by Ted Gioia<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here are your survival tools for\u00a0Finnegans Wake. \u00a0For your benefit,I’ve prioritized these, with the essential items at the top, and the optionalitems lower down on the list. \u00a0Students of this work also need to knowabout several invaluable websites\u2014I\u2019d call particular attention to theFinnegans Wake\u00a0Extensible Elucidation Treasury\u00a0and the\u00a0Finnegans-Wiki. \u00a0Also see my essay\u00a0“The Adventurer\u2019s Guide to Finnegans Wake.” by Ted Gioia Here are your survival tools for\u00a0Finnegans Wake. \u00a0For your benefit,I’ve prioritized these, with the essential items at the top, and the optionalitems lower down on the list. \u00a0Students of this work also need to knowabout several invaluable websites\u2014I\u2019d call particular attention to theFinnegans Wake\u00a0Extensible Elucidation Treasury\u00a0and the\u00a0Finnegans-Wiki. \u00a0Also see my essay\u00a0“The Adventurer\u2019s<\/p>\n
William York Tindall: \u00a0
A Reader\u2019s Guide to Finnegans Wake
<\/strong>This is still the best short guide to\u00a0Finnegans
Wake<\/em>. \u00a0Tindall taught at Columbia University for
40 years, and he began lecturing on Joyce back
in the 1920s when\u00a0Ulysses<\/em>\u00a0was still banned in the
United States. \u00a0For many years he taught a seminar
course on\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u00a0at Columbia, and, as
this guide makes clear, he both instructed and
learned from his students. \u00a0This book, one of
Tindall\u2019s last publications, draws on the fruits of
this lifetime of engagement with Joyce\u2019s work. Like
Campbell, Tindall will walk you chapter-by-chapter
through the book\u2014and do so with a clarity, honesty
and good humor that other scholars might do well to
emulate. \u00a0He will make clear the distinction between
what he knows about the book, and what he merely
suspects. \u00a0\u00a0If he encounters a passage that mystifies
him, he will admit it. \u00a0\u00a0He praises Joyce when praise
is warranted, and isn\u2019t afraid to criticize the author
when he Joyce falls short of Tindall\u2019s standards. His
accounts of each chapter are not synopses, such
as Campbell offers, but are astute commentaries,
filled with facts, hints, ideas and conjectures. Of all
the Joyceans, he is the one who comes closest to
matching Joyce pun for pun, joke for joke, and in a
field that is littered with dense, foreboding academic
jargon, Tindall achieved the almost impossible: writing
a sprightly, readable guide to the most difficult work
in the English language. \u00a0
John Bishop:
Joyce\u2019s Book of the Dark
<\/strong>When I was at Stanford, I heard about a graduate
student who allegedly knew Joyce\u2019s work better
than any of the professors. \u00a0I never met him or
went to the classes where he demonstrated his
arcane knowledge of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>, but word-
of-mouth accounts of his expertise spread through
campus intellectual circles, and caught the attention
of people who cared about such matters. When
I picked up this book years later and saw all the
names of Stanford professors in the acknowledge-
ments, the lightbulb went on. \u00a0This must have been
that<\/em>\u00a0dude. \u00a0And, truly, John Bishop has probed into
the inner workings of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u00a0as deeply
as anyone not named James Joyce. \u00a0His study,
Joyce’s Book of the Dark<\/em>, will not take you gently
through each chapter of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>, as do
Campbell and Tindall, but it is unsurpassed at
grasping the larger themes and significations of
the text. I do have my reservations about this book
\u2014it is filled with some of the most cumbersome
sentences I’ve ever read (in true Joycean fashion),
and the repetitions sometimes seem like padding.
It is too partisan, both in its advocacy of Bishop’s
agenda and its unwillingness to admit any criticisms
of Joyce’s work. \u00a0But the astuteness of the author
and the brilliance of his synthesis make this an
essential book for those grappling with\u00a0Finnegans
Wake<\/em>. \u00a0\u00a0
Richard Ellmann: \u00a0
James Joyce
<\/strong>Reading a writer’s biography is typically an
optional exercise for the casual student. \u00a0But Joyce
put so much of his own life into his novels\u2014and
in ways that are so puzzling to outsiders who don’t
know the real-life details behind the fiction\u2014that
readers of his work really should consult a first-rate
biography. Fortunately for us, Richard Ellmann has
written one of the best literary biographies of
modern times, and his 900-page work\u00a0James
Joyce<\/em>\u00a0(first published in 1959 and revised in 1982)
remains unsurpassed more than a half-century
after its initial release. \u00a0(For those who want to
know why I prefer Ellmann’s book to more recent
Joyce biographies, including Gordon Bowker’s
2012 volume, check out my essay\u00a0“The Many Lives
of James Joyce.”) \u00a0\u00a0You will understand many
aspects of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u00a0far better if you first
make your acquaintance with Joyce via Ellmann’s
in-depth study. Joyce’s complex relationships with
his father, mother, wife, daughter, and brother
Stanislaus undergird the family dynamics of
Finnegans Wake<\/em>. These and many of the recurring
plot fragments of the novel (such as the encounter
of Buckley and the Russian general or Joyce\u2019s many
literary\u2014and other\u2014rivalries) are addressed
superbly in Ellmann\u2019s bio. \u00a0
Joseph Campbell:
A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake
<\/strong>Published just five years after Joyce released
Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u00a0to a befuddled public, Joseph
Cambpell’s ‘skeleton key’ served as the entry point
that allowed the first generation of readers to come
to grips with this daunting novel. True, Campbell’s
interpretation has been superseded by later
scholars, who differ with some of his views, and
have supplemented others. \u00a0Yet this remains a
useful guide to Joyce\u2019s book, especially as it still is
one of the few places to go to get a page-by-
page synopsis that will guide you through the
entirety of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>. \u00a0I found some insights
in Campbell\u2019s exegesis that were missing in later
commentaries, and even some of his “outdated”
interpretations are thought-provoking and will spur
you to consider different aspects of Joyce\u2019s novel. \u00a0
Also, the last chapter in Campbell\u2019s book is one of
the best brief assessments of\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u2014
you might even want (in true Joycean fashion, if you
will allow me repeat myself) to start with that chapter
before turning to the start of the book.
Giambattista Vico: \u00a0
The New Science
Joyce often told people that, if they wanted to
understand\u00a0Finnegans Wake, they should read
Vico’s\u00a0The New Science. \u00a0I second that suggestion,
and you will find a familiarity with Vico will be
especially helpful if you also read\u00a0The New Science
in conjunction with the section on Vico in John
Bishop’s\u00a0Joyce\u2019s Book of the Dark\u00a0(see above). \u00a0
But I would also recommend\u00a0The New Science\u00a0simply
for the joy of reading one of the most visionary wor
of sociology \/ anthropology \/ philosophy every
published. \u00a0I only wish someone would come up
with a fully annotated version of\u00a0The New Science<\/em>,
akin to the annotated guides to Joyce. \u00a0In a pinch,
you can consult\u00a0Isaiah Berlin\u2019s writings on Vico, but
at that point you will have moved beyond Joycean
studies and into the fascinating world of Viconian
studies.\u00a0\u00a0
Roland McHugh: \u00a0
Annotations to Finnegans Wake
I thought I would use this book more than I actually
did. \u00a0When I read\u00a0Ulysses, I benefitted enormously
from\u00a0Don Gifford and Robert Seidman’s 700 pages
of annotations, and wanted something comparable
for\u00a0Finnegans Wake. \u00a0But McHugh\u2019s tiny font
reference is more compressed and far less user-
friendly as the\u00a0fweet.org\u00a0website. \u00a0That latter
resource\u2014also known as the Finnegans Wake
Extensible Elucidation Treasury (FWEET)\u2014is now
the starting point for close analysis of puzzling
passages in Joyce\u2019s novel. \u00a0Also check out the
Finnegans Wake\u00a0wiki on the web. (You can fin
other relevant web links at the\u00a0James Joyce in
Cyberspace\u00a0website.)
The Egyptian Book of the Dead:
(The Paypyrus of Ani)
<\/strong>I recommend this book (papyrus?) with some
trepidation. \u00a0Any list of the most boring books
I have read in my lifetime will find\u00a0The Egyptian
Book of the Dead<\/em>\u00a0somewhere in the top five. \u00a0
But the plot of this apparently plotless ancient
book is\u2014as Joyce himself understood and planned
\u2014the blueprint for the plot of the apparently
plotless novel\u00a0Finnegans Wake<\/em>. \u00a0Once again,
consult Bishop\u2019s excellent treatment of\u00a0The
Egyptian Book of the Dead<\/em>\u00a0in\u00a0Joyce\u2019s Book
of the Dark<\/em>\u00a0(see above) for insights into the
connections between the two works. \u00a0And may
you come forth by day with your wrappings still
in good working order. \u00a0
Thornton Wilder: \u00a0
By the Skin of Our Teeth
<\/strong>This last recommendation is the least essential,
but for the sheer fun of it, you ought to read
Thornton Wilder\u2019s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1942
play\u00a0The Skin of our Teeth<\/em>. \u00a0Joseph Campbell
accused Wilder of stealing his story from
Finnegans Wake<\/em>\u2014perhaps an unfair accusation
(and especially puzzling coming from Campbell,
who made a significant borrowing from Joyce for
his own bestselling\u00a0The Hero with a Thousand
Faces<\/em>). \u00a0I consider this play more a hidden tribute
and reimagining of Joyce\u2019s book. \u00a0And I can’t
imagine any serious reader of\u00a0Finnegans Wake
<\/em>who doesn\u2019t take some delight in seeing how Wilder
can capture the essence of this difficult novel and
turn it into a fast-paced and funny stage comedy. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"