I don’t have much to say, nor a drawing to post. The passage from p. 28 to 45 was short and essentially dull, save a paragraph that I totally cannot decipher:
“Across the page the symbols moved in grave morrice, in the mummery of their letters, wearing quaint caps of squares and cubes.”
That much I think I get, but then-
“Give hands, traverse, bow to partner: so: imps of fancy of the Moors. Gone too from the world, Averroes and Moses Maimonides, dark men in mien and movement, flashing in their mocking mirrors the obscure soul of the world, a darkness shining in brightness which brightness could not comprehend.”
No clue. Maybe a fancy dance of words for math or script.
Other things anew: a disappointed bridge- while clever, is also useless, lost on his audience… again the mention of the proof- Shakespeare’s ghost is Hamlet’s grandfather- I think Stephen feels bad about being an integral part of others’ drunken amusement, the witty clown.
We found out Stephen is a debter, owing to Mulligan and a dozen others, which is why Buck gets to keep the key. 9 pounds to Buck, which is maybe 3 weeks pay? 2 weeks? a month? 3.12 & the pain of a lecture.
Oh yeah, and I really can’t think of a reason why jewish people would be FOR hoof and mouth disease, so Stephen’s headmaster must be a fucking dolt.
ADDENDUM:
After some research, a bit more on the paragraph- the Moors are generally attributed with the invention of Algebra.
So the first two sentences describe the student’s math (not writing or script) exercises- maybe some quadratic equations. The hats of squares and cubes are like I first thought, superscript 2′s and 3′s. “Give hands” is likely the operations, +-*/, “Traverse, bow to partner” refers to the order of operations, parenthesis, multiplication, and division going before addition and subtraction. So in the course of solving, the various operands bow to the ones that must go first. All the numbers having started as little imps for the Moors to play with.
Averroes and Moses Maimonides are two of the three great thinkers of the Middle Ages, Aquinas (Catholic) is omitted. All three were castigated by their respective religious authorities and communities, despite later being recognized as among the greatest thinkers in history. Mien is manner or conduct, for the record.
So I think Joyce might just be mocking authority (and the authority of knowledge?). Calling their collective efforts a darkness because that’s how their work was regarded by their contemporaries. Calling those contemporaries the brightness because that is how they perceived themselves- bright, correct. Meanwhile the brightness is blind to the truth and greatness that sits in its midst. The flashing mirrors could be mirrors used to communicate with code, their flashing code analogous to mathematics and its code of numbers, which may very well describe the soul of the world. Isn’t math often regarded as one of the only absolute truths of the world? (Interesting read.) Or maybe the flashes refers to the bits of realization by authorities of the Middle Ages that these men could be correct in their thinking, and upset the status quo.
With respect to the where and how of this paragraph, it sounds to me like Stephen might be comparing himself to great thinkers of the world, and feels like he’s surrounded by a bunch of people who don’t understand what he understands, and who are going to mistake the next giant leap forward in knowledge and understanding as another form of blasphemy, repeating the mistakes of the Middle Ages. In the very next scene, Stephen is confronted by that very problem, the headmaster who thinks it’s foolish to think of God as a shout on the street, who blames the Jews for hoof and mouth disease, but who considers himself to be an enlightened and noble educator. Quite the paragraph.
that is quite a paragraph. the ending is real cool. dont remember reading it at all. for some reason it is very hard for me this morning to think of the world as having a soul, even an obscure one.
Chapeau!
Yes, I agree with you Caty, sometimes is really hard to think of the world as having a soul… I hate that feeling, it makes me realize how dangerous is being tempted by existentialism. Please, never never never buy me any book of Sartre or Camus… These people were strong enought to look into the meaninglessness and absurd nature of this world and survive to the trip. Just a few can do that (Stephen… I guess is one of them) The rest of the mortals need to find a haven somewhere else (i.e: religion…)
Blimey. Top grade to Ben for his research and analysis. The only bit of that paragraph I understood is ‘imps’ which is clearly the plural of Israel. If you can do some similar research on the next section. Didn’t understand a bleeding word.