Who the Hell Is This Joyce (1928)
theparisreview.org
theparisreview.org
- imagine (correctly or incorrectly) a system of values/upbringing that might result in Finnegan's Wake being seen as good or worthwhile [not his words, but for example: valuing “artistic” / “creative expression” over pleasure or illumination for the reader],
- articulate his own values and why as a result he considers it not worth his time,
- yet remain humble [you may not think so but this is how it appears to me] that this is just his own point of view and for others with different values, this “extraordinary experiment” may be worthwhile after all — or not.
This ability to imagine another point of view, another system of preferences even, and come with a plausible explanation of it.
This style of multi-layered writing used to be more common, but I have not seen it in more recent reviews, which read more like ideological screeds.
But why is this necessary, unless you basically hate a person and don't think you could ever reconcile? It's a psychology of tribalism.
Unfortunately the letter also has a certain "shoot first, ask questions later" aspect to it. Like, why wouldn't Wells diplomatically _ask_ Joyce about the perspectives that informed his writing to the public in such a way?
The "articulate his own values and why as a result he considers it not worth his time" aspect is also a bit of a cringe along the same lines. You can see it all the time today, in comments on things that are shared on various, ahem, online communities. Especially in response to new projects or posts that don't seem completely pragmatic or tuned for performance, as if everything is meant for a paying audience of common moviegoers. Why wasn't I consulted? I'm a common man! I represent your most common audience!
Nah, I think Wells was also feeling afraid of being left out, tossed into the dustbin. Why else would you stake your entire identity so firmly in opposition to someone else, in a letter to that person, instead of keeping it open and asking questions? You're arguing for your own existence. Maslow has entered the chat with some cake and coffee and a monthly stipend.
Finally he seems to project some pretty nasty subjective perceptions right into Joyce's rationale. It kinda pulls Joyce down from what Wells seems to treat as a high horse. But it also promotes Wells' own perceptions all the way down the page. Like he invited himself to a debate and forgot to summon a live opponent.
TBH while it's amusing to read, and especially in a pompous voice, it also illustrates (to some, and hopefully) how we can learn to do much better for ourselves and others as a thoughtful corresponding audience.
- In 1917 (when Wells would have been ~51 and Joyce ~35), Wells had written “one of the most favourable reviews” of Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. This was very helpful to Joyce, and Joyce wrote a letter to Wells thanking him. Even earlier, Wells had helped Joyce secure a grant.
- In 1928 (a few days before this letter), Wells and Joyce met for the first time and had lunch. During this lunch meeting they discussed Joyce's work, and Joyce “as was his fashion” asked Wells for a favour (probably enlisting his support when it finally came out as a book).
- Wells then replied with this letter, which explains why the second sentence of Wells's letter has “I don’t think I can do anything for the propaganda of your work.” Joyce found the letter “friendly and honest”.[1]
I think some of what you said may make more sense for an unsolicited letter, especially one posted in public (like the comments on online communities that you mention) — bothering to write to someone to attack them. Here, though, I'm afraid I can't share your perception that Wells was “afraid of being left out”, or “stak[ing his] entire identity” or “invited himself to a debate” — he was simply declining a request: “Sorry I can't help you in the way you asked: here's why, but good luck anyway”. One part of what you said that I can fully agree with is that it “promotes Wells' own perceptions all the way down the page”: because explaining his perception is the point, and it's one of the polite things you can do when saying No.
[1]: https://books.google.com/books?id=eVGFCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT158&lpg=... and https://books.google.com/books?id=8MkRCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA92&lpg=P... and https://jamesjoyce.ie/day-24-february/
Sorry I can't be more clear for now but this kind of mixing of language interpretations happens sometimes. For example in MBTI soft-theory land this happens quite often on a tech site like HN when an INTJ writes metaphorically and an INTP consumes literally for logical analysis. Instant disagreement is common.
But yes, nothing about your comment came across as hypothetical conjecture. The tone is overwhelmingly "here is my conclusion, watch me work vigorously back to it and then insinuate many bad things as a result of my mistake".
Which is still qualitatively a different type of accommodation, as I'm saying we are likely, or possibly both right while also respecting the approach taken. Do you see how this is different from missing the purpose of the approach taken, remarking on how it is not fit for consumption by the common man, and saying, "it's OK, there is room for us both to be wrong here?"
> hypothetical conjecture
Why, because I don't have Wells in the room to ask? Accusing someone of hypothetical conjecture on a reading of a historical document is poor form here, given the context. I was given historical data based on a conjectural map of my writing onto someone else's psychology. I gave a valid reason why such a map leads away from my intended meaning. If you have a specific critique about the other post's contents, please go ahead. Otherwise criticizing my tone, whether to make Wells and I "both wrong" or for some other reason is unfair to the spirit of the discussion.
Because you respect a person, but want to be honest about your opinion of their work?
It's a fascinating mix. It operates at several levels of brutal honestly and self-reflection.
In modern terms it's shockingly literate and expressive. I think it's tragic that we almost never see writing like this today. (You can imagine the modern equivalent as some kind of semi-ironic "'Sup fam?' YouTube or Twitter feud, mixed with appeals to mash that subscribe button.)
The only true sour note for me is the comment about delusions of persecution. The persecution of the Irish was very real, and it was tone deaf of Wells not to realise this.
Either way, I'm glad this letter exists, as it validates my priors :)
Even though he admits these are both delusions, I think that Wells is lying to himself a bit here, considering that Joyce was operating in a system where he couldn't exercise political responsibility. I'm sure Wells would have also have wanted to break up that system if he was in the same position.
The first time I tried to read Joyce my attempt did not go well because I didn't really understand why Campbell was so taken with these works, so my own expectations about what I was getting into were wildly off the mark.
So I really get where H. G. Wells is coming from. Though I have to admit that Wells' writing is way, way more articulate than my thoughts at the time.
Many years later I got back into Joseph Campbell by way of Julian Jaynes and wound up with Finnegan's Wake again only I suppose with a different set of expectations and perspective. It's still not something I personally would read for idle pleasure but I feel like I'm understanding more of the big picture Joseph Campbell was all about, so it was a worthwhile read.
I agree with Wells about the frustrations with the endless riddles and the incessantly opaque style.
However an unexpected pleasure was how much fun it was to read in a group. For example, a set of allusions sprinkled on the page might catch the eye of someone for whom the subject was a pet interest or hobby, otherwise we all would have missed it. I learned a lot about world history, art, philosophy, etc., and I almost always ended the evening astounded at the oddest bits of information my friends had tucked away in their heads.
Finnegans Wake works really well as a scaffold for learning and conversation; as a story, I'm not so sure, but I think it is a remarkable literary experiment. There are also several truly beautiful passages hidden away in the book, which hit you by complete surprise when you stumble on them.
I’m imagining HG Wells on a modern software team, code-reviewing a large refactoring diff.
Though now that you mention it, I do recognise a bit of myself in this. I always try to mix criticism with praise. Not quite this brutal, though.
Here's Martin Amis, speaking at Nabokov's centenary celebration in 1999:
"[O]nly once, I think, did [Nabokov] bow to a superior talent. Of James Joyce he said, 'My stuff is patball to his champion game.'
"Now, how sincere was Nabokov being? In my view the bidding starts at 50% and then drops sharply. Anyway it's a judgment he whittled away at elsewhere. That 600-page crossword clue Finnegans Wake Nabokov considered a tragic failure: 'a cold pudding of a book, a persistent snore in the next room.'"
Plus it's terrible to tell a friend that you may both be wrong, when they may still have something to say--unless you are ready to be accused of backing out of the entire friendship arrangement. Relationships are all about reconciliation. They're not about subjective meta-narratives which attempt to evenly dole out critique, but from one side. It makes the doling side appear delicate and fearful of their own weaknesses.
Better to listen to friends, ask questions, and present your concerns as if they are third parties to yourself. Otherwise you will end up without friends when you need them most. Wells' own writing was likely gasoline on the fire, but I don't think he knew what he was getting into. Simply admitting possible fault as an entry point to subjective commentary like "BUT you're in the same fault zone with me" is a slap in the face.
You're very definitely not British.
Adding "maybe we're both wrong" is similarly a way to avoid confrontation and politely avoid open disagreement - allowing them both to remain on the same plane of neutrality and maintain respectful discourse.
It's always difficult to explain these sorts of things without tonality and cultural familiarity (much like explaining sarcasm on the internet). For the British culturally there is an underlying assumption that you're trying to be respectful/non-confrontational even when you're technically critiquing someone's work (which is a sort of overwhelming politeness the British are famous for - being polite means never being brash or overly direct). Another example of this sort of indirection is a "backhanded compliment".
I'll add that there was some also implied humour in my comment, and perhaps also in Wells's remarks to Joyce. Humour is the great leveller, before which we all have to confront our failures and fallibilities, and laugh.
With all due respect to cultural differences, one of these levels of politeness seems to have comparatively and metaphorically wiped the floor with the other.
Part of this message would be good for programmers to hear too
And now I shall continue writing PureScript, because I enjoy it :)
So much relevant to today in this personal letter.
> But the world is wide and there is room for both of us to be wrong.
Perhaps not so in the 21st century, the postmodernists have won. External reality is a mirage now and we can choose from any of the countless, mutually incompatible narratives as we see fit.
I'd count Joyce as a canonical modernist. (If he isn't, who is?)
Yes, there are lots of modernisms. Modernism in literature really has very little in common with modernism in architecture, for instance. Even more confusing, each of these modernisms has its own postmodernism, all 'post' their respective modernisms in different ways.
The sort of fragmentation of language and narrative that we see in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake is a pretty central modernist trait, I'd say. An even more central example would be something like Eliot's The Wasteland.
The problem, you see, is that everyone believes they themselves have a firm handle on "reality", and everyone else is spinning a "narrative".
Deciding what does/does not constitute external reality is the whole issue.
I could be totally wrong, however, and led astray by architecture, graphic and industrial design where ‘modernism’ is rather straightforward.
Joyce was arguably the greatest writer of the 20th century.
Wells wrote enjoyable books that could entertain most anyone.
“If I gave it all up immediately, I'd lose my immortality. I've put in so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant, and that's the only way of insuring one's immortality.” -Joyce's reply for a request for a plan of Ulysses, as quoted in James Joyce (1959) by Richard Ellmann
“The demand that I make of my reader is that he should devote his whole Life to reading my works.” -Interview with Max Eastman in Harper's Magazine, as quoted in James Joyce (1959) by Richard Ellmann. Eastman noted "He smiled as he said that — smiled, and then repeated it."
That pretty well sums up my experience with Ulysses and Finnegan’s Wake as well, though to be fair I have never given the latter much of a try.
His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.
There is a section, for example, that mixes something like the inventory of a pantry with a sexual encounter, so if you read it out loud you seem to be listing off various food products, but somehow underneath it all... something else it going on.
It's best to read out loud IMO because above all else it sounds funny. It's playful and silly and fun, so if you sit quietly and try to make sense of it you will miss the point.
Heh.
For those who want to dip their toe into Ulysses
on edit: although of course there would be no reason that the critical reputation of Verne should be gained at the expense of Joyce. Just that we are far enough away from a generation of writers that you would think there would be some shaking up of the critical order.
Should I read Ulysses? I’ve wanted to read it on account of its acclaim but after reading some comments here I feel like maybe not?
Ulysses, on the other hand, is hundreds and hundreds of pages of modernist stream of consciousness, from the point of view of many characters who don't believe in providing context, where every sentence is packed full of complicated wordplay and obscure allusions, and everything happens at a snail's pace. If the idea of reading a book where you literally can't understand half of it gives you pause, Ulysses is probably not the book for you.
For what it's worth, Joyce is commenting on Finnegans Wake, which goes 10x on everything above and is basically entirely incomprehensible.
Do you expect a person to fully understand C++ the first time they use it?
It was like my fourth or fifth attempt like six years ago (at 32) where it clicked. Honestly love it now.
The trick is to let go of this notion that Ulysses is some kind of schoolboy challenge. You have to let it wash over you, allow the language to intoxicate you mind. You need to be in an altered state where you are more open to symbolism in general.
I think the key to enjoying it is familiarity. There are many balls you need to juggle mentally and it’s hard to enjoy Ulysses when everything is too different to what you’d normally expect from a book.
But start with Dubliners first. See how it goes from there.
Wells would say don’t, but fuck Wells ;p
Sir Tristram, violer d'amores, fr'over the short sea, had passen- core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war: nor had topsawyer's rocks by the stream Oconee exaggerated themselse to Laurens County's gorgios while they went doublin their mumper all the time: nor avoice from afire bellowsed mishe mishe to tauftauf thuartpeatrick: not yet, though venissoon after, had a kidscad buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in vanessy, were sosie sesthers wroth with twone nathandjoe. Rot a peck of pa's malt had Jhem or Shen brewed by arclight and rory end to the regginbrow was to be seen ringsome on the aquaface.
>riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.
And you'll just have to read to the end of the book to find out how the sentence begins.
Joking aside, I actually love this style of writing even though I get virtually no narrative from it. I read it almost like some sort of abstract poetry, letting my mind wander as the words go by.
Also, I find it reads a lot better out loud than silently: easier to notice some of the strange dream-like word mixes. Like `venissoon` kind of sounds like `very soon`. I only saw `venison` until I read it out loud.
I've never read Joyce, but based on these couple of lines I think I understand Wells' letter. It's magnificent to be able to write like that, but please keep it short. Nobody can withstand that for more than a page or two.
Here, Wells constrasts the work of writing for an english audience with the hack value of playing with english itself.
In our language, Joyce might've posted a "Show HN" of some reflective lispian tower that self-rewrites at runtime to collapse into monadic machine code, and Wells would comment that it was probably more fun to write than to use, and as for himself, he will keep on plugging along in javascript to produce value for his paying users.
There's more than one way to skin a cat.
Firstly, it's definitely not written in eye dialect (it's basically a dialect or language of Joyce's own invention)
Beyond that, even if you were to consider accents of Joyce & his contemporaries, along with the changes of accents over 100 years, Joyce—from a Catholic, but well-off background—had an accent[0] much closer to a modern English accent than anything else.
He also lived in Italy, Switzerland and France for most of his life.
the short sea: the English Channel
North Amorica: North America
penisolate: combination of pen, peninsula, penis, and isolated
topsawyer: Tom Sawyer, an American character written by Mark Twain. Also, for lumbermen, the top sawyer stands above log, while the bottom sawyer stands below the log, introducing the theme of a sibling rivalry.
Oconee: There's a river Oconee that flows through Lauren County, Georgia, and the county seat of Dublin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin,_Georgia
Laurens County: during the Anglo-Norman conquest, the archbishop of Dublin was Lawrence O'Toole; Dublin would be "Lawrence's County": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorcán_Ua_Tuathail. Also, the Earl of Tristram changed his family name to Lawrence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_of_Howth)
doublin their mumper: doubling their number
thuartpeatrick: Saint Patrick. 'taufen' is German for baptize. Peat symbolizes Ireland. The fire references the miracle of Saint Patrick's Purgatory, where he drew a circle on the ground and the earth opened in flame.
kidscad ... isaac: the Old Testament story where Jacob, in rivalry with his brother Esau, disguises himself with a lambskin, to steal the blessing of their dying father Isaac. "not yet, but very soon after, Jacob, disguised in the kidskin, duped blind old Isaac". This reinforces the theme of sibling rivalry. Also a reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Butt.
Vanessy ... twone nathandjoe: two/one, nathandjoe is Nathan and Joe, another sibling rivalry. Also, an anagram for Jonathan (Swift): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadenus_and_Vanessa
sosie sesthers wroth: transformations of Susie/Susannah, Esther, Ruth, the heroines of Biblical stories.
In vanessy: Inverness was the castle from Macbeth.
Pa's malt, Jhem, Shen: the Biblical story of Noah getting drunk and discovered by his sons, Shem, Japhet, and Ham: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunkenness_of_Noah. This introduces the theme of the fading of the father into the sibling rivalry.
Yeah, it's dense stuff, but I find it fascinating. This paragraph is introducing a bunch of themes that are explored in depth throughout the book. It's impossible to get much meaning without a guidebook; I've used A Skeleton Key by Joseph Campbell.
I presume this makes Pikotaro the modern avatar of Joyce then: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct6BUPvE2sM
> North Amorica: North America
Are you sure? The quoted text says "North Armorica", which is in northern Brittany, just across the English Channel from the British Isles.
Writing it like that certainly evokes "North America", but I guess this is what Joyce does: mix multiple different but similar words and names into one in order to confuse the hell out of the reader.
If Donald Knuth wrote TAOCP in Befunge as a thought experiment, I'd regard it much the same: kudos to you for pulling it off, but even if it's a work of genius, I'd rather do literally anything else than try to make sense of it.
(Have read the former and not the latter.)
Perhaps if somebody has a motivation different than "I just want to read a classic," then there could be an approach or motivation to invest the time and energy.
But parsing gibberish is like reading zero-point SO answer code.
Well, I agree, but I also have never seen it written so nicely like this.
If you had values not in opposition to reality, then they wouldn't be relevant to reality, would they? Because in not opposing reality, they couldn't guide you in changing it.
The most you could really say about values being objectively wrong is if they are inconsistent and could not be fulfilled in reality in any possible universe. But what is a possible universe? And what if all value systems are impossible to completely fulfill?
Wells is arguing that Joyce is being shocking for the sake of it in an internal struggle with his conservative values, while Wells sees himself as a scientific man "never been shocked to outcries by the existence of water closets and menstrual bandages".
(Presumably a reference to Ulysees and the content that got it banned: https://www.bl.uk/20th-century-literature/articles/ulysses-a... )
In the first instance, there is no "system of values" only things of greater or lesser value (the fact-value dichotomy is hopelessly wrong).
Second, what exactly is in stark opposition to reality? The whole ground of Catholicism/Christianity vis-a-vis who Jesus is (beginning in the Torah) is that the fall of Man had put men in opposition to reality (rebellion, really) and the ultimate source of reality that is God. Here we have the natural law theory of ethics that explains sin as willed act opposed to the good (and thus the true, and the beautiful) which is known through the nature of things, esp. of Man which is absolutely real.
And where science is concerned, how about the Logos [0]? Christianity sees reality as utterly intelligible which gives all science (whether empirical or not) its footing and possibility. Any civilization, culture, or religion that stifles this will never produce a sustainable and flourishing scientific culture (Stanley Jaki develops this point in his books). A timely example is Islam where Allah is understood as arbitrary will and not analogically as primarily intellect. The result is that the world is rendered unintelligible and helps explain why the scientific achievements of the Islamic world were exceptions rather than the rule.
Wells was probably mechanistic and scientistic in his outlook but likewise parasitically drew from the (warped) Christian heritage of his culture.
Thats HG Wells for - "You Suck".
It’s a great piece: An eloquent reminder that disagreement doesn’t have to mean disrespect.
He frames himself and Joyce as opposites, as if in an attempt to make what follows fair game.
I think if someone came up to me and said, "Not that my opinion matters, but I think you're disgusting", I'd still be pretty offended. I think onlookers would see something like that as unnecessary.
Just don't write the letter next time, eh Wells?