leal up with wax the Letter of life that they help to write, (There is, as J shall show, a
constant
and dose a~a.
Hart-Clive-1962-Structure-and-Motif-in-Finnegans-Wake
.
.
.
6 e u 1 a r : a l I o r u r .
11 s n o t 100 panicular $(I till budly abootJ lite rising ~rminallel bodley chew the rat ofhis auger and budJey bite the dustice ofthe piece.
' (Add.
MS 47"&, f.
67; it ;.
pouiblc thilt 'auger' mould rud 'anger'.
)
J oyce worked ! hi. up into a parody of Quinet lOr the /ulluiliH text; once again the earli~" venion of the parody it . "nOllt
identical to the final primed. text :
'When old the wormd was a gadden and Anthea fint unlOikd
hcr limt. WilndcrJoot was the way the. . . . . :old wagged anod opl~r and ilptcr were "'muraised twimbs. They had their mutlhering ivies and their murdheriDg idies and their mou1dhcring iri. . in that muskat grov. e but tbc:n:'U "'" hright P\innyflowcrs in . ,.
? TWQ MajorMotifs
Calomdla's cool bowers when tho magpyrc'. babble ! Own. ocorching and screeching from the ravenindove, I f thee. liked the s. ", of hi, head and mees at. . the =ps of h. . trauble. . . he'. dancing liggio. to the . pittle lide and ,hoving OUIS Ihe soord, And he'll be buying buys and gulling gell. with his car""" silk and honey while myandlhys playing laneirer luclfug and what'. duff' "" a bettie for u"",,, mak. . cosyn corallin. . ' moues weeter to wee, So till bU! again budly budly [titJ . hoor. thon riling gcrminallct bodJey chew the fan oChi, anger and badley bide the toil of h;" tubh:
(Add. MS 47. j. 80, f. lOS; J. J. Slocum and H. Cahoon, A Bibliography of ]llJNr ]Oft. 1882-1941, London, 1953, p. IOJ, section C. 70. )
The final parody (615) w. u apparently one of lhe I",t paosag. . of FinlltgallS WaM to he compD3e<i, ,ince il wa, not added to Book TV until aft~r the p("()O/i had btcn set up. 'lbe printed 1t:xl ;" almost exactly the oame OJ Ihe MS insenion. ' (The d ecision to include the q uotation in French in II. ~ aha se<:rru ! O have been made quile lale. )
The otiginal quotation and all the finished parodies are closely aMOCiatcd in the tt-. xt with commentaries on them which reheane the h:ci<; situation, or much of it, in fresh tcrnu, and in ""me c. . . . can alm",,[ be ,aid to ",present further min'" variation. on the mOlif. The paragraph foHowing the quotation
in lb dUeus$(! Quinet's ide,," with vivacity and disrespec:tful wit:
'Margaritomancy! Hyacin\hinou. pervinciveness! T-lowers, A cloud. But Bruto and Cau io are ware only of trifid tongues the whispe",dwilfuln. . . . . ('tis demonal! ) and ,hadow:! ohadows multi_
plicating (il fol$Olclto ne! fal$Olctto col fa. wlono dal fu<z o l = ), totienu quotienlJ, they ! adle thcir quarrel. Sidamo<>r s '" woful . . . . ny. Anci~nt'$ acrger. And ~achway bothwise glory sign. . What ihhc lo~e Sieger IC'S though ,he leave Ruhm moan ~ That', how our oxyggent has galien ahold of half Ihcir world. Moving about in the ~ of Ihe air and mixing with Ihe ruck. EnLen eller, eith. . or. '
, Bri,;,,, M"",wn Add. MS 47488, If. '9y-h. '9'
? T W Q Major Motifs
OM can K1l1<: in the OUlbursl ofnclamalion poinlO lh<: relief with which joy"", for all his praise of Quind, turned again to the frcedom of hi> own manner. That the I<:n! en"" in iUl original and parodied fonru is an important touchstone for the whole ofFiltlU! a11. 1 Wake is . uggested by the marginal gl_ t<. > this commentary: ''-QRTF. $ VIRGINIANAE'- for too. . , with eye. to . cc, all our fate. are to be fOund written in the Book of the Virgiru. , woo. . , my1tic invincibility (deriving perhapo from invincible ignoranc<:) Jccms to be implicit in joy",,', tramIation of th~ir name? . These names Once again allude to the masculine, . . . ,ldierly aspect of the /lowers, for Hyacinthu. was a homo- ><:xual Spartan boy, 'Margaritomancy! ' may be read ':\1argaret, a man, I<:e! ', and j oyce I<:em. to deriv~ pm;i1/C4 from pero;1t(D.
In a channing pr<:lude to the fi"'t parody {[4l, the basic material! of the senten"" ~ preoentcd in a pastoral setting. The polar principk. underlying the ocene ofhattks, death and regmwth, arc to be round 'neath the lIone pine' where the 'paltor lies with hil crook' . ' T he androgynoul lwinl are a pair
of gra7;ng sheep-'pricket' and 'pricket'. sisler'-while the 'herb trinity' Kern Once again to be femak, as on pa~ ~8I : 'amaid' (11. 33), The eternoJ scene haviog been . et- '1"hu. , ton, for donkey'. yean'- the parody of Quinet may follow: 'Since the bont. of Hebeat and Hairyman . . . '
JOYce'. inevitable clabot-atioIll! have allowed the flowers 10 increase their nnmber to . ix: 'ccmfiowen . . . dm kro~e . . . twolipo, ? ,whitethorn . , ? redthom. . . may_', while the garden in whid. they grow i. new located in Ireland. The parody il pregnant with crms--reference, to other themes and
motiu, a. we . hould ~. xpect. Tlu: word 'ria"lts' of the original i. ttndered by 'made-<. >f_ill. . . miles', which recurs in the next parody as 'made-<. >f-ill-houn' (['7'~9), thus 'uggesting both the girl. ' timeless qualities and . heir con,tant sensual willing_ n~; the important figure [QoXJ' appears bere a. 'chiliad'; the
, The cr<>ok ;. Eve, m. d< from Adam', bent rib: d. 'H", ,. . . . nliJi? . ? ip'" IiM"""'"JN~IIIJoJi4m' (7->>).
' s. . (
.
",
? Two Mop Motifs
round of twenty_nine woro. for 'Pea",,' {47? -71)- which form. . a complete cycle in itself; and recurs in lILS as twenty-nine words for 'Dead' (499. 0{)- is heralded in both fornu by the pbrll. $e 'pax,ealing buttonholes', implying that the flowe", both bring pea"" and !
leal up with wax the Letter of life that they help to write, (There is, as J shall show, a constant and dose a~a. tion of the LeUer with Quinet" ",nten"". ) The mqst important of the cross-T~fereIlCe$, however, is the indmion of the old dance to the rhythm of which the llowen a,. . , made to arrive jltSq. ''; MuS: ''luadrilled acl'OS< the centuries'_The dan"" j , C<lntinuallyul<:d inFinntl'JM Wah "" a symbol ofcommunica-
tion and of cyclic progr= _When they chant 'Peace' the leap- year gir\t dance widdenhiOJ around Shaun-Osi. u, as if around II. phallic may_pole and, even more significantly perhaps, they execute a sacred '! rep"'" when they change thu dumt to 'Dead', on the occasion of his spar'W"'" (499)- I have already mentioned Joyce'. repeated assertion that the cyclic scheme of Finntgans Wah 'i, like a rumba round my garden'_' Quinet'. flowers grow ;n the g-~rden of the world as civilisation. dash and
break, SO that;n the 'rumha' of historical progr. . . we may now J"'rhaps hear a . uggcuion of the rumhle of 'toppling malQnry'. Into the commentary which folIoW$ the fint parody Joyce
pours all the superfluity of material that eQuid not be J<[u~Ltd into the parody itself; "",ful idea. o appa,. . ,ntly flowed all too fast. This is one calC where the very richn"" ofJoy""', thinlcing b<<. ame something of an embarrassment to him. He had already hlown the KJIlcnCC up to more than one and half times iU original length ("9 word. against Quinet's 7$) and had left only the vaguest rhythmic similarity. The decoration of the d aMical mooel with a IlUl! S of baroque ornamentation had to stop befo,. . , poor Quinet dilapJ"'ared altog<'lher. BUI, as. usual, Joyce manages to turn difficulty to his own advantage, for
,. . ,petition 'in OUlher waro. ' is, after all, what he u looling fur moot of the time in Finntlans Wah; ifhe has too much material for any given thematic statement he simply repeau hirruelf
,T,,,,,,,(Fr. ) . . d. . . th.
? Su 1~ "
,
o. . pler F;ve, Ill.
'"
? rWQ MaiM Motifs
untu the material il exhawted. Thi. new /low of rich and ~ocative I y m b o l . g i v e > fu rlh~r v a l u a b l e i n . r i g h t s i n t n I h e primary situatinn. The rhylhmic IUperiorily of Joyce's free . Iyleisatonc~ apparent:
'T he babbelero with Iheir thang", vain have b"en (confuoium hald them') they were and went; thigging thugs were and houhnhymn ""ngloms were and comely nurgeL. were and polly. fool fianlCe>. Menn have thawed, clorh have . m. . . urhummed, tbe blond hal ""ught of the brune: Elsd:in thou may, mean Kerry piggy? : and the dundedame> have countered "ilh the hdlisl, fell""" : Who ails tongue codd. au, a'pace of dumbill_ lilly? And they fell upong one anolher: and themselve. they have faUen. And . . ill nowanights and by nights of yure do all bold floral of the field to their Ihyfaun loven "'y unly: Cull me ~re I wilt to thee! : and, but a little later: Pluek me whilst I blush! Well may they wilt, marry, and profu. . ,dly bluili, be
lroth' t? or that saying i, '" nld '" the howitts. Lave a whale while in a whillbarrow (i,n't it the truath I'm tallin yen 10 bave fin< and flippen that ahimmy and Ihake. Tim Timmycan
limped hir, lampting Tam. F1cppety! flippety! Fleapow! Hop! '
In the second parody, 00 page "7, the brothe. . . pair, who had been incarnated on page Ii, . . cavemen equivalent! ! of Heber and Heremon, take on the form of a mwic-hall song_ and? dance team: 'Since nuzzy Nandtc tripped palmyway. with BighOO Harry . . . ' The three flowen, on the other hand, no longer figure as individuall, bllt al a collective Iyrnbol, Ihe Letter: 'this oldworld cpiatola'. In identifying the flower_girls with their Letter, Joyce is ~ven more literally putting into
practice Tsolde', ,ugg~lIion in her lecund footnote on pag<' 28, . It i, significant that while this is the ,? enion in whicb the Q uinet_ Letter identification iI made m! >>t explicit, it il allO the parody which depar! $ mo. t from Ihe rhythlT1. \ an d general urgam. ation of the original (except rur the Sp<<ial (a5<: (m page 354) ;Joyce i, opting for more 'tum,h' and I"" French. It i. partiClIlarly rich in allu\",,,, 10 olher motifs and Iheir :urociated symbot. , ! . he IIK>$I,alienIofth= beingthecup-of_tea_and_polstill_lifewhich
'"
? Two MajO'f Motifs
c. usuaUy in evidence wmewhue in the middle-gT(lundwhencvu the Letter is under discu$$iQt1. The water fur the wetting of the tea and the comcquent creation of a new world is healed o,'er the fiTe of 'Pat', Purge' (I' 7-'6)- an annrnng rone<:it by meam ofwhichJoycedOilely"""". ialC$ the tea symbolwith theubiqui_ tous Phocnix-Magic-Fire theme. Bridget and Patr;cl< enter with their rorulanl litany of 'Launauf'_'m"he mi' he',' modifict! here to 'wulfsouff' and 'talhtalh', and since Bridget and I'atrid, are a cOIUtantly recurring brothe. . . . and-,ister pair, their solemn ritual ;, evidently to be identified with the theatrical frivolit;C$ of 'NaneUe' and 'Harry'.
The . urvival of the Letter-posy ovu the 'billiousne,-,' of infirm 'mixed racings' is devdoped in a very direct ,tatement of the Viconian cyclic principle:
'th'" oldworld epistola of their weathering, and their rnarryings and their burying. and their natural selecti",,", h'" <mnhlcd
tumbled down to lIS fench and made-at? all_hou. . . liL: an ould cup on tay. '
The ,C<:ne of the rise and faU ofmalCuline glory h", meanwhile bttn shifled. from Ireland (IS) had to Europe-'Pieter'. in Nieuw Amotddam and Paoli', where th~ poulC! > go'---<)r ptt- hapo even farther afield- 'he dined off sooth american'_ bul wherever the comedy may be play<:d out Ihe slow progr(:! . ! of history is . een to be like nothing SO much'" the gigantic drink_ ing party of Fin""g<l1U Wake: 'two hoots or three jeen for the grapc vine and brew'. The whole of this parody i. in /a(l a further . tage in J oyce'. reduction of the nightmare of history
to a '. hout in the "reet'.
The puts dts haMill", which in the fInt parody were meta_
morphosed into an Iri,h bloodbath Qn the 'eve of Killallwho', are now no more than a . t<>rm in 'an ould cup on tay'. 'Joyc<: c. identifying the fighting in the flCld with the suual battl~ wruch a$$UI"C. 'l the rontinued. ~. xislCnc<: of tbe race of flowers, and in so doing h~ i. {>O'tulating th~ ultimate interdependence
'. so. A~;x A. ? . so. F. M. BoId<rclf,~F~I""Wok. ,N"",Y""k,'959. pp. ,8. If.
! O< . . - . i n , , = < t i o g " " " " " , n u O I l t h e f u n c ! ; ' " o f , o a . . y m b o l i s r n ; n F ; . " q . . u W~.
t9~
? Two Major Motifs
of Quinel'l oppos<d principles of . . . . . and peace. morulity and continuity_ This is yelanolMr ex. ample oftlw: lu. uaching waY' in which /nllMl,os work for J oy<<, for withoul lhe . tructural ~ 'Pm W MlAjllts-ouid cup on lay', which the
motif eau. blishes, Jvyce'. point would be 1,. _
In the brilliantly (:(Incise ,. . ,~ of1M se"tence on page ~s6
the two Roman histori. . . . . ha~e been tramformed into the tnditionalfoundcnoCtbeirciry-'~andRehmoooc' - a ralher less pacific ample. Afler havi"ll quadrill<<l. aClOSS Ihe centuries which separale 1. 1 and 1l. 1 , lile Howen have been
refined away until nothing remai. . . . of them but 1M <:SSence of theirdar_ dlepa~. . . . . ,wal~reds,andri~hile the _ lie of their . . :ducth. . , Iiolia .
J oyce worked ! hi. up into a parody of Quinet lOr the /ulluiliH text; once again the earli~" venion of the parody it . "nOllt
identical to the final primed. text :
'When old the wormd was a gadden and Anthea fint unlOikd
hcr limt. WilndcrJoot was the way the. . . . . :old wagged anod opl~r and ilptcr were "'muraised twimbs. They had their mutlhering ivies and their murdheriDg idies and their mou1dhcring iri. . in that muskat grov. e but tbc:n:'U "'" hright P\innyflowcrs in . ,.
? TWQ MajorMotifs
Calomdla's cool bowers when tho magpyrc'. babble ! Own. ocorching and screeching from the ravenindove, I f thee. liked the s. ", of hi, head and mees at. . the =ps of h. . trauble. . . he'. dancing liggio. to the . pittle lide and ,hoving OUIS Ihe soord, And he'll be buying buys and gulling gell. with his car""" silk and honey while myandlhys playing laneirer luclfug and what'. duff' "" a bettie for u"",,, mak. . cosyn corallin. . ' moues weeter to wee, So till bU! again budly budly [titJ . hoor. thon riling gcrminallct bodJey chew the fan oChi, anger and badley bide the toil of h;" tubh:
(Add. MS 47. j. 80, f. lOS; J. J. Slocum and H. Cahoon, A Bibliography of ]llJNr ]Oft. 1882-1941, London, 1953, p. IOJ, section C. 70. )
The final parody (615) w. u apparently one of lhe I",t paosag. . of FinlltgallS WaM to he compD3e<i, ,ince il wa, not added to Book TV until aft~r the p("()O/i had btcn set up. 'lbe printed 1t:xl ;" almost exactly the oame OJ Ihe MS insenion. ' (The d ecision to include the q uotation in French in II. ~ aha se<:rru ! O have been made quile lale. )
The otiginal quotation and all the finished parodies are closely aMOCiatcd in the tt-. xt with commentaries on them which reheane the h:ci<; situation, or much of it, in fresh tcrnu, and in ""me c. . . . can alm",,[ be ,aid to ",present further min'" variation. on the mOlif. The paragraph foHowing the quotation
in lb dUeus$(! Quinet's ide,," with vivacity and disrespec:tful wit:
'Margaritomancy! Hyacin\hinou. pervinciveness! T-lowers, A cloud. But Bruto and Cau io are ware only of trifid tongues the whispe",dwilfuln. . . . . ('tis demonal! ) and ,hadow:! ohadows multi_
plicating (il fol$Olclto ne! fal$Olctto col fa. wlono dal fu<z o l = ), totienu quotienlJ, they ! adle thcir quarrel. Sidamo<>r s '" woful . . . . ny. Anci~nt'$ acrger. And ~achway bothwise glory sign. . What ihhc lo~e Sieger IC'S though ,he leave Ruhm moan ~ That', how our oxyggent has galien ahold of half Ihcir world. Moving about in the ~ of Ihe air and mixing with Ihe ruck. EnLen eller, eith. . or. '
, Bri,;,,, M"",wn Add. MS 47488, If. '9y-h. '9'
? T W Q Major Motifs
OM can K1l1<: in the OUlbursl ofnclamalion poinlO lh<: relief with which joy"", for all his praise of Quind, turned again to the frcedom of hi> own manner. That the I<:n! en"" in iUl original and parodied fonru is an important touchstone for the whole ofFiltlU! a11. 1 Wake is . uggested by the marginal gl_ t<. > this commentary: ''-QRTF. $ VIRGINIANAE'- for too. . , with eye. to . cc, all our fate. are to be fOund written in the Book of the Virgiru. , woo. . , my1tic invincibility (deriving perhapo from invincible ignoranc<:) Jccms to be implicit in joy",,', tramIation of th~ir name? . These names Once again allude to the masculine, . . . ,ldierly aspect of the /lowers, for Hyacinthu. was a homo- ><:xual Spartan boy, 'Margaritomancy! ' may be read ':\1argaret, a man, I<:e! ', and j oyce I<:em. to deriv~ pm;i1/C4 from pero;1t(D.
In a channing pr<:lude to the fi"'t parody {[4l, the basic material! of the senten"" ~ preoentcd in a pastoral setting. The polar principk. underlying the ocene ofhattks, death and regmwth, arc to be round 'neath the lIone pine' where the 'paltor lies with hil crook' . ' T he androgynoul lwinl are a pair
of gra7;ng sheep-'pricket' and 'pricket'. sisler'-while the 'herb trinity' Kern Once again to be femak, as on pa~ ~8I : 'amaid' (11. 33), The eternoJ scene haviog been . et- '1"hu. , ton, for donkey'. yean'- the parody of Quinet may follow: 'Since the bont. of Hebeat and Hairyman . . . '
JOYce'. inevitable clabot-atioIll! have allowed the flowers 10 increase their nnmber to . ix: 'ccmfiowen . . . dm kro~e . . . twolipo, ? ,whitethorn . , ? redthom. . . may_', while the garden in whid. they grow i. new located in Ireland. The parody il pregnant with crms--reference, to other themes and
motiu, a. we . hould ~. xpect. Tlu: word 'ria"lts' of the original i. ttndered by 'made-<. >f_ill. . . miles', which recurs in the next parody as 'made-<. >f-ill-houn' (['7'~9), thus 'uggesting both the girl. ' timeless qualities and . heir con,tant sensual willing_ n~; the important figure [QoXJ' appears bere a. 'chiliad'; the
, The cr<>ok ;. Eve, m. d< from Adam', bent rib: d. 'H", ,. . . . nliJi? . ? ip'" IiM"""'"JN~IIIJoJi4m' (7->>).
' s. . (
.
",
? Two Mop Motifs
round of twenty_nine woro. for 'Pea",,' {47? -71)- which form. . a complete cycle in itself; and recurs in lILS as twenty-nine words for 'Dead' (499. 0{)- is heralded in both fornu by the pbrll. $e 'pax,ealing buttonholes', implying that the flowe", both bring pea"" and !
leal up with wax the Letter of life that they help to write, (There is, as J shall show, a constant and dose a~a. tion of the LeUer with Quinet" ",nten"". ) The mqst important of the cross-T~fereIlCe$, however, is the indmion of the old dance to the rhythm of which the llowen a,. . , made to arrive jltSq. ''; MuS: ''luadrilled acl'OS< the centuries'_The dan"" j , C<lntinuallyul<:d inFinntl'JM Wah "" a symbol ofcommunica-
tion and of cyclic progr= _When they chant 'Peace' the leap- year gir\t dance widdenhiOJ around Shaun-Osi. u, as if around II. phallic may_pole and, even more significantly perhaps, they execute a sacred '! rep"'" when they change thu dumt to 'Dead', on the occasion of his spar'W"'" (499)- I have already mentioned Joyce'. repeated assertion that the cyclic scheme of Finntgans Wah 'i, like a rumba round my garden'_' Quinet'. flowers grow ;n the g-~rden of the world as civilisation. dash and
break, SO that;n the 'rumha' of historical progr. . . we may now J"'rhaps hear a . uggcuion of the rumhle of 'toppling malQnry'. Into the commentary which folIoW$ the fint parody Joyce
pours all the superfluity of material that eQuid not be J<[u~Ltd into the parody itself; "",ful idea. o appa,. . ,ntly flowed all too fast. This is one calC where the very richn"" ofJoy""', thinlcing b<<. ame something of an embarrassment to him. He had already hlown the KJIlcnCC up to more than one and half times iU original length ("9 word. against Quinet's 7$) and had left only the vaguest rhythmic similarity. The decoration of the d aMical mooel with a IlUl! S of baroque ornamentation had to stop befo,. . , poor Quinet dilapJ"'ared altog<'lher. BUI, as. usual, Joyce manages to turn difficulty to his own advantage, for
,. . ,petition 'in OUlher waro. ' is, after all, what he u looling fur moot of the time in Finntlans Wah; ifhe has too much material for any given thematic statement he simply repeau hirruelf
,T,,,,,,,(Fr. ) . . d. . . th.
? Su 1~ "
,
o. . pler F;ve, Ill.
'"
? rWQ MaiM Motifs
untu the material il exhawted. Thi. new /low of rich and ~ocative I y m b o l . g i v e > fu rlh~r v a l u a b l e i n . r i g h t s i n t n I h e primary situatinn. The rhylhmic IUperiorily of Joyce's free . Iyleisatonc~ apparent:
'T he babbelero with Iheir thang", vain have b"en (confuoium hald them') they were and went; thigging thugs were and houhnhymn ""ngloms were and comely nurgeL. were and polly. fool fianlCe>. Menn have thawed, clorh have . m. . . urhummed, tbe blond hal ""ught of the brune: Elsd:in thou may, mean Kerry piggy? : and the dundedame> have countered "ilh the hdlisl, fell""" : Who ails tongue codd. au, a'pace of dumbill_ lilly? And they fell upong one anolher: and themselve. they have faUen. And . . ill nowanights and by nights of yure do all bold floral of the field to their Ihyfaun loven "'y unly: Cull me ~re I wilt to thee! : and, but a little later: Pluek me whilst I blush! Well may they wilt, marry, and profu. . ,dly bluili, be
lroth' t? or that saying i, '" nld '" the howitts. Lave a whale while in a whillbarrow (i,n't it the truath I'm tallin yen 10 bave fin< and flippen that ahimmy and Ihake. Tim Timmycan
limped hir, lampting Tam. F1cppety! flippety! Fleapow! Hop! '
In the second parody, 00 page "7, the brothe. . . pair, who had been incarnated on page Ii, . . cavemen equivalent! ! of Heber and Heremon, take on the form of a mwic-hall song_ and? dance team: 'Since nuzzy Nandtc tripped palmyway. with BighOO Harry . . . ' The three flowen, on the other hand, no longer figure as individuall, bllt al a collective Iyrnbol, Ihe Letter: 'this oldworld cpiatola'. In identifying the flower_girls with their Letter, Joyce is ~ven more literally putting into
practice Tsolde', ,ugg~lIion in her lecund footnote on pag<' 28, . It i, significant that while this is the ,? enion in whicb the Q uinet_ Letter identification iI made m! >>t explicit, it il allO the parody which depar! $ mo. t from Ihe rhythlT1. \ an d general urgam. ation of the original (except rur the Sp<<ial (a5<: (m page 354) ;Joyce i, opting for more 'tum,h' and I"" French. It i. partiClIlarly rich in allu\",,,, 10 olher motifs and Iheir :urociated symbot. , ! . he IIK>$I,alienIofth= beingthecup-of_tea_and_polstill_lifewhich
'"
? Two MajO'f Motifs
c. usuaUy in evidence wmewhue in the middle-gT(lundwhencvu the Letter is under discu$$iQt1. The water fur the wetting of the tea and the comcquent creation of a new world is healed o,'er the fiTe of 'Pat', Purge' (I' 7-'6)- an annrnng rone<:it by meam ofwhichJoycedOilely"""". ialC$ the tea symbolwith theubiqui_ tous Phocnix-Magic-Fire theme. Bridget and Patr;cl< enter with their rorulanl litany of 'Launauf'_'m"he mi' he',' modifict! here to 'wulfsouff' and 'talhtalh', and since Bridget and I'atrid, are a cOIUtantly recurring brothe. . . . and-,ister pair, their solemn ritual ;, evidently to be identified with the theatrical frivolit;C$ of 'NaneUe' and 'Harry'.
The . urvival of the Letter-posy ovu the 'billiousne,-,' of infirm 'mixed racings' is devdoped in a very direct ,tatement of the Viconian cyclic principle:
'th'" oldworld epistola of their weathering, and their rnarryings and their burying. and their natural selecti",,", h'" <mnhlcd
tumbled down to lIS fench and made-at? all_hou. . . liL: an ould cup on tay. '
The ,C<:ne of the rise and faU ofmalCuline glory h", meanwhile bttn shifled. from Ireland (IS) had to Europe-'Pieter'. in Nieuw Amotddam and Paoli', where th~ poulC! > go'---<)r ptt- hapo even farther afield- 'he dined off sooth american'_ bul wherever the comedy may be play<:d out Ihe slow progr(:! . ! of history is . een to be like nothing SO much'" the gigantic drink_ ing party of Fin""g<l1U Wake: 'two hoots or three jeen for the grapc vine and brew'. The whole of this parody i. in /a(l a further . tage in J oyce'. reduction of the nightmare of history
to a '. hout in the "reet'.
The puts dts haMill", which in the fInt parody were meta_
morphosed into an Iri,h bloodbath Qn the 'eve of Killallwho', are now no more than a . t<>rm in 'an ould cup on tay'. 'Joyc<: c. identifying the fighting in the flCld with the suual battl~ wruch a$$UI"C. 'l the rontinued. ~. xislCnc<: of tbe race of flowers, and in so doing h~ i. {>O'tulating th~ ultimate interdependence
'. so. A~;x A. ? . so. F. M. BoId<rclf,~F~I""Wok. ,N"",Y""k,'959. pp. ,8. If.
! O< . . - . i n , , = < t i o g " " " " " , n u O I l t h e f u n c ! ; ' " o f , o a . . y m b o l i s r n ; n F ; . " q . . u W~.
t9~
? Two Major Motifs
of Quinel'l oppos<d principles of . . . . . and peace. morulity and continuity_ This is yelanolMr ex. ample oftlw: lu. uaching waY' in which /nllMl,os work for J oy<<, for withoul lhe . tructural ~ 'Pm W MlAjllts-ouid cup on lay', which the
motif eau. blishes, Jvyce'. point would be 1,. _
In the brilliantly (:(Incise ,. . ,~ of1M se"tence on page ~s6
the two Roman histori. . . . . ha~e been tramformed into the tnditionalfoundcnoCtbeirciry-'~andRehmoooc' - a ralher less pacific ample. Afler havi"ll quadrill<<l. aClOSS Ihe centuries which separale 1. 1 and 1l. 1 , lile Howen have been
refined away until nothing remai. . . . of them but 1M <:SSence of theirdar_ dlepa~. . . . . ,wal~reds,andri~hile the _ lie of their . . :ducth. . , Iiolia .
