling Christian symbolism. As Mulligan stands with his dressing gown open and floating in the breeze he carries out a blasphemous rendition of the mass. And it's pretty funny. When I read the sensual description of the milk lady pouring the milk ("not hers"), I laughed out loud and read it to my roommate who laughed as well. Another classic is Buck's announcement at the table after taking off his clothes: "Mulligan has been stripped of his garments."
In this chapter, Joyce's style is familiar and reminiscent to Portrait of the Artist. He toils obsessively over the mundane. The forgotten shaving bowl, the ballad of "Joking Jesus",
the Latin quarter hat. These details don't just make the narrative remarkably lucid and real. They also provide a startling contrast against Joyce's bursts of ecstatic writing. They're toned down here. Mulligan and Daedalus suddenly look at each other in a solemn silence. A seal pokes his head out of the bay. Nightmare images of Daedalus' undead motherblow through his mind. If these passages were more prominently featured in Joyce's writing they would seem self-important and lofty. They would lose their firm connection to the real and perceivable. This technique allows Joyce to both startle his reader with jolts of profundity and secure those jolts compellingly to everyday life.
It's surprising how much of Joyce's humor still retains its force today. Though much of the puns are rooted in elitist intellectual archetypes, many of them are still appreciable. The annotations point to the mockery of the Catholic mass a number of notes, but this time I saw the parody in fluidity for the first time. It reminded me that the first time I read this chapter I actually believed that Buck Mulligan was a monk and that Daedalus was somehow back in training for priesthood. I saw the parody for what it was immediately during this reading. The razor lays "crossed" on the bowl, signaling Christian symbolism. As Mulligan stands with his dressing gown open and floating in the breeze he carries out a blasphemous rendition of the mass. And it's pretty funny. When I read the sensual description of the milk lady pouring the milk ("not hers"), I laughed out loud and read it to my roommate who laughed as well. Another classic is Buck's announcement at the table after taking off his clothes: "Mulligan has been stripped of his garments."
In this chapter, Joyce's style is familiar and reminiscent to Portrait of the Artist. He toils obsessively over the mundane. The forgotten shaving bowl, the ballad of "Joking Jesus",
the Latin quarter hat. These details don't just make the narrative remarkably lucid and real. They also provide a startling contrast against Joyce's bursts of ecstatic writing. They're toned down here. Mulligan and Daedalus suddenly look at each other in a solemn silence. A seal pokes his head out of the bay. Nightmare images of Daedalus' undead motherblow through his mind. If these passages were more prominently featured in Joyce's writing they would seem self-important and lofty. They would lose their firm connection to the real and perceivable. This technique allows Joyce to both startle his reader with jolts of profundity and secure those jolts compellingly to everyday life.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Yeats' later poems
"The Circus Animals' Desertion" left a deep impression on me, both in light of Yeats' struggle with poetic meaning (as outlined in Blackmur's essay) and personally as writer who seeks the inexpressible.
Yeats begins by poking fun - in a somewhat sorrowful way - at his earlier work. This self-criticism emerges out of a frustration with writing. "My circus animals were all on show." Yeats sees a triviality in his youthful poetry. A flamboyant circus is a far cry from what Yeats clearly wants to embody in his work. The profundity he seeks is shadowed by empty entertainment. The performance is shallow, yet personal in a humiliating way. "What can I do but enumerate old themes?" he cries. His audience demands what they are familiar with. He is chained to the mundane
Yeats is unclear about whether it is the essence of his older poems that has become trivial or whether it is their popular interpretation. He seems to strongly disassociate the latter with his ambitions as well as his passions. In the second stanza he seems to condemn one of his themes to uselessness: "Vain gaiety, vain battle, vain repose." While this line technically lists the richness of irony in Oisin's story, the repetition of "vain" implies a deeper disillusionment in the heart of the author. "I starved for the bosom of his faery bride." Yeats could be illuminating the deeper profundity that he is looking for, but the line emphasizes his position on the periphery; as well as the shallow lustfulness of his obsessions.
One of the most powerful lines in this poem echoes this ambiguity. "Players and painted stage took all my love,/And not those things that they were emblems of." All at once Yeats wants his art to stand on its own in its richness but still sees futility in that ambition. Without meaning, these symbols take on an air of superficiality: they are fake sets, actors. In his age, Yeats sees his aesthetic crumbling without the support of firm meaning. The images literally become trash on the street. But Yeats clings to this refuse when he resolves to return to the core of his soul for inspiration. The ladders start in "The foul rag and bone shop of the heart." The profundity exists in the trivial, and the poet must found his ambitions in the peripheral and the mundane.
Yeats begins by poking fun - in a somewhat sorrowful way - at his earlier work. This self-criticism emerges out of a frustration with writing. "My circus animals were all on show." Yeats sees a triviality in his youthful poetry. A flamboyant circus is a far cry from what Yeats clearly wants to embody in his work. The profundity he seeks is shadowed by empty entertainment. The performance is shallow, yet personal in a humiliating way. "What can I do but enumerate old themes?" he cries. His audience demands what they are familiar with. He is chained to the mundane
Yeats is unclear about whether it is the essence of his older poems that has become trivial or whether it is their popular interpretation. He seems to strongly disassociate the latter with his ambitions as well as his passions. In the second stanza he seems to condemn one of his themes to uselessness: "Vain gaiety, vain battle, vain repose." While this line technically lists the richness of irony in Oisin's story, the repetition of "vain" implies a deeper disillusionment in the heart of the author. "I starved for the bosom of his faery bride." Yeats could be illuminating the deeper profundity that he is looking for, but the line emphasizes his position on the periphery; as well as the shallow lustfulness of his obsessions.
One of the most powerful lines in this poem echoes this ambiguity. "Players and painted stage took all my love,/And not those things that they were emblems of." All at once Yeats wants his art to stand on its own in its richness but still sees futility in that ambition. Without meaning, these symbols take on an air of superficiality: they are fake sets, actors. In his age, Yeats sees his aesthetic crumbling without the support of firm meaning. The images literally become trash on the street. But Yeats clings to this refuse when he resolves to return to the core of his soul for inspiration. The ladders start in "The foul rag and bone shop of the heart." The profundity exists in the trivial, and the poet must found his ambitions in the peripheral and the mundane.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
The Tower
The Tower is a drastic change from Wild Swans in terms of style and content. Yeats has two new sources for inspiration in these poems: the automatic writing of his wife and the system of symbolic philosophy he had composed from the former. The somber reflection of Wild Swans gives way here to a new confidence and, though not a pure one, optimism.
The ambiguity of Yeats' symbols is still there. But before it seemed to reflect Yeats' own insecurity and indecision - or the complexity of the idea. Now the ambiguity in his symbols seems to spring from pure obscurity. Their meaning maybe somewhat intangible, but Yeats uses these symbols as if they are a precise language.
In "The Tower", Yeats holds a confrontation between the moon and the sun. In one part, the two are perilously confused and disaster ensues. The "brightness of the moon", is mistaken for the "prosaic sun". Yeats is referencing his moon phasology. The full moon, implied by the brightness, is the phase of subjectivity. It's hard to tell what this means, but it looks like Yeats is making a pragmatic warning: do not confuse your whims with your imperatives. These men, as "Music drove their wits away", saw their subjective passions as clarity. Thus, they drown.
In the next stanza the speaker cries "O may the moon and sunlight seem/One inextricable beam". The speaker seems to be refering to his own hopes for vindication. He may also, simultaneously, be praying that his creativity be married to the realness of life. These prayers look like they are related to Yeats' own thoughts. As Ellman says, he was aware that his symbology was eccentric. Maybe he is hoping that it will be taken seriously anyway and pondered over, thus the line "For if I triumph I must make men mad".
I'm going to stop here and flesh out this post tomorrow.
The ambiguity of Yeats' symbols is still there. But before it seemed to reflect Yeats' own insecurity and indecision - or the complexity of the idea. Now the ambiguity in his symbols seems to spring from pure obscurity. Their meaning maybe somewhat intangible, but Yeats uses these symbols as if they are a precise language.
In "The Tower", Yeats holds a confrontation between the moon and the sun. In one part, the two are perilously confused and disaster ensues. The "brightness of the moon", is mistaken for the "prosaic sun". Yeats is referencing his moon phasology. The full moon, implied by the brightness, is the phase of subjectivity. It's hard to tell what this means, but it looks like Yeats is making a pragmatic warning: do not confuse your whims with your imperatives. These men, as "Music drove their wits away", saw their subjective passions as clarity. Thus, they drown.
In the next stanza the speaker cries "O may the moon and sunlight seem/One inextricable beam". The speaker seems to be refering to his own hopes for vindication. He may also, simultaneously, be praying that his creativity be married to the realness of life. These prayers look like they are related to Yeats' own thoughts. As Ellman says, he was aware that his symbology was eccentric. Maybe he is hoping that it will be taken seriously anyway and pondered over, thus the line "For if I triumph I must make men mad".
I'm going to stop here and flesh out this post tomorrow.
Friday, February 1, 2008
On "The Wild Swans at Coole"
The Wild Swans at Coole was published in 1919 - in the aftermath of World War I. Yeats was fifty-four years old. His obsessions with old age and passing time reached new intensities in this book as they became more and more relevant to his immediate experience.
The title poem is the most direct; it sets the sad reflective tone for the rest of the book. The poem takes place on the brink of winter. "The woodland paths are dry" and the seasons, though cyclical, reflect the speakers concern with change. "All's changed", he says, since 19 "autumns" ago. Yeats seems to be specifically referencing the world war, although the change that frightens and saddens him runs deeper than international politics.
The beating wings of the swans "above my head/Trod with a lighter tread" twenty years before. While Yeats is said to have been concerned with aging and death since he was twenty-one, his earlier work is not particularly concerned with personal nostalgia. This book deals directly with the mass mourning of fading memory and Yeats establishes this theme right at the beginning. Even the youthful unchanging swans whose "passion and conquest.../Attend upon them still", will inevitably fly away. The speaker wonders where his most fixed memories will land when they leave him. Yeats leaves it unclear whether this is a rhetorical question reminding us of death's emptiness or an honest hope for greater permanence. The latter seems more likely given Yeats' typical mysticism and the fact that the swans do not die but merely depart - presumably for another lake. But the sinking post-war feeling that absurd nightmares are possible might also reside in the heart of this dark inquiry.
"In Memory of Major Robert Gregory" continues in the same vein; combining the metaphysical thoughts on death concocted by the younger Yeats with the newer and more imminent experiences of nostalgia and fragility. The speaker, in giving a eulogy for a young soldier, is overcome with the sensation that his lifelong friends are dying off. "All, all are in my thoughts to-night being dead." He fumbles for optimism in the depths of this experience. New friends and old friends will not squabble over nonsense and he would be spared the pain of watching them meet only to become enemies.
But these conflicts between his close companions seems to be what he misses the most about them. In recounting their various countenances, he emphasizes the bitter differences they might have had had they met. One is an introverted rationalist another a worldly empiricist. The third dead friend shirked both of their philosophies for physical prowess only to lose his might in his later years.
The speaker solemnly recalls these characters (who were real people according to Wikipedia) to differentiate them from the untimely death ("What made us dream that he could comb grey hair") of Robert Gregory. According to Wikipedia he was an "accomplished artist" and Yeats bemoans this loss of talent: "We dreamed that a great painter had been born" whose work "Wherein the gazing heart doubles her might." A mini-refrain emerges in three stanzas endowing Gregory with "renaissance man" characteristics: "Soldier, scholar, horseman, he,/And all he did done perfectly/As though he had but that one trade alone."
In the third of these stanzas, the speaker unifies his nostalgia for his older dead friends with his eulogy for Gregory. He contrasts the great men he knew who "burn damp faggots" - and thus die slower - with those like Gregory who "...may consume/The entire combustible world in one small room.../Because the work had finished in the flare." He tries to console himself and Gregory's mourners with the thought that his great achievements justified his early death. But as he means to begin listing them in greater detail, he is choked by sadness. The very thought of his death "took all my heart for speech."
Yeats breaks the theme of old age and death for a moment in "Solomon to Sheba" and returns to his earlier thoughts on the frustration and futility of love. The poem describes love as cognitively claustrophobic: "There's not a thing but love can make/The world a narrow pound." King Solomon in one of his biblical songs, addresses a lover that is often presumed to be the Queen of Sheba with whom Solomon exchanged praise and gifts (again, this is from Wikipedia). The lover in the song rejects Solomon's persistent love in effective analogy with Yeats' relationship to Maud Gonne. The image of the horse circling a narrow pound depicts love as a tantalizing passion inescapable to all who participate in it, even if they are educated or wise: "There's not a man or woman/Born under the skies/Dare match in learning with us two." But the equality implied by "us two" and "we have found" suggests that Yeats may be thinking of other loves of more mutual nature than the one between him and Maud Gonne. Perhaps Yeat is examining his own nuanced obstinacy in his pursuit of Maud Gonne when he compares it Solomon's love. Or maybe he is unaware of it and merely presumes that all love, no matter how mutual is plagued by the same paradoxes.
In "Lines Written in Dejection", Yeats attaches his concerns with age more firmly to Ireland. The imaginative and mythical elements in the speakers life have disappeared now that he is fifty years old. These mythic images contain, along with Greek references, strong Celtic symbols. "The round green eyes and the long wavering bodies" mention the Celtic color green and resemble pagan dance rituals. The moon is mentioned twice, an important Celtic symbol of motherhood - the second time the moon is called "mother moon". The "wild witches", which are celebrated as "noble ladies", refer to the labeling of practicing Celtic women as witches. In the European witch trials, women would be accused of witch craft based on their resemblance to pagan women and their ritual behavior. The "holy centaurs of the hills" mix Greek mythology with the beautiful Irish landscape.
This fundamental pre-Catholic Irishness bonds with the curious and creative youth that the speaker remembers in himself. In stark contrast to the adventurous and elusive moon, the sun is "embittered" and - strangely - "timid". The timidity of course does not refer to the sun's power, but to its consistency. The sun is too shy to adopt the mystery of the moon and is irrevocably tied to the mundane.
The title poem is the most direct; it sets the sad reflective tone for the rest of the book. The poem takes place on the brink of winter. "The woodland paths are dry" and the seasons, though cyclical, reflect the speakers concern with change. "All's changed", he says, since 19 "autumns" ago. Yeats seems to be specifically referencing the world war, although the change that frightens and saddens him runs deeper than international politics.
The beating wings of the swans "above my head/Trod with a lighter tread" twenty years before. While Yeats is said to have been concerned with aging and death since he was twenty-one, his earlier work is not particularly concerned with personal nostalgia. This book deals directly with the mass mourning of fading memory and Yeats establishes this theme right at the beginning. Even the youthful unchanging swans whose "passion and conquest.../Attend upon them still", will inevitably fly away. The speaker wonders where his most fixed memories will land when they leave him. Yeats leaves it unclear whether this is a rhetorical question reminding us of death's emptiness or an honest hope for greater permanence. The latter seems more likely given Yeats' typical mysticism and the fact that the swans do not die but merely depart - presumably for another lake. But the sinking post-war feeling that absurd nightmares are possible might also reside in the heart of this dark inquiry.
"In Memory of Major Robert Gregory" continues in the same vein; combining the metaphysical thoughts on death concocted by the younger Yeats with the newer and more imminent experiences of nostalgia and fragility. The speaker, in giving a eulogy for a young soldier, is overcome with the sensation that his lifelong friends are dying off. "All, all are in my thoughts to-night being dead." He fumbles for optimism in the depths of this experience. New friends and old friends will not squabble over nonsense and he would be spared the pain of watching them meet only to become enemies.
But these conflicts between his close companions seems to be what he misses the most about them. In recounting their various countenances, he emphasizes the bitter differences they might have had had they met. One is an introverted rationalist another a worldly empiricist. The third dead friend shirked both of their philosophies for physical prowess only to lose his might in his later years.
The speaker solemnly recalls these characters (who were real people according to Wikipedia) to differentiate them from the untimely death ("What made us dream that he could comb grey hair") of Robert Gregory. According to Wikipedia he was an "accomplished artist" and Yeats bemoans this loss of talent: "We dreamed that a great painter had been born" whose work "Wherein the gazing heart doubles her might." A mini-refrain emerges in three stanzas endowing Gregory with "renaissance man" characteristics: "Soldier, scholar, horseman, he,/And all he did done perfectly/As though he had but that one trade alone."
In the third of these stanzas, the speaker unifies his nostalgia for his older dead friends with his eulogy for Gregory. He contrasts the great men he knew who "burn damp faggots" - and thus die slower - with those like Gregory who "...may consume/The entire combustible world in one small room.../Because the work had finished in the flare." He tries to console himself and Gregory's mourners with the thought that his great achievements justified his early death. But as he means to begin listing them in greater detail, he is choked by sadness. The very thought of his death "took all my heart for speech."
Yeats breaks the theme of old age and death for a moment in "Solomon to Sheba" and returns to his earlier thoughts on the frustration and futility of love. The poem describes love as cognitively claustrophobic: "There's not a thing but love can make/The world a narrow pound." King Solomon in one of his biblical songs, addresses a lover that is often presumed to be the Queen of Sheba with whom Solomon exchanged praise and gifts (again, this is from Wikipedia). The lover in the song rejects Solomon's persistent love in effective analogy with Yeats' relationship to Maud Gonne. The image of the horse circling a narrow pound depicts love as a tantalizing passion inescapable to all who participate in it, even if they are educated or wise: "There's not a man or woman/Born under the skies/Dare match in learning with us two." But the equality implied by "us two" and "we have found" suggests that Yeats may be thinking of other loves of more mutual nature than the one between him and Maud Gonne. Perhaps Yeat is examining his own nuanced obstinacy in his pursuit of Maud Gonne when he compares it Solomon's love. Or maybe he is unaware of it and merely presumes that all love, no matter how mutual is plagued by the same paradoxes.
In "Lines Written in Dejection", Yeats attaches his concerns with age more firmly to Ireland. The imaginative and mythical elements in the speakers life have disappeared now that he is fifty years old. These mythic images contain, along with Greek references, strong Celtic symbols. "The round green eyes and the long wavering bodies" mention the Celtic color green and resemble pagan dance rituals. The moon is mentioned twice, an important Celtic symbol of motherhood - the second time the moon is called "mother moon". The "wild witches", which are celebrated as "noble ladies", refer to the labeling of practicing Celtic women as witches. In the European witch trials, women would be accused of witch craft based on their resemblance to pagan women and their ritual behavior. The "holy centaurs of the hills" mix Greek mythology with the beautiful Irish landscape.
This fundamental pre-Catholic Irishness bonds with the curious and creative youth that the speaker remembers in himself. In stark contrast to the adventurous and elusive moon, the sun is "embittered" and - strangely - "timid". The timidity of course does not refer to the sun's power, but to its consistency. The sun is too shy to adopt the mystery of the moon and is irrevocably tied to the mundane.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
In the Seven Woods
I might be completely misreading this, but “The Folly of Being Comforted” seems to reflect the tension Yeats had with his father; or at least his father’s generation. The “one that is ever kind” has a paternal element to his voice. He tells the narrator “though now it seems impossible, and so/All that you need is patient.” Ellman describes a senior Yeats as loving but abrasive towards Yeats’ inner beliefs – particularly his Christian faith.
The “kind one’s” voice seems pragmatic and perhaps atheist. He matter-of-factly reminds the narrator about old age and death and urges him to take comfort in the wisdom that comes with frailty. The narrator objects for strange, evasive reasons. His defiance is adolescent and disorganized. He seems to want the other to be wrong more than he can demonstrate that he is wrong.
Interestingly, the narrator does not contradict the other out loud. It is “Heart” that speaks against the “folly of comfort”, implying that this is an internal and silent retort. I can picture Yeats’ father talking down to him and young Yeats saying nothing though he fiercely disagrees.
Of course it’s unlikely that Yeats’ sole intention is to express his frustration with his father. But he might be drawing from his own experiences as he constructs these two characters.
“The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water” also seems to emphasize generational divides. The oldness of the men is their most prominent feature. It warrants the doubling of the word “old. Their oldness is violent and ugly. They have claws and “their knees were twisted like the old thorn-trees”. The short poem manages to be more complex than a crack at the elderly. It is saddening to hear them bemoan their contingency. This delicate contradiction reminds me of Yeats’ indecision in Ellman’s account. He strongly opposed his father’s atheism and prayed every day. Inexplicably, however, Yeats would often defend atheist ideas from students and friends in debate. Yeats seems similarly torn in this poem between identifying with the old men and caricaturing them.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Early Yeats and Irish History
The "Very Brief and Basic History of Ireland" is an exhaustive learn-the-kings account of the Irish past. There aren't many broad insights to draw from it except that this nation was done serious wrong. A persistent pattern emerges by the half-way mark where the Irish seem to secure their dignity only to have it dashed from their hands. The story of Ireland is the story of Sisyphus, the king in hell who heaved boulders to the top of a hill only to have it crash back down to the ground.
The account imbues the native Irish with a striking tenacity. Over and over they battle the English, the French and others for their freedom. In the 19th century organizations for a democratic Ireland emerge on the back of America's ideals for independence. Thankfully the Irish finally gain their sovereignty after centuries of dominion and molestation.
"Politics of Irish Literature" is a more interesting read, discussing the more emotive and subjective impact history had on Ireland's writers. Yeats, it turns out, was the poetic voice for Young Ireland, one of the 19th century more militant factions for democracy. It's leader O'Leary was a mentor of sorts for Yeats. But it seems like Yeats was also a mentor for Ireland. His early work vindicated revolutionary thought and sustained the Irish nationality. He actively sought talent in his homeland and built a coalition of Irish writers.
But Yeats' loving relationship with Ireland was short-lived. He considered himself a poet before a member of Young Ireland and as his poetry emigrated from the cause for Irish freedom his criticism of O'Leary became increasingly harsh. Other Irish writers followed suit; there was more to Irish literature than politics and revolution.
The backlash against the Irish literary community lasted well into the 20th century. Irish works were treated with cynicism and disdain by popular publishing companies. One of the more prominent paradoxes illuminated in Brown's paper is the absurd skepticism with which the Irish people treated their own literary geniuses.
Yeats' growing reluctance to confine his art to the Young Ireland movement is pretty evident in "The Madness of King Goll". The king tells of a time when he ruled absolutely and righteously. Wise men said of the king, "He drives away the Northern cold", a reference to the scourge of Great Britain. The king fiercely defeats his enemies in the name of his people only to be possessed by "a whirling and a wandering fire" which compels him to turn away from war and surround himself with the world's natural beauty. It's easy, given Brown's paper, to see King Goll as a surrogate Yeats; who obeys an internal calling to give up violent aims in pursuit of the pure.
"The Ballad of Moll Magee" doesn't convey this idea nearly as well. But the struggle between poet and political movement is still here. Where Magee has lost a child, Yeats has lost a nation. Her attempt at sympathy from a stranger ends in jeers. Yeats may have been inspired by his own rejection by the people he championed. Although, I think it might have been written before he was widely criticized.
"To an Isle in the Water" is a love poem that has little to do with Young Ireland. However, it contains the same admiration for the poor and weak. The coveted woman is defined by her meekness and her servitude. The isle itself suggests an escapist attitude towards Ireland. Yeats seems ready to abandon his country for love.
Yeats parts with civilization once again in "The Lake Isle of Innisfree". This time he is tempted not by "a whirling and wandering fire". On the lake he doesn't not seek exhilaration, but peace. Yeats emphasizes the time scale of nature. "Peace comes dropping slow", he says. "...always night and day/I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore". The peace he seeks is slow and consistent. Yeats is rejecting his revolutionary past here not merely for the beautiful, but the eternal.
In "Who Goes With Fergus?", Yeats approaches that eternity more directly. He calls on the youth to embrace the quiet corners of the world as sanctuaries, not dark mysteries. The unanswered call "who will go drive with Fergus now?" implies a sad idea. Yeats seems to believe, without wanting to say, that rest of the world might never heed his advice. His poetry seems to return to this alienating idea the more he grows as a poet.
I'm curious about the specific details of O'Leary's "mentoring" of Yeats. Which parts of Yeats work were the most inspiring to Young Ireland and organizations like it? It's hard for me to pinpoint exactly where Yeats is being a mouthpiece for a movement and when he is striving for a more universal poetic voice.
I'm also a little frustrated with "The Man who dreamed of Faeryland". Nature seems to be the enemy in this poem, at least to the "man". How did Yeats square this sentiment with his poems that find fulfillment in the natural world? Is he actually changing his mind? Or is there something specific about the man that I'm missing that justifies this conflict?
The account imbues the native Irish with a striking tenacity. Over and over they battle the English, the French and others for their freedom. In the 19th century organizations for a democratic Ireland emerge on the back of America's ideals for independence. Thankfully the Irish finally gain their sovereignty after centuries of dominion and molestation.
"Politics of Irish Literature" is a more interesting read, discussing the more emotive and subjective impact history had on Ireland's writers. Yeats, it turns out, was the poetic voice for Young Ireland, one of the 19th century more militant factions for democracy. It's leader O'Leary was a mentor of sorts for Yeats. But it seems like Yeats was also a mentor for Ireland. His early work vindicated revolutionary thought and sustained the Irish nationality. He actively sought talent in his homeland and built a coalition of Irish writers.
But Yeats' loving relationship with Ireland was short-lived. He considered himself a poet before a member of Young Ireland and as his poetry emigrated from the cause for Irish freedom his criticism of O'Leary became increasingly harsh. Other Irish writers followed suit; there was more to Irish literature than politics and revolution.
The backlash against the Irish literary community lasted well into the 20th century. Irish works were treated with cynicism and disdain by popular publishing companies. One of the more prominent paradoxes illuminated in Brown's paper is the absurd skepticism with which the Irish people treated their own literary geniuses.
Yeats' growing reluctance to confine his art to the Young Ireland movement is pretty evident in "The Madness of King Goll". The king tells of a time when he ruled absolutely and righteously. Wise men said of the king, "He drives away the Northern cold", a reference to the scourge of Great Britain. The king fiercely defeats his enemies in the name of his people only to be possessed by "a whirling and a wandering fire" which compels him to turn away from war and surround himself with the world's natural beauty. It's easy, given Brown's paper, to see King Goll as a surrogate Yeats; who obeys an internal calling to give up violent aims in pursuit of the pure.
"The Ballad of Moll Magee" doesn't convey this idea nearly as well. But the struggle between poet and political movement is still here. Where Magee has lost a child, Yeats has lost a nation. Her attempt at sympathy from a stranger ends in jeers. Yeats may have been inspired by his own rejection by the people he championed. Although, I think it might have been written before he was widely criticized.
"To an Isle in the Water" is a love poem that has little to do with Young Ireland. However, it contains the same admiration for the poor and weak. The coveted woman is defined by her meekness and her servitude. The isle itself suggests an escapist attitude towards Ireland. Yeats seems ready to abandon his country for love.
Yeats parts with civilization once again in "The Lake Isle of Innisfree". This time he is tempted not by "a whirling and wandering fire". On the lake he doesn't not seek exhilaration, but peace. Yeats emphasizes the time scale of nature. "Peace comes dropping slow", he says. "...always night and day/I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore". The peace he seeks is slow and consistent. Yeats is rejecting his revolutionary past here not merely for the beautiful, but the eternal.
In "Who Goes With Fergus?", Yeats approaches that eternity more directly. He calls on the youth to embrace the quiet corners of the world as sanctuaries, not dark mysteries. The unanswered call "who will go drive with Fergus now?" implies a sad idea. Yeats seems to believe, without wanting to say, that rest of the world might never heed his advice. His poetry seems to return to this alienating idea the more he grows as a poet.
I'm curious about the specific details of O'Leary's "mentoring" of Yeats. Which parts of Yeats work were the most inspiring to Young Ireland and organizations like it? It's hard for me to pinpoint exactly where Yeats is being a mouthpiece for a movement and when he is striving for a more universal poetic voice.
I'm also a little frustrated with "The Man who dreamed of Faeryland". Nature seems to be the enemy in this poem, at least to the "man". How did Yeats square this sentiment with his poems that find fulfillment in the natural world? Is he actually changing his mind? Or is there something specific about the man that I'm missing that justifies this conflict?
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