The people's Joyce

JOHN RIDDELL

A guide to the guide books to "Ulysses," in the manner of the current efforts to explain the Irish Genius

NOTE: Ever since Judge Woolsey rendered his famous decision removing the ban from James Joyce, and Ulysses consequently became a legal topic of conversation at our better dinner-parties, ever-increasing numbers of guide-books to the Irish classic* have been attaching themselves like tin cans to Mr. Joyce's tail, explaining the hidden meaning of Joyce, unbuttoning his innuendoes, and revealing his inner significances. In view of all the current popular efforts to explain the inner significances of Joyce's work, therefore, the editors of Vanity Fair have requested Mr. John Riddell this month to compile a guide-book to all these guide-books to Ulysses, complete with map, thesaurus, and six (6) socially correct remarks about James Joyce to make to your partner at a formal dinner.

• Apparently the first step in understanding Ulysses—according to all the guidehooks and keys and charts to the Irish classic that seemed to spring up overnight as soon as the thirty-sixth State ratified James Joyce—is to realize that this epic work is really a vast symbol of something. All we need to do is to find out what that something is, and then we shall all be able to discuss James Joyce as well as the next one, who probably hasn't read him, either.

To be sure, there seems to be a slight difference of opinion on the subject among the guide-books. Certain learned critics, for example, claim that Ulysses is a modern version of the Odyssey. Other savants have insisted that it is really a parody of the Catholic Church, a medical treatise, an Irish version of the Wandering Jew, an autobiography, a story of wit vs. obstacles, an interesting ramble through Dublin and environs, or a symbol of the human digestive-organs in operation. In order to clear up the matter once and for all, therefore, we should like to reveal the fact that Ulysses, in reality, is a vast allegory showing the progress of a Thought through Janies Joyce's mind. No wonder that nobody can understand it.

For example, we shall assume that the arena of the action is Joyce's brain. The wanderings of Stephen Dedalus, the hero, therefore, actually represent the progress of the idea of Stephen Dedalus fare you following this very carefully?) through the head of Joyce, from the time the idea first enters his left ear until the time it emerges from his right ear. Everything that happens to Stephen is really only what Joyce thinks happens to Stephen. On the other hand, Stephen himself is actually somewhere else all the time, and as a matter of fact is pretty firmly convinced for his own part that James Joyce is only a thought that is passing through his mind. The plot of the book is to see which of them can stop thinking about the other one without his knowing it, as a result of which the loser automatically becomes a Red Rover and may tackle either side.

To make this vast allegory perfectly clear, we append a partial list of characters and a brief outline of Ulysses so that the reader may observe the brilliant analogy:

LIST OF CHARACTERS

Stephen Dedalus as James Joyce's Idea of Stephen Dedalus.

Leopold Bloom as A Spinal Impulse.

Mrs. Bloom as A Spinal Ganglion.

Blazes Boylan as Pons.

Gerty MacDowell as Cerebrum.

Martha Clifford as Cerebellum.

Paddy; Dignamtas parietals.

Skin-the-Goat )

Bella Cohen as James Joyce's Left Frontal Lobe.

The Mad "Citizen" as Napoleon.

Membranes, Grey Matter, Brain Tissues, and Hautboys, with Torches.

OUTLINE OF ULYSSES BOOK I

CHAPTER I. Time: About 8:00 A.M., 1904-34. Place: James Joyce's Brain, near Dublin.

Buck Mulligan (James Joyce's left ear) is shaving. Stephen Dedalus enters and encounters Haines (Joyce's tympanum) who sets up immediate vibrations (on page 7) as a result of which Stephen is transferred to the inner ear (Mr. Deasy's school). On page 18 Stephen leaves Buck after breakfast to go to one of Joyce's temporal lobes (82 Tyrone Street) where he meets Bella Cohen and several other red corpuscles. They sit around brooding about some grey matter. During the next fifty-eight chapters Stephen sets out for an afternoon walk through the back of Joyce's mind, and visits various brain hemispheres. Bloom (a spinal impulse) appears in Joyce's Eustachian Tube, where he and Stephen purchase a basket of young spring ganglions for Mrs. Bloom at Thorton's. They decide that they are not getting anywhere and emerge from Joyce's right ear and go off somewhere together to get very plastered. The book ends just as Joyce stops thinking.

A Key to theUlysses of James Joyce by Paul Jordan Smith; James Joyce's Ulysses by Stuart Gilbert; James Joyce and the Making of Ulysses by Frank Bludgen; etc., etc.

To be sure, no guide-book to James Joyce would be complete without a word of warning to the inexperienced reader who contemplates setting out for the first time on a journey through Ulysses. For example, he should know at the outset that some of Mr. Joyce's paragraphs extend anywhere from twenty to thirty pages in length, and that several sentences are so long that their source has never been discovered by a white man. Indeed, the margins of his chapters are strewn with the bones of unfortunate readers, whose bleached skulls are mute testimony to the perils that await the novice along the trail. Although past efforts to explore and map this vast wilderness have taken a heavy toll of readers, nevertheless the fascination of Ulysses still persists, and plans are being made today to organize a vast expedition which will endeavor to penetrate the final chapter and track down a persistent rumor that Gertrude Stein is being held captive there as a White Goddess by an unknown tribe of natives.

In case the reader decides to embark on a tour of Ulysses, therefore, he should equip himself beforehand with plenty of warm clothing, a hatchet, compass, firstaid kit (in case he should trip over some of the longer words) and sufficient food to last him for several weeks. Upon entering a sentence, the experienced reader will take the added precaution of blazing every few words with his axe, so that in case of emergency he can find his way back again to the beginning. It is also wise to sight some familiar object, such as a page numeral or a Chapter Heading, and learn to guide on this. In case the reader is without a compass, moreover, he may determine the general direction in which the book is going by noting the shadow of a match on the face of his watch at noon, or else by observing tin* moss which usually grows on the north side of Joyce's words. Remember that the beginning of a sentence is generally indicated by a capital letter, and the end by a small sign such as (.) or (?). The end of the book may be determined by the back cover.

■ Let us say that the reader has penetrated to the center of a dense paragraph and is forced to stay there for the night. Above all, he must not lose his head. His first task is to kindle a small fire, which may be accomplished without matches by means of rubbing two words together. Feed this spark with hits of dead wood which can be broken off from any of the surrounding sentences, and hank the fire for the night with some of the rich dirt which fortunately is found everywhere in great abundance. In case a shelter or lean-to is desired, moreover, the reader should seek out the nearest innuendo and crawl deep down into its inner meaning, where he will he comfortable and, according to Judge Woolsey, safe from harm.

(Continued on page 72b)

(Confinued from page 57)

Perhaps a word of explanation regarding the vocabulary of James Joyce would also aid the prospective reader. In the course of a day's march through Ulysses, one is apt to encounter a number of words and paragraphs which at first glance do not seem to make sense. (You never get any further than a first glance.) For example, such phrases as "hoopsaboyaboy, hoopsa" or "contransmagnificanjewbangtiality" are apt to puzzle the novice who does not possess the right key to decipher Joyce. Upon discovering one of these words, the reader first should hold it up to a mirror to discover whether it is merely spelled backward. If this ruse fails, his next move should he to rotate it slowly in front of a strong light and try to look through it. As a last resort, he may break the word up into very small pieces and soak it overnight in a basin of water. In the morning, the word usually will he found to have dissolved altogether, and the resultant thick gelatinous mass can be digested with ease.

In case of a paragraph such as the following, however, the reader will he forced to adopt a more elaborate procedure. Suppose that he has just encountered this hit of prose from Mr. Joyce's classic: . . if an inverecund

habit shall have gradually traduced the honourable by ancestors transmitted customs to that thither of profundity that that one was audacious excessively who would have had the hardihood to rise affirming that no more odious offence can for anyone he than to oblivious neglect to consign that evangel simultaneously command and promise which on all mortals with prophecy of abundance or with diminution's menace that exalted of reiteratedly procreating function ever irrevocably enjoined?"

I pon discovering himself face to face with this paragraph, the reader should first cut it out and hang it by the two upper corners against a blank perpendicular wall. ' Walking hack twelve paces, he should next blindfold himself very carefully, extend his right forefinger, turn around three times, and proceed in a straight line across the room, out the door, and down the street to the nearest bar. where he can take off his blindfold. What's more, if he goes hack to that paragraph again, it is his own fault. Personally, we wash our hands of him.

Last hut not least, we should like to offer in conclusion a few sample remarks about James Joyce which could be made to your partner at a formal dinner-party. Although these remarks may he varied according to the partner (as, for example, "I like Ulysses" may he altered to read "I don't like Ulysses" in the case of partners under the mental age of ten), it has been found that the six conversational remarks offered below will serve very adequately to carry on an average literary discussion about the Irish classic. If the reader will commit them to memory, moreover, he won't have to read the hook at all:

1. "Don't you think that James Joyce is significant?"

2. "I've never read Ulysses all the way through, hut I've read at it."

3. "I suppose you might say Joyce is really an author's author, if you know what I mean."

4. "I don't want to he a prude, hut 1 must say it does seem to me that he could he just as effective if lit' didn't use some of those disgusting words he uses, still, I guess maybe some people get a certain pleasure out of reading that sort of thing, so maybe I must he old-fashioned, after all. hut just the same I must say, etc."

/ vital?" i thrilling?" Imagnificent?"

5."Isn't hex colossal?"

(Choice / of one.)

j breath-taking?" f sheer genius?" Vjoyceian?"

6."Personally I don't know anything about literature, but 1 know what l don't like."