Update on Infinite Jest

I certainly haven't been writing about it to the extent I wrote about Ulysses as I haven't really felt the need for a chapter-by-chapter analysis on the blog, especially as there are many more chapters. So, before I get too ahead of myself, I thought I'd update. At the moment, I am about 30% of the way through the book, I'm not sure, but I believe I've gone past the part I got to the last time I read. This time I am making copious notes about the different characters, which has helped a great deal. I can't always remember in what context each character has popped up before, so it makes sense to check on it. 

Wallace's plotting is intricate in the extreme; I can't think of another book I've read that works in the same way with each character fitting together. Its like a big puzzle giving out clues all the time. In some ways, I wish I'd left 'subsidzed time' as a mystery until it was reveled, but never mind, the rest of the book has been a spoiler-free zone so far. 

Even though it's difficult at times, it's an enjoyable book to read, particularly the incidences of black humour and absurdity. I particularly enjoyed the story of Poor Tony stealing the woman's heart, somehow you don't know whether to laugh or not. 

Difficult parts include a bit too much tennis and AA meetings, Clenette's narration and the history of Quebecois separatism, which is no walk in the park. 

Themes so far include appearences and the eternal struggle between freedom and responsibility. This final theme is revealed through the Ennet House Drug and Alcohol Recovery House [sic] parts, which is in turn mirrored by the drug taking that takes place in the Enfield Tennis Academy. It seems no-one can escape the consequences of absolving responsibility, and the Separatist Operatives have an interesting discussion about having enough responsibility to be able to be free. Even though there are serious points to be made, I haven't found the book to be that 'preachy' about it. 

The trouble with a book like this is that sometimes, it spoils you for other books. I want to carry on reading something that I can feel is doing something good. I want to find out what happens, but at the same time I don't really want it to end. 

Just a brief word about reading the e-book version. So far, I've found it okay. Using the footnotes in the book is good, but I've used a physical notebook and a pencil to make notes. I haven't really got to grips with bookmarks on the Kindle as yet, so I've had to scan around to find James's filmography and probably will when Separatism becomes vital to the plot. I think the main benefit to reading on Kindle is not ending up with a wrecked copy from too much bookmarking, note-taking and flipping back through different sections!

 

At the Bloom residence

Another chapter, another new, interesting narrative technique. It moves nicely on from the previous chapter in the formal tone, in the form of a dialogue or questions and answers, a catechism. I have to say, I don't think I've ever come across this technique used anywhere else.  

It is extremely formal and uses mathematical, technical language; almost impossibly detailed, although sometimes contradictory or even oxymoronic: '...his firm full masculine feminine passive active hand.' (p627, OUP 1998).  Still, Joyce's humour carries on, with the ironic comments about 'light to the gentiles' (p629, ibid), Bloom's declining of an invitation to dinner: 'Very gratefully, with grateful appreciation, with sincere appreciative gratitude, in appreciatively grateful sincerity of regret, he declined.' (p633, ibid), the use of the mock-serious and word-play on the infamous Plumtree's potted meat. The form forces impartiality and lack of emotion about the characters, for example, when Stephen performs a bizarre example of an anti-semitic song, Bloom is described as reacting 'With mixed feelings. Unsmiling...' (p644, ibid).

Bloom and Bloom's house are both depicted with the utmost realism, to the point that the narrator describes in detail the contents of his drawers and bookshelf. 

Leopold Bloom at home. Guessing the film-maker is focusing on his 'womanliness' here (link) 

 

 

 

 Speaking of womanliness and the contents of drawers, we even get to see Bloom's birth certificate and to snigger over his middle name, 'Paula'. If this isn't an obvious way of James Augusta Joyce to point out Bloom's lack of masculinity, I don't know what is. Mind you, he did marry Nora Joseph Barnacle!


We also get to see another view Bloom has of Molly. So far we've mainly seen the adulterous singing wife, but here we get to see Bloom's view of not-very-intelligent Molly who needs Bloom's practical suggestions to assist in her every day life. Bloom does have quite a high opinion of his own common sense, as we've seen in the last chapter, he's not above giving Mr. Big Brains Stephen some unwanted advice about avoiding prostitutes and eating regularly. Bloom also seems to think of Molly as some kind of harlot, once he gets rid of Stephen he goes to bed imagining the legions of men who've slept with her in that same bed; the list including a couple of priests and even Simon Dedalus. I think here we are assume that this is hyperbolic rather than literal. Bloom doesn't blame her for her adultery, as it seems they haven't had sex in over a decade.

I admit, I liked this chapter, in spite of its deliberate anti-literary style that was so different from anything else I read. Completely confusing because these last few chapters seem to have wiped out all my preconceived ideas about the characters, about the book and about Joyce himself. I don't think I will ever be a fan of S&C, but I can see why people re-read the book.     

A Romantic Interlude...

Amazingly, another readable chapter of Ulysses. Okay, so it's readable because Joyce is writing a parody of certain types of sentimental romance, but it's still nice to move a little away from something that requires the utmost concentration. I think it's also the bit of The Odyssey I remember the most (aside from the Cyclops incident). 


The episode opens with an idyllic seaside excursion and our very own Nausicaa, Gerty MacDowell. I wondered if Gerty was another Hamlet reference. The episode parodies The Lamplighter, by an American author called Maria Susanna Cummings. The novel's heroine, Gerty, has to overcome adversity using her own inner resources to ultimately find happiness. I suppose you could call it a feminist novel as it was intended to instruct as well as entertain young women on becoming self-reliant (although not in a shunning men kind of a way presumably).

Image courtesy of Wikipedia

Rather than use first person narrative or the ol' stream-of-consciousness malarkey, Joyce uses the third person, so Gerty doesn't really get a 'voice' as such, however, the narrative style suits her perfectly; a mixture of romantic fiction and women's magazines. It's a beautiful description, almost tender, yet at the same time reminding us of Gerty's frailties. Some of the lurid prose reminded me somewhat of Lady Chatterly's Lover, but not in a bad way, although I think perhaps Lawrence wouldn't have found that a compliment!  

Gerty spots Bloom on the beach and reacts to him in a completely different way to the other characters' disdain and downright antipathy toward him. She thinks that he looks like a film star in morning and perhaps fancies him because he looks different. She doesn't consider his Jewishness which is obvious to the other people bloom has encountered so far. Gerty sees herself as some sort of combination of the traditional Catholic ideas of the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene; innocent, motherly and a temptress all at the same time. Sex mingling with religion. This is further complicated with blood as Gerty feels her period starting. 

The 'shocking' bit was tame by today's standards, but I suppose I can see why it might be considered obscene by the standards of the day, where masturbation was considered at the very least to be something to be discouraged. I guess there is also everything that this chapter represents - an older man spying on a younger woman (who is showing off her legs to him) and becoming sexually aroused accompanied to the sounds of fireworks going off. I suppose that at the time the fireworks were a bit more of a nice touch rather than the romantic fiction then parody film cliche they've become. 

Anyway, Bloom finishes off, having almost been discovered in the act by Cissy asking him the time, then Gerty limps off, leaving Bloom to discover her lameness, much to his surprise. I did love the way that Bloom's final image of her was as someone imperfect that he felt sorry for, somehow it made her much more real as a character. After Gerty's flowery third person musings on love it's an abrupt shock to return to Bloom's matter-of-fact, darting stream-of-consciousness.

As for Gerty as a female character in a book populated by men? I suppose you could see her a cliche for her idea of herself as the virgin/whore, and disparage Joyce both for his parody of books that are popular to women and his portrayal of Gerty as being rather self-obsessed, but I have to say I was fine with his portrayal and thought it fitted in well with the Nausicaa of The Odyssey. I also liked the humour of the episode, with Gerty's delight about her underwear, I think we are meant to view her as being a little bit young and silly rather than representing all women.  

Poor Willy Dignam and the Dog

Finally, an episode I enjoyed. 'Cyclops' is set in a pub, and is 'narrated' by an unnamed person. I say 'narrated' as, according to the notes, it's not as straightfoward as that (as usual), apparenlty it is meant to be written down. I noticed as I started reading it that the tense had changed from the previous episodes, this time it was in past tense rather than present tense, as if it was told by someone telling a long, rambling and utterly pointless annecdote about an evening in the pub with a group of random people. Even though I found quite a lot of the colloquial language somewhat impenetrable, with plenty of cryptic references to contemporary events and people, I did enjoy the humour of the episode, for example, Bod Doran calling Christ 'a ruffian' and Alf's "Don't cast your nasturtiums on my character".


 I was also amused and simultanously dazzled by the thirty three parodies of a variety of different styles of writing such as court proceedings, Irish myths and legends and even a newspaper report about dogs reciting poetry. The parodic interludes serve a variety of functions including linking devices to the next part of the narrative, or sometimes as part of the narrative itself. Often, they provide a strong contrast between quite hyperbolic, formal language written in a highly stylised way and the colloquial quick patter and wordplay of the 'narrator' and the other people in the pub. If the action in the pub is getting too serious, the parody will again make an appearence adding humour to the situation with interludes such as Paddy Dignam's seance (written in a Theosophic style) after someone mistakingly thinks they've seen Paddy, and the society event attended by a group of trees when 'the citizen' starts spouting off about the English. 

Some elements of the parody reminded me of a parody of the Homeric style, which inevitably made me think of Pope's The Rape of the Lock. It is not clear if the narrator is supposed to be inserting these passages, I think instead that this is Joyce playing with the reader and the narrator himself. The blend of the comic and the serious in the chapter has come to be called 'jocoserious'.  

I can see why this is the cyclops episode. As well as the polymorphic voices in the pub, with their continual gossiping about different people, there is also the one-eyed one-sided views of the Citizen, an anti-semitic Fenian. 

Again, this chapter engages with the view other characters have of Bloom. Aside from the Citizen's obvious distaste for Bloom, the narrator himself finds Bloom annoying at the very least. Bloom alienates himself not only through his Jewishness but also through appearing too opinionated  and too mean to buy drinks to the men in the pub. Nevetheless, the Catholics hardly get off lightly either, with Joyce satirising the hypocrisy of the attitude to Bloom and the annecdote about the man having sex with a prostitute then apppearing with his wife at Mass the next morning. Though this is a humorous interlude, there is still an undercurrent of unplesantness with the way that Bloom is treated; the contrast of the opinions toward Irish persecution and the persecution of the Jews.  

Taken from The Irish Studies Association of Australia and New Zealand site.

Bloom leaves having defended himself but antagonised the Citizen to the extent that he tries to throw a biscuit box at him. All is not lost, however, as he ascends to heaven like Elijah in a chariot in the final parody of the chapter.

On to the next chapter, Nausicaa, or Joyce has a brush with obsenity.

The Lotus Eaters/Ulysses as a Comic Novel

I haven't done my required reading for the day as yet, but I did manage to read 'The Lotus Eaters' (chapter 5) last night. I enjoyed this chapter and I think it helped me to start to see the connection with the source material without resorting to the many guides method. I have succumed to note-taking within the book though, and I did have to read over the part in the church a few time, as I kept feeling as if I'd missed something.

I was amused by the advertsing slogan:

What is home without
Plumtree's potted meat?
Incomplete
With it an abode of bliss.

Ironic, because of the use of the rhetorical device and the highly poetic hyperbolic language.
 

(Taken from the St. Andrew's Parish Church website where this chapter was set. Note the lack of mention of the novel if you go on the website)

The part in the church confused me a little because I think I was looking for some sort of 'message' that Joyce had hidden in there. However, that way lies getting bogged down I think. I can't look there for Joyce's attitude to religion, what we're looking at is the way that Bloom is observing the Catholic religion as an outsider, and the way that Joyce is using the Church to fit in with the idea of the Lotus Eaters - in this case the church-goers who are sporific from the Latin and receiving the sacrament. There is an air of hypocrisy (on the part of the church-goers) prevading parts of it, for example, Bloom/Joyce describes a woman going to confession: 'Repentance skindeep. Lovely shame' and the listing of various aspects of religion makes it seem inconsequential somehow. There are also hints about church and state being rather too intertwined. 

The little advertising slogan was the first hint, but listening to the first part of the radio broadcast opened my eyes (pun intended). The way that the book is revered and feared makes you forget that it is meant to be a comic novel, not just a weighty tone for masochists! I think listening to it makes it far more accessible, as it is easier to tell between what is dialogue and what is stream-of-consciousness. I have also heard of editions that have been reformatted to make it easy to read. Anyway, I am certainly going to listen to the rest of the Radio 4 broadcast. I'm not expecting the rest of the book to be laugh-a-minute, but it has been a pleasant surprise. 

Suppose I should get back to reading it now. Next part - the funeral (Hades).