Ulysses by Joyce - Jan 2010 Read-A-Long

[Carol]

No the more I think about it, at some level the artistic community did indulge in drugs, maybe not him personally, but he probably knew of people who did. So with your astute observation that is some thing that needs to be explored. I know alcohol can cause disconnectedness and hallucinations: ergo pink elephants etc. But usually it is from Delirium tremens caused by withdrawal.. I wish others would chime in. I am not aware of any vices the man had. Did he have a problem with alcohol? An inflamed liver is not the same as Cirrhosis of the Liver

[Petra]

There was also the Bella/Bello thing. Did Bella turn into a man (Bello) in these hallucinations? In many ways, this episode is about deviance (S&M with the bootlace tieing and groveling and maybe homosexuality with Bella/Bello).
The Sheila Variations did say that this chapter is very sexually orientated. Makes sense since it takes place in the red light district.

[Carol]

Freud,Jung and Joyce

The novels of James Joyce, particularly Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939), decisively influenced the development of the stream of consciousness. In these novels Joyce presents, in rapid succession, the thoughts, impressions, emotions and reminiscences of his characters often disregarding logical sequence or syntax. This is intended to mirror the complexities of the subconscious mind.


Anything is possible with hallucinations. I think Joyce had a fascination with the works of these men. So much so he included it in this novel and others. As we know Freud was not afraid to use drugs in his research. So Petra you have brought another excellent point to the table. I did not know about the Freud, Jung connection.

I could not get the web site to re-open but here is the link. I hope it works

http://www.google.com/search?q=james+...

[Petra]

Carol, thank you for researching this! This is an interesting article. I hadn't thought of looking into this further than asking here because I'm never really sure if I'm quite "getting" Joyce. I'm glad that it appears that I am, at least a bit.

The article also says: "Jung himself extended the reins of his research by reading Joyce's Ulysses and then writing an essay on the novel. In a letter to Joyce, regarding Ulysses, Jung comments that 'the 40 pages of non-stop run in the end is a string of veritable psychological peaches'."

This will be interesting to keep in mind while I read the "40 pages of non-stop run in the end".

I'd be interested in Jung's Essay on Ulysses.

Being that Jung and Freud were interested in sex and the relevance of the subconscious, I gather the apparent deviance in the episode is a study of deviance.


Any thoughts on why Bloom and Molly sleep head to toe? That just seemed odd to me. Was it the trend of the 1920s? A bed that was too small? Their seperation from each other? Or something else?

[Petra]

LOL!.....another quote from the article:


"Although, Joyce vehemently denied being influenced by the ideas of Freud and Jung, referring to them derisively as Tweedledum and Tweedledee, his writings indicate that not only was he very familiar with the substance of their ideas and theories but that he could also apply them when exploring the minds of his characters."


The Tweedledee & Tweedledum reference is humerous considering he uses a lot of thier techniques & ideas.

[Carol]

Oh girl you ask me such good questions. Where did everyone else go. That is the best names for Freud and Jung LOL.

Why they slept head to toe,maybe Joyce and his wife did that. Again with the foot fetish, this puts Bloom and Molly on an equal footing(hehehe). Just a little joke maybe. Or a whole discourse about the equality of the sexes. You are the same as me so I will smell your feet and you will smell mine. Oh I don't know. Don't take it from me I am too silly this afternoon.

[Petra]

:-) You're probably right, Carol, and it means nothing. It struck me as a really odd thing to do and not something I've read in any other book and, since I now look for "hidden" meanings in Joyce's work, thought he might be telling us something. With Joyce, you just never know.
I love my husband but I wouldn't sleep with his feet in my face. LOL!

[Carol]

Not even as an equalizer? hehe!

[Petra]

LOL! Not even then. We're more equal standing/lying side by side than topsy-turvy like Bloom & Molly.

[Petra]

Carol, you had me googling Jung and Joyce last night and I found these interesting items:

From http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/cjung.htm :

"Among Jung's patients in the 1930s was James Joyce's daughter Lucia, who suffered from schizophrenia. Jung had earlier written a hostile analysis of Ulysses, and Joyce was left bitter at Jung's analysis of his daughter. He paid back in Finnegans Wake, joking with Jung's concepts of Animus and Anima. In his essay 'Ulysses' (1934) Jung saw Joyce's famous novel as an exploration of the spiritual condition of modern man, especially the brutalization of his feelings.

And, from http://www.scribd.com/doc/2084586/Jun... :

Part of Jung's essay on Ulysses is quoted as saying "Yes, I admit I feel have been made a fool of. The book would not meet me half way, nothing in it made the least attempt to be agreeable, and that always gives the reader an irritating sense of inferiority. Obviously, I have so much of the Philistine in my blood that I am naive enough to suppose that a book wants to tell me something, to be understood -- a sad case of mythological anthropomorphism projected on to the book!....One should never rub the reader's nose into his own stupidity, but that is what Ulysses does."

[Carol]

Wow . I did not know that. Thanks for the research. We are certainly learning a lot. I think when people see the life of this man, we appreciate his wit even more. I knew his daughter had some kind of mental problem.

[Dennis]

Hi Petra, in particular, and others as well:
No, Joyce did not do drugs at all, as far as I know. If I remember correctly, he did not drink a lot either and liked only white wine, not red, as I recall. Some readers, like you Petra, are still keen for a good guide to Ulysses. The one I used years ago was "ReJoyce" by Anthony Burgess, the brilliant author of A Clockwork Orange and many others, who was a diehard Joyce enthusiast. That's a very good guide because, unlike Stuart Gilbert, the Burgess guide is more keyed to the novice Joyce reader. Gilbert's guide, too, is masterful, however. I just received, via amazon, a book entitled Ulysses and Us by leading Irish lit. scholar Decan Kiberd. His premise is that Joyce intended his book for "everyman," the average "Joe and Jill." The purpose of the book, Kiberd, says is to celebrate the triumph of "everyman" and life's quotidian richness. Thus the swarm of street details and food and music in the book. Joyce made fun of arcane scholarship all through Ulysses. He himself was, in away, a kind of average "family man." However, I don't quite buy Kiberd's premise all the way because, say what he will, it is virtually impossible to read Ulysses without a guide. How in the world could "everyman" accomplish that task. Also, I myself, much as I love the book, find two or three sections of it virtually unreadable, especially that damned birth section, exasperating and plain dull if you ask me. When I re-read the book, I always skim-skip that part. That said, I highly recommend the Kiberd book. He takes you section to section in a most "accessible" way. Petra, thanks for the kind comments.

[Petra]

Dennis, I never meant to imply the Joyce was on drugs himself. I don't think a person could be involved with drugs and still write a book like Ulysses. It's just that one episode read rather "psychodelic".
You'll have to give us a review on Ulysses & Us when you've read it. I'd be interested in hearing what you say about it.
Didn't Joyce himself say that Ulysses was for "everyman"? Although, I think such a statement is odd because it certainly isn't written for "everyman" to just pick up and read. It requires work (at least the first time through it) and thought. Without a guide and this group, I'm doubtful that I would have made it through. However, now that I've had all this great help, I think I could read this again and get more out of it.
Unlike you, Dennis, I liked the damned birth section. But, I like reading that sort of medieval, flowery writing once in awhile. It's so over-done and archaic and boasting and frought with danger that it's rather fun. In the case of Ulysses, I enjoyed the description of the "mead" drinking and the dragons and castles. It just put a different dimension on the story. In a way, it can be said that Birth (and Death) never changes over the ages. Men were drinking mead and waiting for the Birth hundreds of years ago, just like they do today (or in Joyce's time anyways.....men are more involved today, what with entering the Delivery Room).
I tried reading A Clockwork Orange a couple of years ago and gave up. Can't really remember why other than it didn't keep my interest.

[Carol]

Dennis thank you for the drug clarification. The birth section did not repulse me. Maybe it is a gender thing. I don't know,because no other male has weighed in on the book. I had seen the Decan Kiberd book also and wondered how helpful it would be. So please let us know what you think.

[Dennis]

Hi Petra and others,
I'm about half-way through the Kiberd book and really like it a lot. It's almost comical, though, because he kind of undermines his own premise about how Ulysses is for "everyman." That's because his, Kiberd's, book is not exactly "easy" reading for the average person. It's scholarly, professorial but still readable. It's amazing the insights I'm getting from his book, insights I never got from the many, many other guides and essays I've read about Ulysses. He makes the good point that Joyce makes fun of Stephan's self-centered, over-intellectualized absorption all the time through the book, Stephan being the "former" Joyce. Bloom is the one with street-smart wisdom. Yes, I highly recommend the Kiberd. It's nothing like I've ever read on the subject of Joyce and his thinking processes during the long time it took him to write the book.
Another suggestion. Finnegan's Wake, of course, is the "monster" of arcane unreadability. However, you should at least read the Anna Livia Plurabelle section to see the amazing genius of what Joyce ultimately did with words, sounds, images. If I had two lives to live, I would definitely read and study Finnegan's Wake. Well, I don't so I won't.

[Petra]

Yes the ending is perfect for this book so positive and hopeful and yet uncertain just like real life yes!

After a few pages of Molly's thoughts, my mind started to punctuate the sentences itself and that made it much easier to read. Thank you, my mind!

All in all, I really enjoyed this book with some reservations.
The characters of Bloom and Molly are central and Bloom really grows on the reader. He's really a sweet man....although quite an ogler. He's looking at all the women all the time. As a wife, that would annoy me...and we find out in Molly's chapter that it annoys her. (what a surprise)
Stephen Dedalus is ..... meh. I can take or leave him. I don't think he added anything to the story and if he were left out completely there wouldn't be much change. Yes, there's the father/son connection but since it didn't go anywhere and was left rather inconclusive, that conflict within Bloom could have been dealt with in other ways. However, he didn't take away from the story either, so he can stay.
I'm going to have a very hard time rating this book, though.
For depth and breadth of story, it's a 5*.
For ease of reading, maybe a 3* since it takes some help and some guide to help with understanding when reading the book for the first time. This book takes work to get through the first time.
For the number of words used and losing the story at times within those words, another 3*......at times, 2*. There's a lot of words!
For capturing life in all of it's breadth and depth while the characters live one day in Dublin, 5*. Joyce did a remarkable job in capturing....well.....Life, all in under 24 hours.

Whatever rating I give it would change upon a second reading and probably again on a third reading. It's a book that is destined to get a lower rating on its first reading than on subsequent readings.

I'm very glad that I took part in this Read Along and hope that others will still jump in and add some comments.

[Carol]

So you averaged out at 3.3 stars . 5+5+3+3+2=18<5=3.3

It has been enjoyable, we should find another in the future to read.

[Tani]

Petra wrote: "Carol, you had me googling Jung and Joyce last night and I found these interesting items:

From http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/cjung.htm :

"Among Jung's patients in the 1930s was James Joyce's d..."

I'm kind of really amused by Jung's indignation that Ulysses wasn't meeting him halfway. He felt he was made a fool of; I feel exactly the opposite. Reading Episodes 9 and 10 was a lot of work, but I felt totally awesome after I finished them, like I was so smart for figuring things out and understanding what was going on. I guess it just all depends on your point of view.

Of course, there's still plenty of time for me to feel like a fool. ;)

[Petra]

Tani, you won't feel like a fool at all! If you made it to Episode 11, you're there! Go, Girl!
I'm looking forward to our chats when you're done.

[Carol]

Tani we are all waiting to see your take on the book. Take your time and enjoy.

[Petra]

Just finished reading Beowulf on the Beach: What to Love and What to Skip in Literature's 50 Greatest Hits, which had a chapter on Ulysses.
Jack Murnighan has, in part, this to say:
"The greatest impediment, however, to the appreciation of Ulysses is, sadly, Mr. James Joyce. I get the sense that Joyce was one of those guys whose cerebral gifts were indisputable to everyone but himself, and, like a lot of such boys, he felt the need to show them off again and again and again.......This is both the tragedy and irony of the novel, for if you take away all Joyce's esoteric and occultating parodies, impersonations, games and machinations, what's left is the book's spun gold......Joyce made his magnum opus almost impossible to read for most people and somewhat mortifying to those who actually do."
He goes on to say many good things about the book.
I thought this quote fit in here because we've had the same kind of idea in this thread (that the story is wonderful and the book a lot of hard work to read).

[Dennis]

Petra,
Can't wait to order Beowulf on the Beach. Thanks for mentioning it. Love the title. I'm eager to read the Ulysses chapter. I enjoy hearing from people who DON'T like Ulysses or who have great reservations about it. I've loved the book for a long time, but even I have some reservations. For one thing, it would still be a richly wonderful book if it were easier to read. I've read it several times over the years, and each time, here and there in the book, I pause to wonder, "Did Joyce REALLY have to lard the book with so much swarming minutiae and so many arcane ruminations?" Still, all in all, it's a great literary achievement, just not everybody's "cup of tea."
Dennis

[Petra]

Dennis, I hope you enjoy Beowulf On The Beach. It's a fun read.....even if he does like Anna Karenina. {chuckle}.
I enjoy hearing why people don't like books I do as well as why people like books I don't. It adds a lot to the perspective and understanding of the book.
I wonder, too, why Joyce made Ulysses so convoluted. I suppose it really was an exercise in writing style for him.

[Dennis]

Hi Petra
As far as my research tells me, Joyce wrote Ulysses that way because the book is as much about language as it is about its characters. He also wanted to create a strikingly modern book without resorting to all the old tried-and-true narrative techniques. He wanted to express that day in Dublin, in all its "ordinariness," with all its minutiae and arcane allusions in almost a cubist fashion from a multiplicity of styles, viewpoints. Well, I for one don't think he fully succeeded. Too many parts in that book I admire very much for their pyrotechnic, sleight-of-hand brilliance, but the key word is "admire" rather than "love." Still, the BEST sections are as good or better than anything written in the 20th Century, especially Bloom at the funeral and Molly's ending monologue.

ni

[Carol]

Smoke and Mirrors, we will always wonder why he wrote it as he did. I for one like magicians and to me Joyce was one. You get to explore every form of writing, in one stop shopping so to speak.

[Dan]

I finally finished. I was not impressed.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33...