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A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
A Portrait of the... - SP 2014
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Discussion - Week Two - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man - Part IV & V
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Jim wrote: "Stephen seems to want to do more than just move away from Ireland; he seems to want to transcend the travails of human society via the path of the artist. Is such transcendence possible? Practical? Or just a young man’s delusion?"These are fascinating questions. For me, there is an additional question as to whether Stephen is fleeing from (or transcending) problems, or rather fleeing to opportunities (e.g., a life of creativity)?
Are these the delusions of a young man or just the creative temperament, as you ask? Whether deluded or not, I'd argue that Joyce himself, insofar as Stephen might represent his ambitions, achieved his goal, at least by writing "Portrait" and then "Ulysses".
Whether it would be a delusion for the rest of us, is another question!
Jim, you asked about Dante in the first section of the discussion. I hope we can pursue this issue in this thread when appropriate, especially given the reference to Dante's "spiritual-heroic refrigerating apparatus", which I infer has something to do with Dante's sublimation of his love for Beatrice?
Jim Thanks for doing a read of this. Great book and it really whetted my appetite for more Joyce.
Mod
Yes, of course. Normally, for the last week of a given book, I include "Conclusions/Book as a whole" in the first post to encourage a summing up of the book.
And so, more about Dante, please!
Mod
Glad you enjoyed it! If you're new to Joyce, you might try Dubliners next, then on to Ulysses!
Please share your thoughts about what makes this a great book for you.
Mod
Are these the delusions of a young man or just the creative temperament, as you ask? Whether deluded or not, I'd argue that Joyce himself, insofar as Stephen might represent his ambitions, achieved his goal, at least by writing "Portrait" and then "Ulysses".
Whether it would be a delusion for the rest of us, is another question!..."
I'm going to borrow from your playbook and reply with a music video - a kind of portrait of the Police as young artists (remember when we were all young and fair?)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7v2GD...
The relevant verse, of course, is:
Poets Priests and Politicians
Have words to thank for their positions
Words that scream for your submission
And what a perfect soundtrack for the themes in this book. Politicians causing disarray at Christmas dinner, Priests causing irreparable guilt for a young man wanting to indulge his emerging sexuality, and Poets (Aristotle, et al), leading young Stephen to believe in some godlike, creative existence on Plato's Higher Plane, which estranges him from family, friends, and nation. All these endless submissions that cause more pain than pleasure, by any measure. Joyce, of course, uses words to highlight their weapon-like nature.
De doo doo doo... De da da Dedalus...
After many distractions, including the permanent vanishment of my Kindle (violins weep)... I've finished reading this.It's great throughout. I couldn't have anticipated where it would go, but I was pleased with its progress.
One brief summary of what I like about this book is this: no one has ever written about Stephen Dedalus except Joyce. Okay, that may be obvious, but I hope you see what I mean. He's not a type. (Of course, someone may have written about Dedalus after Joyce, if there's any fan-fiction out there).
I thought it interesting that, to me, the ending seems triumphant and sad, aspiring and remorseful, hopeful and cynical.
Is the book also, to an extent, an anthem to art as faith?
Stephen's religious faith and fervor are the seeds of his idealism which discovers a new object: the aesthetic ideal. We have to feel some fear, as he does, that he may be making an absurd blunder in the end. He may just be playing the fool here, and he may be damning himself. On the other hand, his denial of himself throughout, his lost opportunities for love as well as any kind of human connection... hurt a bit.
Depending on one's perspective, one might ask: What have they done to poor Stevie!? (They being the church, school, family, peers, community... but mainly the church). Then one might equally ask: What has fool Stevie done to himself!? And why has he broken down and lost the faith which defined him? Is his poetry really worth it, when he doesn't even know what he wants to say? What if, ironically, his poetry--for which he abandoned his faith--becomes a voice only through which he can mourn the loss of his faith?
A few questions to ponder: to what extent does Dedalus's musing on aesthetic values mirror the author's present views at the time this book was written? We can't know for sure. There's some irony in the fact that his persuasive argument about the nature of aesthetics and beauty can only go so far before faltering in its attempt to rationally analyze beauty... and while he argues in favor of static pity and terror rather than dynamic desire and loathing... his unfulfilled longings for a woman turn the question into a partially unsolved riddle. Still, we can wonder, to what extent does Joyce prefer pity and terror in stasis... to what extent does Joyce agree with young Dedalus?
Mod
You've hit on many important questions that are key to this book. While I can't comment on Joyce's intent, what I do get from the text is that Stephen/Joyce are completely immersed/obsessed/invested-in words. Normally I don't like to rely on pop music to mount an argument, but I think the song I quoted from above has much that applies to the world examined in the book.
Poets Priests and Politicians
Have words to thank for their positions
Words that scream for your submission
The world of poets, priests, and politicians are dominated by and created by and adhered to by words and their "agreed upon" meaning. Words are symbols and very much abstractions of "reality", whatever that is. Priests and politicians use big words like "truth" and "justice" and "good" and "evil" - all of which are relative and open to interpretation. A society is lead to believe that these words represent reality and that the priests and politicians have the authority to clearly define what these words mean and how they are to be applied to the everyday life of a given society. To be "god-fearing" or "law-abiding" is to submit to the meanings established by the respective representatives of church and state.
Where, then, is the poet/artist in this scenario? I would submit that the priests and politicians provide only "answers" to life's questions and confusions, but it is left to the poet/artist to interrogate life directly, as well as to interrogate the answers provided by the priests and politicians.
Stephen has been subjected to the laws of god through the Jesuits, and subjected to the laws of man via the Greek and Roman philosophers, whose musings form the basis of man's laws. In the book, he is thrown back and forth between questions of morals, ethics, faith, duty, aesthetics, truth, beauty, and cetera. As you point out, he is hinging his hopes on a life in poetry, seemingly willing to abandon the known entities of god, family, and nation for what could likely be a pipe dream. But, this pipe dream is the ultimate act of courage because it requires going into the unknown and interrogating all the laws of god and man, even though those around you will reject you for your lack of faith and contentment in the words of the priests and politicians.
By the time this book was published, Joyce had been married for over a decade and had children of his own. I've always thought of this book as his "looking back" to see how he arrived at this life of the poet, and maybe finding solace in knowing that the young man made out okay, even if his youth was a tangle of philosophical confusion.
Mod
I'm considering a BP reread for 2015. In October or so, I'll post a poll to see if members would like to reread Ulysses and/or Infinite Jest.
Interesting thoughts on the role of language in human relations. I'll ponder.
Love the thoughts on the book guys. I am new to Joyce and completely loved this book. I personally relate to Dedalus in many ways that have now lead me up to the central valuing of creating (art) in life currently. For me growing up in a Christian sphere was very isolating, confusing and unreal. I was floating through different conversations that made such audacious claims as "proven truth" or "ultimate truth", just as Dedalus seemed to be with the priest interactions and conversations. How great it is when you find a book that echos and articulates life in a personal way! Me and this character are very very similar in thought, it felt as if the feelings were being swept from me and understood, quite a profound experience for this reader here!It seems that people of the Modernist arts movement and school of thought usually come from this similar type of background. This is why they often resign to not claiming to know the answers to life definitively, but rather the exploration of it through one of the most beautiful and personal mediums the human can utilize; artistic self expression. It is the individual collected experience of a person that makes that person that person, and to display this in any form can often be quite profound.
I would love to read more Joyce next year Jim, please poll that!
Mod
Will do. BTW, The Dead is included in the Dubliners story collection, so you don't need to buy The dead separately.
Very glad to hear you found personal resonance with your own life. This often happens with the classics of literature. I also found religion to be confusing when I was a young Dedalus, but the political clashes for me were Viet Nam, race riots, Watergate, and the general insanity of the late 60's and early 70's. And like Stephen's parents, I found it disconcerting when the church involved itself in politics. And I found it to be really strange that the church did not vehemently protest the war, because in my young mind, things were black and white - "thou shall not kill" should be applied to the war. If not, then the whole ten commandments and the church have no meaning. If one set of words is invalidated, then they're all invalidated. I think Joyce captured that kind of young man thinking very well.
I had to read this book for my senior year at high school and found it difficult and have tended to shy away from Joyce ever since. You’re aware from the start that there’s a sense of destiny connected to the name and the imagery of flying too close to the sun and falling (but he is Daedalus the great architect of the labyrinth and not Icarus).I’m enjoying the novel much more thirty years on. I love the brevity (stream of consciousness) and find it gets a little bogged down in Stephen’s adolescence with the development of his sexuality and the hell and damnation lectures. He’s rather stuck in his head (and the brain/mind labyrinth metaphor is perhaps pertinent). I thought the allusion to a meeting with his daemon/angel rather beautiful, and that he misses it and thus is confused and projects the angel onto actual girls and then is misled towards sublimation(of creativity) through sex.
I was reading on Kindle and there were no notes whatsoever and sometimes I found the Irish slang or Latin pretentious (but I suppose in Joyce’s day Latin was taught in the schools and would have been second nature). But it’s a good read not to be slowed down by editorial notes.
Within the ‘history of Ideas’ the artist as hero is a modernist stance; whereas during the post-modernist, we have the death of auteur/author/artist and no absolutes or Truths. I think Stephen leaves one set of absolutes for another (the Church/God/Country) for Poetry/Art. He has the arrogance of the Hero and we get the impression that he will find redemption through Art.
Whatever Latin I didn't get, I didn't get, and I let it wash over me, just as I've handled Russian novels that include characters who speak in French... when translated into English, the French bits are usually retained, and for good reason: they were intentionally foreign in the original, and it was not necessarily assumed that the reader would understand them except based on context and the forgoing and following comprehensible dialogue. But, yeah, there's a potential for winking inside commentary between author and those who are well-versed in Latin, which I'm going to miss.I saw the use of Latin as a part of the "pretense" that made up Cranly's character, and I thought it interesting and bizarre to have a crude hot-head who also lapses into Latin from time to time.
I also thought it interesting to witness kids fighting, literally resorting to violence at times, over taste in poetry. It reminded me of my reaction to Jean Cocteau's Orpheus, which gave a modern French setting to the classic story, and has a cafe brawl erupt over poetry. It's just... funny.
The kids live in a weird world which is both prissy, intellectual, abstracted from the real world... and part of and reflection of the real world. The rough and tough bullies in this environment would be the sissies in a village school, but that doesn't prevent them from being genuinely threatening within their context.
Also, violence over intellectualism was recently reflected in the news, which made me think of this once again. Ireland is about to have their first modern criminal case of cannibalism, since a couple of old geezers got into an argument over chess, with the result that one of them killed the other and ate his lung... possibly part of his heart too.
Jim wrote: "Ryan wrote: "I would love to read more Joyce next year Jim, please poll that!.."Will do. BTW, The Dead is included in the Dubliners story collection, so you don't need to buy The dea..."
That's very interesting! I very much agree.
Jim wrote: "This discussion covers Part IV & V, p. 159 – 276 and Conclusions/Book as a wholePart IV – A strict regimen of calisthenics for the soul begins after the retreat. Stephen gets the call, but he do..."
I think it is entirely necessary for Stephen to go away. He craves, as a future artist, new experiences unavailable in parochial Dublin. And he wishes to be free to express himself unrestrained.
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Books mentioned in this topic
Dubliners (other topics)Dubliners (other topics)
Ulysses (other topics)
Ulysses (other topics)
Dubliners (other topics)
Part IV – A strict regimen of calisthenics for the soul begins after the retreat. Stephen gets the call, but he doesn’t pick up the line. While wandering along the strand at twilight, the white fringes of an angel’s drawers set Stephen on a new path.
Part V – “You know, before, I was all messed-up on drugs, but since I found the Lord, now I’m all messed-up on, The Lord.” - Cheech y Chong, 1972
After the long strange trip from innocence to the corruption of lust, to attempted redemption, and to rejection of the priestly path, young Stephen Dedalus finds himself in a living limbo, unable to love, unable to connect with family, friends, nation, but still holding before him the glowing flame of commitment to art as he prepares to go out in the world and create his legacy.
Throughout the book, Joyce has forefronted questions of personal morality and ethics, as related to the Catholic faith. Although surrounded by the political issues and history of conflict between Ireland and England, Joyce seems to use those politics as a kind of background noise to the turmoil of young Stephen trying to find his identity. What pictures form of Stephen’s youth during these times, given the one-two punch of moral subservience to the Church and political subservience to the British government? What is this desire to move away from his own nation and people? The saying goes “There’s no geographical solution to an emotional problem.”, but Stephen seems to want to do more than just move away from Ireland; he seems to want to transcend the travails of human society via the path of the artist. Is such transcendence possible? Practical? Or just a young man’s delusion?