No More Learning

'"
IRUANO
S""UN'S O~&lT
? Spatial Cydts: 1- Tlu Cirdt
joyc~" own tJlpo:ri= . His oeveral trip' bad: to Dublin al\cr his initial fljght always brought him ;nro WIlmet with th~ Shaun. figures of that city. and a number of those ShaUllS,
notably Byme and Gogarty, did in raCt go to the United Stats. The hienn:hy of worlds in Filw:-IU 111mis now . . . . . , to be complete: the three united ',tates' of God (Trinity) in the Hea\lCn ofAm~rica; Patrid<', Purgatory and th~ earthly mean
in I~land; and a torrid al1. <<ral HeJl.
Australia', antipodal position, itl hot climate (whkh j oyce
would haY<) detr$ted) and ill early reputation as Ihe rough, tough, inhuman land <:J: the convict and pioneering dayo-the explon:r William Dampier u lled it ? ' I. and of sin, sand and IOl'C eyu'_all made il an ideal symbol of the Kingdom of the Dead. MoTeO''! ! ', larg" numbers of Shem's ante<<<knll had ""po:rience of it. Many an lrishmln was lransported there during the early days of colonisation when ;1 was, in the e~ of El,lropo:, lilllc more than a vasl prillOtl. Irishmen ""eking free- do,n from t~'ra"ny fled to the United State! ; those l~ fortunate men who were caught in insllJTe<:tion might be Dan;"h<<! 'down under', frequently to ""rve a life lentence. j oyce, who had ! 'ead a. . d heard i. . 1m YOUlh of the experiences of the F<;niana, and of~{jtchdlandDavilt,wasfuUya~ofthisIrishimageof lhe colony. T he Uni<<:d Statel. . . -as abo It land of<:rile, but the aile. . . -as ~. . . Jl,lntary. 'l'h. erc WlI. I hope, there wu a wealthy, a weUellabli. hed, and above all a 'Ylnpathetic new civilisation. And dwing the """"nd half of the ninetccnth century lhere was Fenian;"m. The oonln03l is pal enough, and j oyce m~dc good use of it in Fill! ltlatU W,. ,\-,.
Th~ faw of li. fe, as we know, pl~ycd into joyc. '. hands with astonishing frequency: in addition to the general aura of duth and damnation associated with 'New Holland' Ihe. . , was the original name of lhe ;"Iand. . tate of T asmania-'van O;"mcn',
l. and'- which. 10asilyand lIDine\1t>obly bewrna'w n De",,",', Land' (56. 21). T h;" is Shem', 'Pinlua! home; it is from here, at a Goldsmithian Traveller (". orne luy w Id or maundering pot~'-th. Devil;. traditionally a w. ndcrer), that he cOmes to Ireland, 'Inn the da)'! of the Bygning', just as Satan made hi.
n'
? Spatial Cycles: l - T l u Circle
way from Hell to tempt Ev~, According to ""rtain 'toughneclu' quoted by ShaUll ('6g,02), Shem is in facl a black Australian 'aboriginal', Ifhe wa4 there from the beginning, he i< evidently a r. lanichean co-cterna] Salan, whiclI i< a sorry thing for Shaun', vanity to have to admit, Hi< unwiIlingne>a to reform i< deplored
at 374'~7:
'The 6nd of hi, kind! An arliS! , sid And dirt ch ap at a $Ov-
erdgn a sku! ! 1 He knows hi. Fw bury Follies backwo<xU $0 you baLlt;r Se<: to your regent refutation. Ascare winde is rifing again about nio:: boy! ; going nati. . . ,'.
For good measure, van Di~rrI(:n',Land is surrounded by demonic ima",ry in one of the three ,eU of three a"'wen {hat Glugg (Shem) gives the tantalising girlo in n . I : 'monbreamstonc . . . Hellfeue<"! u:yn . . . Van Diemen'. ~. oral pearl'. (~~. ~. ,,)
T hi< allegiance of Shem', to the underworld of Awtra1ia i< repeatedly established. He i. not only an occult 'al. hemiS! ' but abo a fraudulent astrologer. At /34" 3the three mwket""<"! are adv;":d to 'leave Au,tralia to J erry the Astrologer'---partly,
perhaps, became there are 1"ll. ther more visible "an in the . outhern hemisphere. A. . the 'plain clothes priest W. P. ' (86. 3+}' IW address i< given as 'Nu! ! nuH, Medical Square'. Along with suggestion, here ofmedicinc-mcn there is probably, in the word 'NullnuU', an allusion to the 'n"l1a_nulla', the AWl1ralian
aborigine's ,lim club ; Shern'. likwand would seem 10 have been transformed into a lethal bludgeon. ' He i. identified at ~~8. 33 and 3,p. 06 wi{hJohn Mitchell, exiled in AlUtralia, and author of]ai/JouTMI,while 3. \ the wandering poet he appean at 347. ~7 in the disgui. o: of the popular troubadour of the Australian oUlbad:, Andrew Barton Paterson, uni. . . ,. . . . . lly known as 'Banjo Paterson' ('banjopcddlan ').
The OCcWonal plagu,," of gr""'lhoppcrs in Australia may havc suggcotcd the allusion to Tasmania in Shaun', tale of 'The Ondt and the Gracehoper'. When Shem, the
, 'W,P. ' is an invcnioo--aon. . inly ;ntend"d . . d. i>. l><>I~ 'PoW. ', tho a b b K v i > ' ' ' ' D { . , . . < I ' a r n d l W i " " " , , ' w h i c h i , u o << I ,~,oughout { ! k
MacDonald','Doi/JX_flW,'qf/I<<F"""U~. ~bdx. ru. ld', "'"arnaj<otlOUr'"fro<F~ W. u;,. . AIhenon,W. ". ,,,If.
, Of. '. . . ,"S'<"! '<><kd the divlun &om hi,. punch. poIl . . . ' ("7. "), "9
? Spatial Cyrlu: I - The Cird~
Gra. c<:hopa, ha. . eaten the little he ruu saved and is going mad wilh hunger, he begin, once again to ! ravel in tight cirde, (416. 27) until he gro. . . . . . SO distraught . . . to W<)nd<:r ifptthaps heh. . . ~pilepsy(that. . . hew()nd~",ifheis~dofthe Devil) :
'He took a roWld . troll and he took a . troll round and he took a round . trollagain till the grillieo in his head and the leivnito in hio hair made him thought he had the T= mania:
A fUTther allu. ion immediately afterward. 10 hi, gyrating activilico ~infun:Cl! , with il. '; mention of Hell and damnation, the demonic character of Shem's antipodal home:
'Had he twicycled the = of the deed and tr~travel"1led their rcvermer~ Was he corne to hevre with his <ngiles or gone to hull with the poop? '
Nearby New Zealand ('New Z-land') io the lrue nadir of Shem'. cycle through the leiters of the alphabet, but ""tremes mUlt be made to meet, 50 that in Book IV New Zealand appears =rutituted a, 'New<:r Aland' (601. 35), [mm wbi~h Shem
bcginl a fresh cyck around the verbigra. :ious globe. (At 156. 29 Shcm is alluded to a. Macaulay's 'brokenarched traveller fmm Nuzuland', come to take hi. < Satanic arml'<-ry. vicw of de- struction. ) The magician b", on page 601 trarumngrified him_ self into a wallaby_ 'T be arntrologcr WaJlaby by T olan, wh" fanhook our . h'>Wl"1l from Newer Aland'--a furm in which he is apparently able to make Ireland tremble even from the distant anlipodes. He rearnves in this same 'hape early in Finlltlldl1l WIlk (165. 20) in a generally Awtralian context,
where Ihe bleary-eyed zoologi. <t .
ceo s<:rpentine Dalicsque 'oongorool teah' crawling through the bush.
1lte contra. t betwc<:n the geographical contrari. . , Australia and Ireland,;' again ""labli,hed at 78. 26, whe~ the two ! idel of the glob<: a. re renamed 'New South 1~1and' and 'Old
Ulster', while the equally important 0ppoMtion of Australia and Ihe United States i, developed in Earwicker's 'percb at 543. 03 where they figure a. the two exlremes bet""",n which common man, HCE, i. ,iwaled- half_way up the Scale of
Nature and sharing something of both end. : "0
? SpatW. l Cyclt. r: I-TIlt Girck
'willi . . ! log to . quare ItS' I oem my bol,lDdary 10 Botany 8. o. y
. nd I n. n up . score and IOu. of mes while the Yanb were huckling ! . he Empie<:'.
Botany Bay, the prUon "",demelll, is at the HUH of the earth; the United SIU"" i. tbe 'EmpytUll', The theme is taken up ye, again at 369. 17. wh= Canbt-mt. and New York are Ip<<ified . . . the po]. . . ,
Shun', orbit, on which lie Dublin, Eire, and Dublin, Ga. , though approximately 'horizontaJ' (that is, un-we. t) 0. 1 the Dublin meridian, is luffio<:IItly inclined 10 the -equator \0 take him inlo Ihe IOUth""'- mm"l'be. " a, hit farthest disance from Ireland 'around the back of the ,lobe', ILnd Joyu n::pramrs the oeconda'1' QUaiDg ofthe brothen' WlI)'lI as taking place uGh time in AUII,. . "li. . (~ Figure III ), Shem n:peuediy circles up and down throughout FimotglllU W. . u but rintt slow-lOOted Shaun i. the S" UII he manages only one vUie ptr revolution
of the book, with whO$< diurnal motion hi, cycle i. synchronil<<l,' TIL" daily linking and reappearance of the l un is of w urse rymbolic. olly identical . ,. ;! h the ~arly death and rt:Surrtttion of tile god. Sh. >. un ;, ,nade to viii! Shcm'. N~ South Welsll domain in Book IV, bctwttn the cydca oI' lhe liturgical year of f. 'Uutt,. . . . Willi, bootwttn the du tll or Ille god and his rebi" ". T he Christian hierarchy;' thus mainu,ined- Christ ma y appcar in all three worido, but SII"", ncvfl' vUitJ the United Su,t. . , ! Or, like the Devil, he can n,. , no higher than the Purgatorial earth. A. the effeminate, Christlike Kevin ('Kri&tJikc Kvinne', ~67. L3), Shaun vi,,;u the Kingdom or the Dead on page Go', harrows it, and h. . . a lU$! lc with tile Devil in the form or 10il argument with Shem during the Berkeley-Patrick dialogue. Kevin;' unainly 10 boo identified with the . . . indy Kevin hod O ' Dohen y who appears ebcwhcre in FiMt,. ,. . WIIlI. O'Dohen y
W3J
returned to Dublin, where be w aJ completely pardoned. The parallel with Christ'. crucifixion, descent into Hell, and R. . ur. rectioD i. obviow and J oyce h. . quietly put it 10 UK. In
~ with treaoon and bulished 10 Tasmania but iatu , cr. 1} 50' '. . ,offat do. . . . . ". ",1muM io r""" "h I>< . . . . . , . "",1a day',
ma>'cli on him. Keep I, up for. ,. . . ,,- ~cr '"
_ . day oId<< tcduQcoUy. '
? Spatial Cycles: I - T M Circle
T asmania O'Doherty met Mitchell (identified by Joyce with Shem) SO 'hat on page 601 Shaun', appearance at Botany Bay proon"""ttlement as O'Doherty already foreohadnws the m""t? ing or Mid:: and Nir. k (6TI). Throughout Fi=gallJ IVa" the ,ymboh of coffin and prison are identified with ea<:h other and with Hell. In 1. 4 it ;. never dear whether we are t<, co""ider Earwicker '" buried, impri. oned, or damned. Significantly, then, the imprisoned O'Doherty', fi. . . t name ;. eht:whcre modulated to 'coffin' (23I. t4)' For good me. . ,ure, another celebrated proon, Singsing, ;. thrown inlo the context (601. I8), wilh th~ ironic suggestion that ShaWl', ideal Heaven (thc United State,) may b. ,piritually a. ,uffocaling '" Hdl itsdf. As 'DcV', Shaun will later try to ",afuc his misguided ideal in Eire, only to make P1H:gatory even more helli'h. In SI#p/wl lfero Cranly and Stephen discu"" the latter'. ddi:etion from the ChuTeh:
'. . . <:Yen if I am wrong at le",t I ,hall not have t<> endure Father Bull', company f"r eternity'. (SH I41)
Mention of Set (60ull) thicken, the undcrworld-coffin atmooph<:rc, ,inc,," it wa, he whu, aided by ,eventy_two com- paninn" took 'hc measure orOsiri,' body by ,tealth and induc<:d him to lie Ilkc a Trappilt in a coffin tailored to fit,' which they immediately fa. '! lcned down and hurled into the Nile,' Shaun ;. dearly identified as Osiris ,everal tim. . in Finntgll1\S With, notahly on page 470, while the ~"frln floating down the
river is identical with Shann', barrel which drifu through Book IlI.
A poor ghO:l' in the cellarage, Shern keeps ,ending up 'de- gra"" from hi! 'obscene coalh"lc' (194. IS). J W{ '" the Letter from America i, d ""'ly 3. $sodated with Shaun the p()! It, . . . the Telegram from Awtralia is 'pcdfically a. . ociated with Shem
who, like the Devil, ;. inv~ntive and moTe up-to-the? minute than hi. conservative-minded counterpart. (That it ;. in any case Shem, playing the par' of tho Holy C hO$t, wh" write. the Leiter
, Of. the dOCussion of the T",ppQ" m ' lh? lJ<ad', 0 1511-
1Si,J'''''''1',. . . ,. -,11u('''Ii. . . . ~,ab<idgododn. ,London. J9~ p. 3113-
,"
? Spatial Cycles: I-Tlu Cireu
. . . wdl as the Telegram is a furth~r,,",arnpleofJoycc'. tortuollliy jocular irreverence and the . ubdcty of Shern', method? . ) Both Letter and Tdegram are addr=cd to the GOOhead, although the Lcttu is add! 'CS$(d in particular to GOO the Father ('Rever_ end', 'Majesty'), and Ihe Telegram to God the Son. Since bolh
comist of the polyglol verbiagt: of the Holy Ghost, the Deity U he,"" once again addr=ing himlClf, in a oomewhat rollDdabout
way, "" in Kabbalistic theology.
T h e Tel ~ rarn , w h i c b , i n c l u d i n g f r a g m e n t a r y , " " c a l t . . ,
appean about a doun times in various /Om. . " U always an appeal for alOi. tance of >Ome kind, . . ,Dt by Shem when absent on h;' fr<:quenl trips 'down under'. As SO often, the Devil tries 10 implicate Christ in hi< schemel. The Telegram first appears in ralh~r fragmentary form at 42. 09. That Shem is its author is he,"" indicated simply by the word 'cx-cx_exe<:utive', which foreshadows the epithet 'Ex"",,,,, COMMUNICA TED' applied to Shem at 172. 10 (half a pa~ prior to a further important occurrenCe of the motif). In this first eaac the request, like Joyce's iunumerable importuning!