NOTE: this thread will be moved to the new International Reading Group once it has been created.
Finnegans Wake, the book that beat all books, the one to rule them all, impossible to read say some but incredibly FUN to go through as well.
Several translations have been made of the text, Dutch, Portuguese, Chinese, French, German, Italian, and some other languages too I think.
A few useful notes when reading the book for the first time.
The title, Finnegans Wake, was inspired by an Irish ballad of the same name about a builder who feel off a ladder, hit his head, and was then believed dead. Miraculously, Tim Finnegan is revived when some whisky is spilt on him during his wake. Book 1 / chapter 1 is partly concerned with the fall and its immediate aftermath. The ballad is one of the dominant themes of the book and helps as a sort of guideline to keep track of it again. Much of the narrative, if you can call it that, is concerned with HCE (Here Comes Everybody, Humphrey Chipden Earwicker) and his family but you will encounter several incarnations of 29 girls, 12 pub visitors, and four old men who are historians of Ireland, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, or the authors of the four gospels.
The circular nature of the book is, according to some scholars, inspired by Giambattista Vico's La Scienza Nuova (The New Science) discussing the birth and rebirth of nations. Joyce has taken the birth and rebirth theme and applied it to people instead though the book itself is replete with reference to rise and decay of empires (also the subject of my thesis...).
Lastly: no-one knows what the book is about. There's been discussions, scholarly and otherwise, ever since its publication 80 years ago.
The Ballad of Finnegan's Wake (yes, there's an apostrophe in the ballad):
Rescources (I'll update as I find more).
Useful links when tackling the Wake:
Finnegans Wake, the book that beat all books, the one to rule them all, impossible to read say some but incredibly FUN to go through as well.
Several translations have been made of the text, Dutch, Portuguese, Chinese, French, German, Italian, and some other languages too I think.
A few useful notes when reading the book for the first time.
The title, Finnegans Wake, was inspired by an Irish ballad of the same name about a builder who feel off a ladder, hit his head, and was then believed dead. Miraculously, Tim Finnegan is revived when some whisky is spilt on him during his wake. Book 1 / chapter 1 is partly concerned with the fall and its immediate aftermath. The ballad is one of the dominant themes of the book and helps as a sort of guideline to keep track of it again. Much of the narrative, if you can call it that, is concerned with HCE (Here Comes Everybody, Humphrey Chipden Earwicker) and his family but you will encounter several incarnations of 29 girls, 12 pub visitors, and four old men who are historians of Ireland, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, or the authors of the four gospels.
The circular nature of the book is, according to some scholars, inspired by Giambattista Vico's La Scienza Nuova (The New Science) discussing the birth and rebirth of nations. Joyce has taken the birth and rebirth theme and applied it to people instead though the book itself is replete with reference to rise and decay of empires (also the subject of my thesis...).
Lastly: no-one knows what the book is about. There's been discussions, scholarly and otherwise, ever since its publication 80 years ago.
The Ballad of Finnegan's Wake (yes, there's an apostrophe in the ballad):
Tim Finnegan lived in Walkin street,
A gentleman Irish, mighty odd.
He had a brogue both rich and sweet
And to rise in the world he carried a hod.
You see he'd a sort of a tipplin' way
With a love for the liquor he was born.
And to help him on his way each day,
He'd a drop of the craythur ev'ry morn.
CHORUS:
Whack fol' the dah, now, dance to your partner.
Wipe the floor, your trotters shake.
Isn't it the truth I told ya?
Lots of fun at Finnegan's wake.
One morning Tim was rather full;
His head felt heavy, which made him shake.
He fell from a ladder and he broke his skull
And they carried him home, his corpse to wake.
They rolled him up in a nice, clean sheet
and laid him out upon the bed
With a bottle of whiskey at his feet
And a barrel of porter at his head.
(Repeat Chorus)
His friends assembled at the wake
And Mrs. Finnegan called for lunch.
First she brought in tay and cake,
Then pipes, tobacco, and whiskey punch.
Biddy O'Brien began to cry,
"Such a nice clean corpse did you ever see?"
"Arragh, Tim, mavourneen! Why did you die?"
"Arragh, hold yer gob!" says Paddy McGee.
(Repeat Chorus)
Then Maggie O'Connor took up the job.
"Oh Biddy," says she, "you're wrong, I'm sure."
Biddy gave her a belt in the gob
And left her sprawling on the floor.
Then the war did soon engage;
'Twas woman to woman and man to man.
Shillelagh law was all the rage
And a row and a ruction soon began.
(Repeat Chorus)
Then Mickey Maloney ducked his head
When a noggin of whiskey flew at him.
It missed, and falling on the bed
The whiskey scattered over Tim.
Tim revives, see how he rises!
Timothy risin' from the bed!
Says' "Whirl your whiskey 'round like blazes,"
"Thanum an Dhul! Do ye think I'm dead?"
A gentleman Irish, mighty odd.
He had a brogue both rich and sweet
And to rise in the world he carried a hod.
You see he'd a sort of a tipplin' way
With a love for the liquor he was born.
And to help him on his way each day,
He'd a drop of the craythur ev'ry morn.
CHORUS:
Whack fol' the dah, now, dance to your partner.
Wipe the floor, your trotters shake.
Isn't it the truth I told ya?
Lots of fun at Finnegan's wake.
One morning Tim was rather full;
His head felt heavy, which made him shake.
He fell from a ladder and he broke his skull
And they carried him home, his corpse to wake.
They rolled him up in a nice, clean sheet
and laid him out upon the bed
With a bottle of whiskey at his feet
And a barrel of porter at his head.
(Repeat Chorus)
His friends assembled at the wake
And Mrs. Finnegan called for lunch.
First she brought in tay and cake,
Then pipes, tobacco, and whiskey punch.
Biddy O'Brien began to cry,
"Such a nice clean corpse did you ever see?"
"Arragh, Tim, mavourneen! Why did you die?"
"Arragh, hold yer gob!" says Paddy McGee.
(Repeat Chorus)
Then Maggie O'Connor took up the job.
"Oh Biddy," says she, "you're wrong, I'm sure."
Biddy gave her a belt in the gob
And left her sprawling on the floor.
Then the war did soon engage;
'Twas woman to woman and man to man.
Shillelagh law was all the rage
And a row and a ruction soon began.
(Repeat Chorus)
Then Mickey Maloney ducked his head
When a noggin of whiskey flew at him.
It missed, and falling on the bed
The whiskey scattered over Tim.
Tim revives, see how he rises!
Timothy risin' from the bed!
Says' "Whirl your whiskey 'round like blazes,"
"Thanum an Dhul! Do ye think I'm dead?"
Rescources (I'll update as I find more).
Useful links when tackling the Wake:
- http://finwake.com/desktop.htm online version of the books with annotations.
- https://norman.hrc.utexas.edu/JamesJoyceChecklist/ for any resources concerning James Joyce in general, you may need University access for some of them though.
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLftB2gYwhiFHpnAAaH-S3--j3oywenNk0 some very lovely people have read out the first few chapters. This is a work in progress and every so often another chapter is added.
- http://www.fweet.org/ more annotations to the Wake, but online, AHOY! It has a search engine but it's useful to have a look at the manual for the search engine before diving in. Similar to McHugh's annotations, this also allows you to view page-by-page glossaries. Can't recommend it enough. Fweet is a great alternative to McHugh (hasn't got everything the book has but quite a lot of it is there, and it's updated semi-regularly!)
- http://www.finneganswake.org/ this is the New York Finnegans Wake Reading Group. Their group dates aren't interesting for the purposes of this thread but it does have some useful links.
- https://jamesjoyce.ie/ website to the James Joyce Centre in Ireland. More general information but they also organise James Joyce talks, etc if you're ever near Dublin.
- Roland McHugh, Annotations to Finnegans Wake
- William York Tindall, A Reader's Guide to Finnegans Wake
Last edited:
