3 ms·

It requires a person that loves to solve riddles. Think of a crossword aficionado escalated to the next level.

pupser 8y ago
But maybe there's no riddle after all... just Joyce being a dick. This is my preferred theory. The guy was a dick or just mocking the academics - nothing more, nothing less. Edit / To clarify: I know about art and people's preferences. I am not English/Irish, am no expert in Shakespeares' works or "speak" fluent Latin, so there will be things I won't understand without some (sometimes substantial) effort on my part (reading Ulysses) - I know that. I am also capable to enjoy unconventional styles and writing (like Naked Lunch, for example - no comparison, just an example). With Joyce, however, I just can't shake the feeling the guy was just showing-off and making fun of the people who later try to convince others and/or themselves that they "got it". But to each their own.
- rumcajz 8y ago
  I can't tell about Finnegan's Wake. I am not a native English speaker and that kind of prevents me reading it. I've enjoyed Ulysses though. Even on the most simple level, you can, for example, read the book with a clock and a map of Dublin and follow what's happening in real time (the reading time seems to match the time described in the book). Anyway, my point was that art is, essentially, to be enjoyed. I've enjoyed it. Great. You didn't. Good as well. What's weird though is the academics analyzing books nine-to-five, to put food on the table.
  - sdenton4 8y ago
    (To be sure, I am a native english speaker, and feel that not being Joyce prevents me from reading Finnegans Wake.)
- pas 8y ago
  He's a dick all right, but he marvellously teeters on the edge of genius and sometimes dipping into full blown ga-ga, and the riddle is deciphering which side is which. It's a meme/drug. It evokes a mental buzz - in some people. Some people are drawn in by the gigantic accomplishment, the magnitude of the writing, some by the strangeness of the content itself, some by other means. (Maybe trying to understand what others see in it.) Some then get sober soon, some take decades.
- coldtea 8y ago
  > But maybe there's no riddle after all... just Joyce being a dick. This is my preferred theory. The guy was a dick or just mocking the academics - nothing more, nothing less. Aka the "everybody else is an idiot for not getting it except me" theory... How about it's just that literature or specifically 20th century literature isn't your thing?
  - exelius 8y ago
    Except the article we’re replying to makes essentially this same argument, while asserting that many Joyce scholars have come to the same conclusion.
    - coldtea 8y ago
      Well, the article is a middlebrow filler piece, filled with autobiographical cuteness, and little substance. There is tons of great Joyce scholarship without those lightweight complaints. And yet, there doesn't need to be, to be frank. Books are to be read and perhaps re-read by readers, not to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives. For literary works, as a reader you either get it or you don't, and if do it's primarily on a visceral level that beyond the plot and the craft includes the emotions, the flow of words, the mental imagery etc. It's not meant to be some great riddle to be solved, as if it's the Voynich manuscript.
      - kbutler 8y ago
        > Books are to be read and perhaps re-read by readers, not to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives. I submit that Finnegans Wake is the exception proving that some books are specifically written "to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives."
    - Mediterraneo10 8y ago
      But the argument in the article and by various other scholars is specifically about Finnegans Wake. Joyce wrote several distinctly different books that should never be lumped together as “impenetrable modernism”. Dubliners is so straightforward that its stories are commonly assigned to school pupils. Portrait is a bit more experimental, but again it is often read by young people. Ulysses definitely requires a good grounding in artes liberales at the university level (or simply being a very bookish person regardless of formal education or not), but if you have that, then you can certainly read right through the book. Some allusions or references might escape you, but you can always refer to a commentary, because it is pretty well agreed what everything in that book means. The Wake is a whole other story. Joyce’s oneiric storytelling and sheer amount of puns makes it difficult to pin down even some of the basic plot. But don’t let that book or scholars’ fatigue and ultimately dismissive view of it turn you off from everything else that Joyce wrote.
- vixen99 8y ago
  According to Joyce "The only demand I make of my reader is that he should devote his whole life to reading my works". No one else, just Joyce! If seriously intended, I'd love to read someone's literary justification for this example of messianic arrogance.
- raverbashing 8y ago
  It's more like "playing it hard to get". That can be considered "being a dick" depending on the point of view. But it's the same idea as "why aren't all paintings painted as realistically as they can" Or why slang evolves in some contexts even when not need (though not the only reason). So it's linguistic jazz playing an underlying story and decorating it on top. But it's definitely not for everybody.

But maybe there's no riddle after all... just Joyce being a dick. This is my preferred theory. The guy was a dick or just mocking the academics - nothing more, nothing less. Edit / To clarify: I know about art and people's preferences. I am not English/Irish, am no expert in Shakespeares' works or "speak" fluent Latin, so there will be things I won't understand without some (sometimes substantial) effort on my part (reading Ulysses) - I know that. I am also capable to enjoy unconventional styles and writing (like Naked Lunch, for example - no comparison, just an example). With Joyce, however, I just can't shake the feeling the guy was just showing-off and making fun of the people who later try to convince others and/or themselves that they "got it". But to each their own.

rumcajz 8y ago
I can't tell about Finnegan's Wake. I am not a native English speaker and that kind of prevents me reading it. I've enjoyed Ulysses though. Even on the most simple level, you can, for example, read the book with a clock and a map of Dublin and follow what's happening in real time (the reading time seems to match the time described in the book). Anyway, my point was that art is, essentially, to be enjoyed. I've enjoyed it. Great. You didn't. Good as well. What's weird though is the academics analyzing books nine-to-five, to put food on the table.
- sdenton4 8y ago
  (To be sure, I am a native english speaker, and feel that not being Joyce prevents me from reading Finnegans Wake.)
pas 8y ago
He's a dick all right, but he marvellously teeters on the edge of genius and sometimes dipping into full blown ga-ga, and the riddle is deciphering which side is which. It's a meme/drug. It evokes a mental buzz - in some people. Some people are drawn in by the gigantic accomplishment, the magnitude of the writing, some by the strangeness of the content itself, some by other means. (Maybe trying to understand what others see in it.) Some then get sober soon, some take decades.
coldtea 8y ago
> But maybe there's no riddle after all... just Joyce being a dick. This is my preferred theory. The guy was a dick or just mocking the academics - nothing more, nothing less. Aka the "everybody else is an idiot for not getting it except me" theory... How about it's just that literature or specifically 20th century literature isn't your thing?
- exelius 8y ago
  Except the article we’re replying to makes essentially this same argument, while asserting that many Joyce scholars have come to the same conclusion.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    Well, the article is a middlebrow filler piece, filled with autobiographical cuteness, and little substance. There is tons of great Joyce scholarship without those lightweight complaints. And yet, there doesn't need to be, to be frank. Books are to be read and perhaps re-read by readers, not to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives. For literary works, as a reader you either get it or you don't, and if do it's primarily on a visceral level that beyond the plot and the craft includes the emotions, the flow of words, the mental imagery etc. It's not meant to be some great riddle to be solved, as if it's the Voynich manuscript.
    - kbutler 8y ago
      > Books are to be read and perhaps re-read by readers, not to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives. I submit that Finnegans Wake is the exception proving that some books are specifically written "to be over-analysed for decades by obsessives."
  - Mediterraneo10 8y ago
    But the argument in the article and by various other scholars is specifically about Finnegans Wake. Joyce wrote several distinctly different books that should never be lumped together as “impenetrable modernism”. Dubliners is so straightforward that its stories are commonly assigned to school pupils. Portrait is a bit more experimental, but again it is often read by young people. Ulysses definitely requires a good grounding in artes liberales at the university level (or simply being a very bookish person regardless of formal education or not), but if you have that, then you can certainly read right through the book. Some allusions or references might escape you, but you can always refer to a commentary, because it is pretty well agreed what everything in that book means. The Wake is a whole other story. Joyce’s oneiric storytelling and sheer amount of puns makes it difficult to pin down even some of the basic plot. But don’t let that book or scholars’ fatigue and ultimately dismissive view of it turn you off from everything else that Joyce wrote.
vixen99 8y ago
According to Joyce "The only demand I make of my reader is that he should devote his whole life to reading my works". No one else, just Joyce! If seriously intended, I'd love to read someone's literary justification for this example of messianic arrogance.
raverbashing 8y ago
It's more like "playing it hard to get". That can be considered "being a dick" depending on the point of view. But it's the same idea as "why aren't all paintings painted as realistically as they can" Or why slang evolves in some contexts even when not need (though not the only reason). So it's linguistic jazz playing an underlying story and decorating it on top. But it's definitely not for everybody.