Sunday, June 17, 2012

The following are allusions to Oscar Wilde in James Joyce's Ulysses.


Telemachus:
"Laughing again, he brought the mirror away from Stephen's peering 
eyes.

Wilde were only alive to see you! 

Drawing back and pointing, Stephen said with bitterness:
 
-- It is a symbol of Irish art. The cracked looking-glass of a servant."
****

" -- Pooh! Buck Mulligan said. We have grown out of Wilde and paradoxes. It's quite simple. He proves by algebra that Hamlet's grandson is Shakespeare's grandfather and that he himself is the ghost of his own father."


Proteus:
"He lays aside the lapboard whereon he drafts his bills of costs for the eyes of master Goff and master Shapland Tandy, filing consents and common searches and a writ of DUCES TECUM. A bogoak frame over his bald head: Wilde's REQUIESCAT. The drone of his misleading whistle brings Walter back."
***

"Staunch friend, a brother soul: Wilde's love that dare not speak its name. His arm: Cranly's arm. He now will leave me. And the blame? As I am. As I am. All or not at all."


Scylla and Charybdis:
" -- The most brilliant of all is that story of Wilde's, Mr Best said, lifting his brilliant notebook. That PORTRAIT OF MR W. H. where he proves that the sonnets were written by a Willie Hughes, a man all hues. 

-- For Willie Hughes, is it not? the quaker librarian asked.
Or Hughie Wills? Mr William Himself. W. H.: who am I? 

-- I mean, for Willie Hughes, Mr Best said, amending his gloss easily. Of course it's all paradox, don't you know, Hughes and hews and hues, the colour, but it's so typical the way he works it out. It's the very essence of Wilde, don't you know. The light touch.

His glance touched their faces lightly as he smiled, a blond ephebe. Tame essence of Wilde."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Portrait_of_Mr._W._H.

" -- Are you going to write it? Mr Best asked. You ought to make it a dialogue, don't you know, like the Platonic dialogues Wilde wrote."


The Wandering Rocks:
"Cashel Boyle O'Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell walked as far as Mr Lewis Werner's cheerful windows, then turned and strodeback along Merrionsquare,his stickumbrelladustcoat dangling.

At the corner of Wilde's house he halted, frowned at Elijah's name 
announced on the Metropolitan hall, frowned at the distant pleasance of duke's lawn. His eyeglass flashed frowning in the sun. 

With ratsteeth bared he muttered:

-- COACTUS VOLUI."

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home