Dear Colin, Presumably Beckett would have discussed Swift with Joyce during
the composition and occasional dictation of 'Work in Progress' --
'Finnegans Wake' is surely the modernist work in which the Dean's memory
predominates. He's there with Vanessa and Esther in the second paragraph
right after Isaac Butt: 'not yet, though venissoon after, had a kidscad
buttened a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in vanessy, were
sosie sethers wroth with twone nathandjoe'. His role at the wake comes
nearest to being clear in the 'Shem the Penman' chapter, which also
contains references to Goldsmith's 'Auborne-to-Auborne', Montesquieu's
'Persian Letters', bits of Percy and Ossian, and bits of Vico mixed up with
Blake. Swift seems to represent the Tristram/Eneas/Shem figure, the exile
who actually makes it back to Ireland. More particularly, Swift's descent
into madness corresponds with Joyce's encroaching blindness, and his
daughter Lucia's approaching insanity -- here Beckett, to whom Lucia was
very attached, was also involved. At least, that's the sense I get from the
patterns of reference -- the Wake would never yeild to such simple
readings, of course. I also remember various quite detailed references to
'The Drapier's Letters' and Wood's half-penny, but I can't find these in my
notes. Best of luck if you hope to make any real sense of all this!
Paddy Bullard,
St. John's College, Oxford. OX1 3JP
143c Iffley Road, Oxford. OX4 1EJ
telephone 01865 243764
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|