Chicks On Lit discussion
This topic is about
Ulysses
Archive 08-19 GR Discussions
>
Chunky Read ULYSSES with reading schedule
Tyler wrote: "Marialyce wrote: "I know I am behind, but I find the lack of chapters markings unnerving. While yes, the whole stream of thoughts and words are unnerving for some reason the lack of chapters annoys..."Thanks Tyler....I am sure I will be on this site a lot....
I am reading the ibook copy which is I am sure a Project Gutenberg piece.
Tyler, I have the same version--and I picked it because it had the most margin space of all the editions my bookstore carried Haha.
Chapter Nine SummaryThis episode takes place in Dublin's National Library from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. In this intricate chapter, Stephen further explicates his theory about Shakespeare and Hamlet that Mulligan asked him to explain to Haines in "Telemachus." Stephen's brilliant but difficult exposition is made even more perplexing by the fact that he himself does not truly believe all of his own theories about Shakespeare — or even about Hamlet; in his own words, his arguments to the men in the library are a "performance." Thus, while the chapter does not tell us a great deal about Shakespeare's personal life (despite the many interesting points about the playwright that it does raise), it tells us very much about Stephen himself, particularly his obsession with paternity; this episode explicitly deals with the father-son theme of the novel: at the conclusion of the chapter, for example, Bloom walks between Stephen and Mulligan as the two young men are about to walk down the library steps; he forces them, symbolically, to separate. This act, besides foreshadowing other sunderings in Ulysses, links the older Bloom with youth, and with Stephen in particular.
In Homer's epic, Odysseus was forced to pass between the six-headed monster, Scylla, and the whirlpool, Charybdis. Following the advice of Athena, he hugged the mountain lair of Scylla; Charybdis, he had been told, promised certain disaster, and he sacrificed one of his men for each of Scylla's maws. In Ulysses, the whirlpool is represented mainly by the poet A. E. (George Russell), an exponent of mysticism, Platonism, and emotive Irish nationalism. Stephen is, as it were, Scylla, constantly snapping at the arguments of his opponents; he is possessed of a sharp, cutting, Aristotelian mind and is, as Mulligan called him earlier in jest, Kinch, the knifeblade.
Chapter 9 summary...maybe I'm not as far behind as I thought! I only started Friday, but from a post I saw somewhere in the beginning we're supposed to be discussing 8-10 this week and reading 11 & 12, is that still correct? I know someone mentioned pace earlier, and while I 100% believe we could spend a month (or years!) on a chapter, I think a lot of people would lose interest along they way. Meaning it's a bit of a struggle catching up, but I think the pace is well set and will be fully manageable once I'm caught up. Lastly, I'm LOVING that I finally found a group of people to read this with! Any idea how many of us are participating?
I have to admit that I found this chapter particularly incomprehensible. I could not follow the argument at all. Part of my problem is that I have only a high school level familiarity with Shakespeare. Other than seeing a few amature performances of his plays, I have not had any contact with his plays in decades.
Irene wrote: "I have to admit that I found this chapter particularly incomprehensible. I could not follow the argument at all. Part of my problem is that I have only a high school level familiarity with Shakes..."Hard to believe that this chapter could be more incomprehensible than others....They all seem pretty much so to me without the benefit of the notes and the ladies here.
I am going to try and catch up today.
Yet again I am behind, but I will push through it this summer. I am glad that everyone is having so much...umm...fun reading this one.
I have to admit, I am not that up on Shakespeare and am wondering if Stephen's hypotheses is possibly correct? Did Ann Hathaway have affairs and was she unfaithful as Stephen suggests? I am not sure of how much Shakespeare's life reflected his art. I did find this episode quite interesting though after reading the notes it was not the main focus of this chapter.
My copy of Gifford finally came in today, and you're right Becky, it's extensive & incredibly helpful. Though it's obviously going to slow me down even more; I'm not even caught up yet and I find myself going backwards and back through things and going a-ha, that's what that meant. I'm falling dangerously behind on my other reading Haha.
I also had a long car ride today and had time to start the re:Joyce podcast (though I'm missing the 1st 8 episodes for some reason) and I LOVE them. I'm so disappointed he's not further along, I'm going to miss them when they run out. I think I'll remain subscribed even once we're done. It cracked me up just how much he loves it, comments like "oh jimmy you've done it again...brilliant!" it's refreshing to hear how into it he is.
Marialyce, I have no idea about the answer to your question, but as a side note related to affairs, I heard somewhere (it might have been re:Joyce actually), but something about how Joyce was led to believe nora was cheating on him (apparently it turned out not to be true) and he was really (understandably) upset and jealous over it. Again, I know it doesn't answer your question, your question just made me think about it. Interesting given everything going on with Molly
Alanna!!!! How cool! Like I said - for me 2 weeks recovering, and the whole thing took about 2 months. I generally read 8+ books a month, and this slowed me down, but I did count my reference books too ;>)I'm not sure either about Shakespeare's wife and affairs - but I think it just adds to Molly.
I googled for you MarialyceAnswer:
We'll never know for sure if she did. One man claimed or may have claimed to be Shakespeare's illegitimate son, although he may have meant godson or even inspiration. If that were true then this would be a case of an extramarital affair. It has also been suggested that his death may have been the result of treatment for syphilis which he picked up from prostitutes. Working where he did, and being as far from home as he was, he may well have been involved with prostitutes, but we have no proof.
I also ordered a Gilbert book, and while my other references have a lot of this info, he has it clearly laid out at the start of each chapter in an easy chart. (I'm still traveling and typing this from my phone , so if auto correct added anything crazy let me know and I'll edit the post.) I found it helpful to add to the notes in my now scrawled all over copy of Ulysses!1. THE TELEMACHUS
Scene: the tower
Hour: 8 am
Art: theology
Symbol: heir
Technic: narrative (young)
2. NESTOR
Scene: the school
Hour: 10 am
Art: history
Symbol: horse
Technic: catechism (personal)
3. PROTEUS
Scene: the strand
Hour: 11 am
Art: philology
Symbol: tide
Technic: monologue (male)
4. CALYPSO
Scene: the house
Hour: 8 am
Organ: kidney
Art: economics
Symbol: nymph
Technic: narrative (mature)
5. THE LOTUS-EATERS
Scene: the bath
Hour: 10 am
Organ: genitals
Art: botany, chemistry
Symbol: eucharist
Technic: narcissism
6. HADES
Scene: the graveyard
Hour: 11 am
Organ: heart
Art: religion
Colours: white/black
Symbol: caretaker
Technic: incubism
7. AEOLUS
Scene: the newspaper
Hour: 12 noon
Organ: lungs
Art: rhetoric
Colour: red
Symbol: editor
Technic: enthymemic
8. THE LESTRYGONIANS
Scene: the lunch
Hour: 1 pm
Organ: esophagus
Art: architecture
Symbol: constables
Technic: peristaltic
9. SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS
Scene: the library
Hour: 2 pm
Organ: brain
Art: literature
Symbol: stratford, London
Technic: dialectic
10. THE WANDERING ROCKS
Scene: the streets
Hour: 3 pm
Organ: blood
Art: mechanics
Symbol: citizens
Technic: labyrinth
What's the Gilbert book? I went back a bit in the conversation and don't see it.
Hey Becky, that's my fault, I didn't reference it specifically. I had taken a bunch of reference books out of the library, but I was finding your posts from the Gifford book very helpful. I wound up asking a friend who major in lit and loved Ulysses what references he recommended and he said the Gifford one you've been using, and James Joyce's Ulysses A Study By Stuart Gilbert, so I ordered them together. It's more commentary less laid out by ref/ line # than the Gifford. If I had to pick one it would be the Gifford, but taken together they're great.I'm getting into this, the rest of my reading list is really suffering Haha.
Alanna wrote: "I also ordered a Gilbert book, and while my other references have a lot of this info, he has it clearly laid out at the start of each chapter in an easy chart. (I'm still traveling and typing this ..."I love the Gilbert book
, I used it more than the Bloomsday
one which the rest of my class loved.
It is pretty sad when I don't even understand the helpful explanatory notes, LOL. Peristaltic, incubism, enthymemic, I have never seen these words before.
Meg wrote: "I googled for you MarialyceAnswer:
We'll never know for sure if she did. One man claimed or may have claimed to be Shakespeare's illegitimate son, although he may have meant godson or even in..."
Thanks, Meg.....
CHAPTER NINE SUMMARY (cliff notes)This episode takes place in Dublin's National Library from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. In this intricate chapter, Stephen further explicates his theory about Shakespeare and Hamlet that Mulligan asked him to explain to Haines in "Telemachus." Stephen's brilliant but difficult exposition is made even more perplexing by the fact that he himself does not truly believe all of his own theories about Shakespeare — or even about Hamlet; in his own words, his arguments to the men in the library are a "performance." Thus, while the chapter does not tell us a great deal about Shakespeare's personal life (despite the many interesting points about the playwright that it does raise), it tells us very much about Stephen himself, particularly his obsession with paternity; this episode explicitly deals with the father-son theme of the novel: at the conclusion of the chapter, for example, Bloom walks between Stephen and Mulligan as the two young men are about to walk down the library steps; he forces them, symbolically, to separate. This act, besides foreshadowing other sunderings in Ulysses, links the older Bloom with youth, and with Stephen in particular.
In Homer's epic, Odysseus was forced to pass between the six-headed monster, Scylla, and the whirlpool, Charybdis. Following the advice of Athena, he hugged the mountain lair of Scylla; Charybdis, he had been told, promised certain disaster, and he sacrificed one of his men for each of Scylla's maws. In Ulysses, the whirlpool is represented mainly by the poet A. E. (George Russell), an exponent of mysticism, Platonism, and emotive Irish nationalism. Stephen is, as it were, Scylla, constantly snapping at the arguments of his opponents; he is possessed of a sharp, cutting, Aristotelian mind and is, as Mulligan called him earlier in jest, Kinch, the knifeblade.
Stephen, obsessed with the ghosts of his own past, including his mother (a parallel with the Odyssey in which Odysseus met his own mother in Hades), believes that Shakespeare himself was very much like King Hamlet of Denmark, who appears as a ghost to his son. And to begin his thesis, Stephen pictures the Globe Theater as it was in Shakespeare's day: "The play begins." Stephen's method is "composition of place," a technique which the founder of the Jesuits, St. Ignatius Loyola, used in his Spiritual Exercises to help believers summon up a physical picture of the locale of a spiritual mystery. For example, the novice tried to imagine the dress that Mary was wearing when Gabriel appeared to her to announce that even though she was still a virgin, she would be the mother of God, and, in addition, the novice was expected to picture what the angel looked like. Joyce employed this method of artistic detail to describe Hell in Book Three of A Portrait, and Stephen uses the same technique in "Scylla and Charybdis."
Irene, I don't have the Gilbert book with me right now, which explains things more. But the short of it is:6. HADES
Technic: incubism : brooding over; variety of interior monologue.
7. AEOLUS
Technic: enthymemic here, the method is as suitable to journalism as to the plights of Stephen and bloom; for an enthymeme is a syllogism with part suppressed.
8. THE LESTRYGONIANS
Technic: peristaltic applies to structure and movement, too.
9. SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS
Technic: dialectic : the method scholastic philosophers use.
Don't worry about it...that's what Google is for afterall!
***snorting milk out my nose***Well, those definitions just cleared it all up. How could I ever have missed that? Now I know why I was put in te lowest reading group when I was in 1st grade. "See Dick run. Run Dick run."
Haha if it helps, I'll look for the longer explanations when I get home. I had no idea about much of what we're reading until I picked up the references, without them I think I was missing the brilliance of Joyce .
I downloaded the book to my kindle and it was just the bare bones copy...no notes. I did download the audible version and it came with a very helpful PDF. I began listening to it last night....sadly, I fell asleep and when I woke up I was completely lost...lol. I will attempt it again today.
After work, I can post the PDF or e-mail it to whoever wants it. I don't have it on my work computer.
I think Sandra, that Ulysses has put many a person to sleep. I would be interested in the PDF...thank you!
Power outage here in NJ. Going through Gifford and annotating my copy of Ulysses by flashlight...on a Friday night. Lol.
Mod
Allana, sounds like an exciting night! LOL
Last year I spent all my Friday nights in a hospital...year before spent them all partying at Pacha until closing at 6 am...funny how things change. Haha. In my defense, in my copy chapter 9 is a little under 30 pages, but the annotated Gifford notes for the chapter is 66 pages! I used to write all of the notes Becky posted right into my book. I suppose it's no longer necessary strictly speaking, since I now own a copy, but it's become a habit. But you literally have to go thru each word one at a time--takes forever compared to just reading, but it definitely helps you appreciate how carefully and masterfully crafted it is. But I am def going to have to slow down the copying over, or I'll never catch up to you guys!
LOL! I started writing up Chapter 9 and spent 15 minutes and was only 3 pages through Gifford! I'm afraid I've been at a conference all this weekend so may not get to it in a bit. I must say - Stephen is pouring it on a bit thick, and then there is the Buck Mulligan interplay...
Still on Chapter 9 Becky! Though I did take most of the day off haha.
CHAPTER TEN SUMMARYThis episode begins at 2:55 p.m. and ends at 4:00 p.m. It describes the wanderings of several characters from Ulysses around the streets of Dublin, and thus it forms a mini-odyssey, a microcosm of Joyce's novel. The chapter consists of 19 short episodes which mirror the overall 18-part structure of Ulysses (early critics usually described "The Wandering Rocks" as consisting of 18 parts and a final coda, the description of the viceregal cavalcade). Coming as it does after the first nine sections of Ulysses (traditionally accepted to be the first "half" of the novel), "The Wandering Rocks" is a kind of interlude — much like the comic entrance of Buck Mulligan during Stephen Dedalus's discussion of Shakespeare in "Scylla and Charybdis" — before Joyce begins the second "half' of the novel.
The chapter is almost perfectly balanced: the meanderings of Father Conmee, S. J., the amiable, patronizing former rector of Clongowes (who once saved Stephen from a painful punishment in A Portrait) begin the episode, and the cavalcade of the amiable, patronizing William Humble Ward, Second Earl of Dudley as he travels to open the Mirus Bazaar ends the chapter. The two men represent Ireland's bondage to two key foreign powers — the Roman Catholic Church and Britain — and all of the smaller odysseys in the episode are directly related to these two major structuring devices. Also, it is in the middle section (the tenth section) of "The Wandering Rocks" that Bloom rents Sweets of Sin for Molly. Finally, this near-central chapter of Ulysses is tied together by scores of motifs, gestures, thoughts, and cross-references. Joyce apparently wrote "The Wandering Rocks" with a map of Dublin before him, and modern Joyceans take great delight in timing the various wanderings of the participants, one critic going so far as to limp along the Dublin streets, miming the one-legged sailor; he discovered that Joyce was unusually accurate in his time sequences.
Oh good, now I feel better about writing out Gifford notes until my finger gets a blister, I'm still not quite at the level of limping around Dublin. What a relief!
Ps, I'm finally moving on to chapter 10 & this is what one of my refs says, "Joyce called this chapter an 'entr'acte,' a 'pause in the action,' which, though occupying the middle of the book, has 'absolutely no relation to what precedes or follows.'" (letters, 149) "There is plenty of movement, to be sure, and the relationship among elements is constantly shifting, but the plot, petrified & motionless, does not advance." So it's unrelated to everything and the plot doesn't move forward. Can't wait for this chapter lol.
Alanna wrote: "Ps, I'm finally moving on to chapter 10 & this is what one of my refs says, "Joyce called this chapter an 'entr'acte,' a 'pause in the action,' which, though occupying the middle of the book, has '..."I got that feeling while I was reading it, and somehow I am not sorry I skimmed.
Re chapter 10, there's a map in a couple of the reference books that I found helpful, though I can't exactly take a picture with my phone and upload it to this group (or I at least don't know how to upload anything here...we should have created a Facebook group for this Ulysses read Haha) but while I was looking for a link to a map I found a couple of websites some of you may find helpful:http://hjs.ff.cuni.cz/archives/v7/ess...
This one has maps/notes for some chapters : http://www.jamesjoyce.nl/ondersteunin...
a cartoon Ulysses for dummies :
http://thattherepaul.com/features/ufo...
And lastly, for those who don't have a reference book, this guy should be very helpful: http://publish.uwo.ca/%7Emgroden/note...
Hope the links work! (I'm still new at doing this entirely from my phone)
I loved the cartoon Ulysses for dummies! thank you
CHAPTER ELEVEN Chapter summaryThis episode begins just after the 3:30 p.m. opening of the bar at the Ormond Hotel and ends at about 4:30 p.m., with the exit of Bloom and the reappearance of the blind stripling, the piano tuner, announced by the tapping sounds of his cane, who has come to retrieve the tuning fork which he had earlier left behind. Parallels with the Odyssey are very broad in this chapter. In Homer's epic, Odysseus stuffs his men's ears with wax so that they will not be seduced by the songs of the mermaids, who induce sailors to smash their ships on the deadly coastal rocks. Odysseus, however, wanting to hear the noted songs himself, has his men tie him to the mast and orders them to ignore him, even if he commands them to release him. The sirens here are Lydia Douce and Mina Kennedy, two barmaids, and an unappetizing prostitute that Bloom (as Ulysses) evades at the end of the episode. The most interesting parallel in this chapter with the episode in Homer's epic, however, is not the sirens themselves; it is the intoxicating power of music, whether it be sung by old men who wish to drown the memories of their failures in sentimental melodies that exalt Irish national failures or whether it is music that is heard by a middle-aged man (Bloom), who traces in the lyrics his own failures as a father and as a husband, and who will, during the course of this chapter, lose his wife to another man.
In "The Sirens," Joyce applies the intricate techniques of musical composition to literature — that is, at the beginning of the episode, he sets up a number of themes or motifs, approximately 57 of them, that are interwoven and expanded throughout this chapter. "Bronze by gold," for example, refers to the bronze-haired Miss Douce and the golden-haired Miss Kennedy. "Chips" in the third line of the chapter alludes to Simon Dedalus's habit of "picking chips off one of his rocky thumbnails," noted a few pages later. "Jingle jingle jaunted jingling" is an aural prefiguration of Boylan's mare-drawn trip to 7 Eccles Street to meet Molly. The "Deepsounding. Do, Ben, do" foreshadows Ben Dollard's rendition of "The Croppy Boy" near the chapter's end, and Molly once said that the hefty Ben had a fine "barreltone" voice; in addition, the "Wait while you wait. Hee Hee" looks forward to Bloom's thoughts about Pat the waiter: "Pat is a waiter who waits while you wait. Hee hee hee hee" (as a parallel, Bloom, unable to stop the cuckolding by Boylan, is also one who will passively wait until Boylan and Molly have finished having sex).
I agree it was great...
I went to the library today to pick up all my group reads and they had Ulysses and I think when I opened and and skimmed thru my out-loud reaction was "holy sh**" lol ... I was very intimidated by the looks of it ... I am passing on the book this time and concentrating on "She's Come Undone" :) I will revisit Ulysses when I am feeling a litte more brazen!
Mod
LOL, fivesunflowers. Yes, it is a bit intimidating. I would never be continuing with this one if it wasn't for this discussion and all the great chicks here!
Alanna, LOVE the Ulysses for dummies cartoon! Thanks for posting that!
Glad you guys liked it. It's funny how simple the plot itself is--yet so mmuch STUFF is in each line. Crazy. I'm just starting chapter 11, so I'm still behind...starting a few weeks late once I saw this wasn't the best idea lol.
CHAPTER TWELVE - SUMMARYThis chapter begins just before 5:00 p.m. and takes place in Barney Kiernan's pub, to which Bloom has come to meet with Martin Cunningham so that the two men can proceed on to Paddy Dignam's residence in Sandymount in order to discuss the deceased man's life insurance policy with the bereaved family. The chapter ends with Bloom, Cunningham, Jack Power, and the Orangeman, Mr. Crofton (in Cunningham's carriage) escaping from the Citizen-cyclops. The Citizen-cyclops of Kiernan's pub is modeled upon the ardent Irish nationalist Michael Cusack, who sought to revive Gaelic sports in Ireland as a reaction against England, and Kiernan's pub becomes, metaphorically, the Homeric cave in which Odysseus and his men were imprisoned by the cannibalistic giant cyclops of Greek myth.
Other parallels with the Odyssey are quite explicit and determine several of this episode's motifs. In Homer's epic, the cyclops, Polyphemus, who devoured some of Odysseus's men, was, of course, one-eyed. He was also an anarchist, as were the other cyclopes in Homer's legendary country. Odysseus escaped the cyclops by getting him drunk on wine; after the monster had fallen into a deep slumber, Odysseus blinded him with a fiery stake. Odysseus and his remaining men then left the cave by latching onto the undersides of the cyclops' sheep. Since Odysseus had told Polyphemus that his name was No-Man, the giant received only ridicule from his cohorts when they asked the blinded hulk who had gored out his eye. They reasoned that because "no man" had done the deed, then the gods must be punishing Polyphemus; for that reason, they left him to an uncertain fate. As he departed from the country of the cyclopes, Odysseus made the mistake of taunting the blind cyclops, who hurled a large rock at the departing voyagers. He missed Odysseus and his men, but Polyphemus asked his father, Poseidon, to curse the crew, and because Poseidon was the god of the seas, Odysseus was forced to wander for many extra years before he finally returned to Ithaca.
Mod
Afternoon. Bloom, a Jew, engages in debate with a one-eyed anti-semite who attacks him physically. Bloom escapes in the nick of time.
My electronic version did not have chapter divides and I read this a couple of weeks ago and understood little, but.... Was this the chapter with the odd hanging sceen? There was a strange interlude in one of the chapters. It talked about how the date of St. Patrick's day was settled by adding together the dates of March 8 & 9 which were dates proposed by two different groups. Some guy was hung before an audience who were all gathered as if for a day at the races. The condemned man's girlfriend caame all teary-eyed to say good-bye. Some other dashing rich man comes up and proposes to her and they go off together. It read like a farce. What was that all about?
Mod
Me too, Sheila....I am stalled a bit further back than you. I think the bad thing was that I am reading other books at the same time and they are eons better...well at least eons more understandable. I try to read it in the morning because I find I can understand more...maybe my pre coffee grogginess helps, but yes, I am getting to the oh no, I dread this point...
Chicks On Lit
Books mentioned in this topic
South of Broad (other topics)Middlemarch (other topics)
Fifty Shades of Grey (other topics)
Moby-Dick or, The Whale (other topics)
Ulysses (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Pat Conroy (other topics)Frank Delaney (other topics)
Hmmm I guess different versions are broken up differently, the one I have in paperback is