NOTES & ARTICLES - TOOLS & QUERIES - LOST & FOUND - ABOUT GENETIC JOYCE STUDIES
The First Generation of the JJA
Joe Schork
Sometime in the mid-80’s
I spotted a notice (in the New York Times, as I recall) that Garland Publishing
was offering the Finnegans Wake portion of the Archive at a significant
reduction. A call to their 800-number revealed that this “fabulous deal”
would total over $2000; nevertheless, I ordered and donated the volumes
to the Special Collections in my university’s library. When they arrived
two weeks later, I got my first glance at the books which I have continually
puzzled over for over for 15 or so years. I was initially disappointed,
since I expected more visual and graphic glitz, like the laid-in facsimile
of the “‘Oxen’ mandala” in Herring’s Notesheets. For weeks (it was summer
vacation) I did nothing but page through the material, from VI.B.1 to VI.C.18
-- the drafts and proofs got a fast and selective leaf-through. Colleagues
who spotted me hunched over those dark green quartos in the library knew
then that I was addicted.
My first real discovery was triggered by a long index of numbers and phrases (VI.B.28.9) which I was able to trace to the exact pages in a popular biography of the American circus-magnate, P. T. Barnum. That source and Joyce’s use of it (in several notebooks) led to an article in JJQ (27 [Summer 1990] 759-66). (At that time, because I had never heard of Understanding Finnegans Wake or its “HCE Project” appendage, I did not know that Rose and O’Hanlon had previously identified this source.) Meanwhile, I had volunteered to be the Classical representative on a language-panel at the 1988 symposium in Venice. My truncated topic (we were all upstaged, if not pre-empted by David Norris) highlighted some Latin snippets in the notebooks. A favorite is “Urbs antiqua (limerick)” (VI.B.23.21): Joyce’s reflection on the recyclability of a verse from the Aeneid (1.12-13), “There was an old city [named Carthage].”
The chairperson of that panel was Geert Lernout, who gathered us for lunch in the garden of San Giorgio Maggiore before our presentations. From that time on, it has all been archivally up hill. That Adriatic introduction to several other genetic researchers lead to subsequent contacts: the Irish mandarins, Vincent Deane, Danis Rose, John O’Hanlon, Roland McHugh; the Flemish prodigies, Wim Van Mierlo (his maiden international talk was on my panel at Dublin in 1990), Ingeborg Landuyt, Dirk Van Hulle -- all students/colleagues of Lernout at Antwerp. At various conferences and meetings (especially those in Antwerp), I have seen our interests in the notebooks and drafts move from a fringe-obsession to a more-or-less accepted -- albeit esoteric – aspect of Wakean scholarship. All the members of the coven (including Bill Cadbury of draft-stage fame, Sam Slote, Aida Yared, the Islamic mavin, and Mikio Fuse, whose modest announcement of his internet-discovery of a source in Katherine Masefield was the single most astounding bit of detection I have ever witnessed) are fun to be with and can be depended upon to give immediate suggestions and assistance. From many countries and cultural backgrounds, young and old, these genetic buddies have been -- and I hope will continue to be -- the best company anyone could imagine. My initial outlay for the Archive has proven to be the wisest and most profitable investment I have ever made.
Finally, a look back and
a glance ahead. Many of the procedures and methods which are the focus
of genetic scholarship on the Wake -- notebooks, lists, crayon strikeouts,
off-the-wall sources -- were also used by Joyce in the final stages of
the composition of Ulysses. The pioneering archival scholarship
and publications of Phil Herring (“Ulysses” Notesheets [1972] and Notes
and Early Drafts [1977]) anticipate and exemplify the purposes and techniques
of current Wakean genetic research.Moreover, his detection of sources (for
example, the Bertrand Russell index in V.A.2.28-30) deserves more attention
and praise than it has received from Joycean critics up to their necks
in post-colonialism or sexual politics. The latest project in archival
scholarship is the Brepols edition of The “Finnegans Wake” Notebooks at
Buffalo (2001+). The first three volumes (VI.B.10 and VI.B.3 [edited by
Deane], VI.B.29 [edited by Lernout]) represent the second generation --
and the scholarly maturity -- of notebook research: crisp introductions,
clear reproductions, scrupulous interpretation, meticulous comment. Every
library should place an order for the series, since all future genetic
scholarship will require these works, as primary documents and essential,
reliable references. In just a bit more than 25 years, then, the Buffalo
notebooks -- which are the key to the Wake -- have moved from the necessary
cloister of a magnificent university collection to the uneven facsimiles
and preliminary introductions in the JJA to the inauguration of complete
accessibility in a first-class edition by world-class scholars. I am lucky
to have been around to watch the action -- and every now and then to have
jumped into the arena myself.
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LOST & FOUND
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GENETIC JOYCE STUDIES