ON AUGUST 1, 2007, I wrote the following on MetaFilter, an online forum:
Ulysses, or, more properly, James Joyce, isn't the first literary thing I have ever been afraid of. I was afraid of George Bernard Shaw for quite a while. He just seemed so curmudgeonly and obviously possessed a ferocious intellect, and I guess I thought his plays would be exhausting as a result. Of course, was I didn't realize is that Shaw also possessed a terrific plotting sense, a marvelous understanding of character, and an enormous sense of humor, and so I shouldn't have been afraid.
But everybody is afraid of Joyce, I think. I recall, in high school, a fellow student was working his way through Ulysses, and a teacher spotted him with the book in his hand, shook his head, and said "Why?" I've discussed reading Ulysses with friends recently, and they suggest techniques for reading the book to make it more palatable, and give me numbers of scholars I can call and consult when I get stuck.
Who wouldn't be afraid of that?
My quote from above is not the only time I have mentioned Joyce on MetaFilter. On June 17 of that year, I wrote the following:
I wasn't. But I was ready to start thinking about it.
I have read Joyce before. I've read both Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, many years ago, and enjoyed them both. But even with these earlier works, Joyce required a committed reader. His stories require active participation on the part of the reader, and their meanings are revealed in hints, often in distinct word choices that reference Catholicism, or Greek literature, or Irish history, or his own biography.
And I'm not a careful reader. I'm not even a careful writer. I write fast and off the top of my head, and revise only as much as I think is required to make my points clear. I skim when I read, driving through whatever I find uninteresting to locate whatever I want to get out of an article, or a book, or a Web page, and I devour it and digest it fast. I read mostly non-fiction, and I read it with an eye toward what I can get out of it. If I don't understand something, unless I think it's something I need, I am okay with not understanding it.
You can't read Joyce like this, and I think this is why I have been afraid of him. After all, from what I hear, his two later books, Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake, are terrifically funny, and usually I'll forgive almost anything if it makes me laugh.
But I am determined to read Joyce. All of it. And I'm determined to do it right. A few months ago, I attended an interview at the Guthrie with Tony Kushner -- another ferocious intellectual -- and he made the case that the purpose of education is, in part, to teach people to be careful, smart, critical readers.
I'm going to be doing a lot of reading for this Irish-American project, and I need to get back into the habit of being a careful, smart, critical reader. And Joyce seems to be a good writer to start with, firstly because he demands that from his readers, but also because it's always good to start with what scares you the most and you have put off the longest. I think I finally am actually ready for James Joyce, God help me.
More Plastic Paddy
I know if it's a really great book if I am unaccountably afraid of it. Ulysses, I'm looking at you. And trembling.
Ulysses, or, more properly, James Joyce, isn't the first literary thing I have ever been afraid of. I was afraid of George Bernard Shaw for quite a while. He just seemed so curmudgeonly and obviously possessed a ferocious intellect, and I guess I thought his plays would be exhausting as a result. Of course, was I didn't realize is that Shaw also possessed a terrific plotting sense, a marvelous understanding of character, and an enormous sense of humor, and so I shouldn't have been afraid.
But everybody is afraid of Joyce, I think. I recall, in high school, a fellow student was working his way through Ulysses, and a teacher spotted him with the book in his hand, shook his head, and said "Why?" I've discussed reading Ulysses with friends recently, and they suggest techniques for reading the book to make it more palatable, and give me numbers of scholars I can call and consult when I get stuck.
Who wouldn't be afraid of that?
My quote from above is not the only time I have mentioned Joyce on MetaFilter. On June 17 of that year, I wrote the following:
Years ago, when I taught Hebrew to children, a boy, 10 years old, brought a copy of Naked Lunch to class. What do you think of this, he asked.
Tell me what you think, I said.
He came back the next day, having read the first chapter.
I'm not ready to read this yet, he told me.
I'm 39. I'm Irish American and Jewish. I drink too much and drink often. My life has, to this point, been nothing but strange side trips off what, for other people, are the main roads. I'm educated in the classics, and in history. I reflexively make jokes, in the way that bullied children learn to, because everyone loves a laugh and forgives those who make them laugh. I'm a writer by trade and a reader by passion, and particularly love to read oddities and works of grandiose, if sometimes misplaced, ambition or passion. I've boxed in a Mexican gym in Los Angeles, gotten drunk with movie stars, written limericks and drinking songs, was beaten in a riot, fled the destruction of New Orleans, seen a city burn, stared at a 200-year old Buddhist monk's mummy in Thailand, sung Yiddish songs in cabarets, made movies with a ventriloquist dummy, and had my writing condemned by a state senator.
Just now, this day after Bloomsday, I feel I'm ready for Ulysses.
I wasn't. But I was ready to start thinking about it.
I have read Joyce before. I've read both Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, many years ago, and enjoyed them both. But even with these earlier works, Joyce required a committed reader. His stories require active participation on the part of the reader, and their meanings are revealed in hints, often in distinct word choices that reference Catholicism, or Greek literature, or Irish history, or his own biography.
And I'm not a careful reader. I'm not even a careful writer. I write fast and off the top of my head, and revise only as much as I think is required to make my points clear. I skim when I read, driving through whatever I find uninteresting to locate whatever I want to get out of an article, or a book, or a Web page, and I devour it and digest it fast. I read mostly non-fiction, and I read it with an eye toward what I can get out of it. If I don't understand something, unless I think it's something I need, I am okay with not understanding it.
You can't read Joyce like this, and I think this is why I have been afraid of him. After all, from what I hear, his two later books, Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake, are terrifically funny, and usually I'll forgive almost anything if it makes me laugh.
But I am determined to read Joyce. All of it. And I'm determined to do it right. A few months ago, I attended an interview at the Guthrie with Tony Kushner -- another ferocious intellectual -- and he made the case that the purpose of education is, in part, to teach people to be careful, smart, critical readers.
I'm going to be doing a lot of reading for this Irish-American project, and I need to get back into the habit of being a careful, smart, critical reader. And Joyce seems to be a good writer to start with, firstly because he demands that from his readers, but also because it's always good to start with what scares you the most and you have put off the longest. I think I finally am actually ready for James Joyce, God help me.
More Plastic Paddy
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