Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Notes from The Wake, pp.196-201


This month we have notes first from Kim Koch --long time group member, linguist, archivist, and musician (among her many areas of expertise), and then from Kevin Spenst, group founder, poet, and teacher (among his many attributes). Members present included Kevin Spenst, Kim Koch, Mark Trankner, Amy Logan, and Robin Bajer.

Kim's notes follow:


“Anna Livia Plurabelle”

- A LITERAL stream of consciousness.

- Some discussion of the origins of the concept/metaphor of stream of consciousness; would Joyce have been aware of it, and thus making express reference to it? Answer: probably. Coined by William James in the nineteenth century. Edouard Dujardin also informed the idea.

- The paradox of stream of consciousness: lack of deixis limits our knowledge of a character; yet we know everything that passes through their mind.

-Washerwomen’s narration of HCE and ALP as they launder clothes in the river; narrative washing through them.

- p. 196: “…steeping and stuping since this time last wik”. Etymology of wik discussed (as of course its modern connotation of wiki-). Likely Joyce chose it for same reason computer technologists chose it: Hawaiian morpheme meaning “quick”. (Though Joyce had the double fortune its homophonousness with “week”.

- River names run through it: Dniepers, Ganges, Loch, Sendai, Loo, etc.

- Canadian content: Pemmican’s pasty pie (197) and Shoubenaccadie (200)

- Eld Duke Alien = Old Ducalian  Gilgamesh myth

- ALP blamed for her rape by HCE

- Aeneas and Dido “all was dodo” invoked.

- Miscegenation of language, p.199: The hen crows on the Turrace of Babbel, cockles her mouth: assumption of alien words/grammars.

- We encountered some Swahili: Wendawanda, a fingerthick.



Kevin's notes follow:

Anna Livia Plurabelle (January 2, 2013)



Robyn: A happy isthmus against bunglers. With the glean of him. The quaggy wag who sold you the pelican’s tale. ‘Til he spied the grand pigeon house. Where was the wash? He rode. When they saw him shoot our staley bread.


Amy: It is just the same if I were to go? Is that what she is?


Kim: Pretending to bow abandon. An odd time she’d cook up wishy-washy. As much as to say, she was safe enough.


Mark: Is that a faith? Nith. Tell me.


William James: I coined the term stream-of-consciousness in 1890.


Saint Augustine: I wrote from the point of view of the self.


Everyone: The old cheb went fut and did what you know!


Kevin: We need an actor to show us swank, stutter, drawl and blather.


Mark: Lictors are probably at the beginning of their careers. They make part of the king’s entourage.


Amy: Saft is a Danish word for juice.


Mark: The story of Dido and Aeneas is central to this passage.


Amy: Eyge is a conflation of egg and eye. A kind of all-seeing egg.


Narrator: And at 9:52, they all went fut at the top of 201.