FWEET

I don't know who reads this blog exactly, but if someone who does happens to have a passionate interest in Finnegans Wake, as I sometimes do, then I'd like to alert you to a website of some value.

FWEET, which stands for Finnegans Wake Extensible Elucidation Treasury has a very powerful & friendly search engine for probing th Wake. It contains over 79,000 "elucidations" about each line of th Wake, & you can search th text of th elucidations & th text of th book. For instance, a search for th word "buggy" (a word that came to mind just now) gives us one line from th Wake itself & two elucidations containing "buggy".

In th FW text, it gives us just that one line, from page 85, "buggy and bike, to walk, Wellington Park road, with the curb," & if I want to see th lines before & after it, I can click on th page number (085) & get this page.

When I do my bibliomantic divinations using Finnegans Wake, I like to nab a smallish & interesting phrase, so I'll expand that just a bit to:

open to buggy and bike, to walk, Wellington Park road, with the curb or quaker's quacknostrum under his auxter and his alpenstuck in his redhand

So today it seems we have an image of a thoroughfare & a person walking w/ a quacknostrum (quack remedy) under his arm (auxter, from oxter, armpit) & a walking stick (alpenstuck, from alpenstick) in his redhand. To whom in my life (since it's a divination for me after all) does this refer? Me? A friend? Someone to watch out for somewhere in th world? Th FW gives us a clue where to find him: somewhere open to buggy and bike. I suppose I could take that literally, altho maybe it means something else... like a blog! Ha, maybe it refers to FWEET, a website that seems very elucidating, but actually carries quacknostrum under its auxter. Hmm.

All in all, in spite of any strange divinations that may come up, I do recommend FWEET for joyful Finnegansplay.

a Bouyant Bloomsday 2009

Hi friends, & again, Happy Bloomsday. As you may recall, 105 years ago to th day, took place th events of James Joyce's Ulysses, altho some miles away in Dublin, & not here in Urbana, Illinois. (& of course, in another Dublin than th one that exists today, since time & space remain inseparable in practice indeed.)

(He flourishes his ashplant shivering the lamp image, shattering light over the world. A liver and white spaniel on the prowl slinks after him, growling. Lynch scares it with a kick.)

I don't have big plans myself; some folks're gathering in Champaign later on, says Facebook, so I'll probably join. It seems I forgot all about it last year, so simply taking a moment to poke thru Ulysses, which has sat on my shelf unread for a few years, counts for something. I quietly recited some of Finnegans Wake to myself last night, & may do that again today. But for th most part, no big plans.

However, for "old time's sake" & to renew a worthy fascination, I'll do a quick bibliomantic divination using th good FW. Ahem. Page 126:

Who do you no tonigh, lazy and gentleman?

Here Comes Everybody

Finnegans Wake, James Joyce's otherworldly experimental (many say unreadable) epic, has occupied my consciousness, time, & happyspace in recent weeks, as I have diligently read it aloud to myself page by page, whilst tallying hours spent (my chart currently shows seven hours & ten minutes of reading). Altho I've had th book for a while & have often enjoyed thumbing thru it whilst grinning, this represents my first cover-to-cover reading. First of many, I hope.

Th experience of reading no other book comes close to that of Finnegans Wake; it defies rational grokking. Its 628 pages of complex, multilayered puns, riddles, dreamscapes, bits of wordmusic & total lucidity entrance me. Altho oodles of articles & books have been written on it, nobody on Earth understands it completely (or probably ever will), & I think that rocks. Timothy Leary claimed that "Joyce's prose prepared [him] to enter psychedelic space."

So I plan to read it first cold, without any guidebook to help make sense of it, simply read it from cover to cover. After this, my second reading will allow one or two guidebooks (of th very many that are available - perhaps A Skeleton Key to Finnegans Wake: Unlocking James Joyce's Masterwork, by mythographer Joseph Campbell &/or A Reader's Guide to Finnegans Wake by William York Tindall). My third reading might incorporate another (perhaps Annotations to Finnegans Wake, by Roland McHugh, considered quite encyclopedic). After a while, perhaps I'll start writing my own guidebook.

At some point, I may take to th bustling streets on my weekends & recite th Wake one chapter at a time to a baffled Chicagoan audience.

It's been said that not until a person has put in 1000 hours of reading time does one start to grok th Wake. Hence my tally chart.

While not reading guides exactly, I've been reading a bit here & there about the Wake. Here's an interesting bit from Robert Anton Wilson, from his book Coincidance: "The 'nat language' of Finnegans Wake, in fact, can best be described as hologrammic prose. Just as a hologram is so structured that each part contains the whole, Finnegans Wake is structured in puns and synchronicities that 'contain' and reflect each other, creating the closest approximation of an infinite regress ever achieved in any art form."

This study may eventually lead up to a massive music project. I won't go into that now, because it may take years to get around to.

~a

fixx om 1 dot finnegans friend

Nodal Nim did play tunes at Fixx Coffee Bar this prior evening. A Greenpeacer named Dan-O did host, played guitar, invited goodtimes. In addition to my frabjous self, I saw some guitarists, a djembist, &, wonderfullest of all, a sitar player. All did doings immeasurably. I did:

.. 25% mor monstr
.. cal it Home
.. 5 songs of fish

This place did I enjoy: persons & friends listened intently as I played; plum oolong tea appealed to my buds.

FNORD

On th trainride home, wondermagickal togetherhappenings did manifest. It began as I sat on my mandolincase whilst waiting for th train & reading from Finnegans Wake, James Joyce's masterwork in dreamlanguage non-linear holistic complexity. I enjoy partaking of said tome by opening to random pages & reading a few sentences, a paragraph or two, maybe, then opening to a new random page et cetera. I have not yet begun a cover-to-cover reading, altho I intend to when time ripens.

So as I sat with book, th wind blew pages, turning them randomly for me. Rather than grip th pages to prevent their turning, I enjoyed having th wind make my anti-decisions. So there I sat at th terminal, reading a book whose pages flapped in th wind, grinning & not seeming to mind.

A fellow (I estimate 32 years of age, thin, redheaded, only somewhat inebriated), when I glanced his way, handed me a Thing. I identified said Thing as a worn playing card, a two of hearts, actually, with an image of Elvis Presley on th front & back. Th fellow's explanation: "Bookmark." I thanked fellow with a grin, stuck th "bookmark" between some pages near th back of th book (sticking up so I could see it in peripheral vision), & continued doing exactly what I had been doing, amused that a confounded fellow found it appropriate to intercede in my peculiar reading practice.

I do wonder what he thought, seeing me do this. (John Cage might understand.)

So we rode th train together, & in th car, since no wind found its way to my book, I flipped th pages myself again, continuing to let th bookmark sit in its place. Th fellow sat not far away. We both got off at th Irving Park stop (Brown Line "L"), & at th bottom of th stairs:

HE: [Evidently amused.] Your bag is unzipped.

I: [Continuing to walk, not surprised or disturbed by th news.] Thanks!

HE: Wait, let me get it.

[I stop & th fellow begins to zip up a pocket on my bookbag.]

HE: I'm putting these matches in your bag. They're from my restaurant - you should come in sometime. [Drops in matches & finishes th zip.] I used to do this in grade school on purpose to make friends.

I: [With a chuckle.] Thanks again!

He passed me & turned right out of th station - I turned left. Only as he passed did I smell a touch of alcohol on him. (Yes, most people returning from a night out at 11:00 would have had a few beers - just plum oolong for me.) He found my private antics amusing, it would seem, & he found himself intrigued enough to invite me to his restaurant. I wonder what overall impression he got of me, how he explained me to himself. I felt elated by th whole strange thing (altho I didn't understand why), & I laughed & grinned all th way home & on & off until sleep overtook me.

heart's tone

Finnegans Fortune, page 454:

A word apparting and shall the heart's tone be silent.

bright-ruling ninny noodles

Today's cryptic Finnegans Fortune - from page 520:

Will you swear or affirm the day to yur second sight noo and recant that all yu affirmed to profetised at first sight for his southerly accent was all paddyflaherty?

A pushy request to disregard, recant "first sight" in favor of "second sight." I am told to officially state that all that I profetised (similar to prophesied?) is "paddyflaherty." But what is paddyflaherty?

A name. A pub.

Pad·dy (pād'ē)
n. Offensive Slang
Used as a disparaging term for a person, especially a man, of Irish birth or descent.

...–noun, plural -dies.
1. a rice field.
2. rice, esp. in the husk, either uncut or gathered.


Flaherty
Ir. Flaithbheartach, lit. "Bright-Ruler."

Also, Flaherty is a common Irish surname; in fact, my smiteful friend Ameh is a Flaherty.

So I am instructed to claim that my "first sight" (noo?) is derogatory Irish alcoholic bright-ruling rice linked in some way to my smiteful friend Ameh. This doesn't seem so bad. I like Ameh, rice, alcohol, etc. I claim that my first sight is indeed paddyflaherty of th highest order!

Noo?

Maybe Joyce refers to Ninny Noodle Noo, a toy company (that had probably not existed yet) "stocking heirloom quality Ostheimer toy figures for children and adult collectors; high quality wooden role-play and traditional toys; stylish children's clothes in the softest certified organic cotton and organic toiletries."

That must be it! I hereby "affirm the day to [my] second sight noo." With noodles.

footsy five

My Finnegans for today, from page 255:

scaling five footsy five and spanning thirtyseven inchettes round the good companions

parenthetical aside

My Finnegans Fortune for today, from Page 237:

(meaning Mullabury mesh, the time of appling flowers, a guarded figure of speech, a variety of perfume, a bridawl, seamist inso one)

Something for th OZ Lovers.