Thursday, March 20, 2014

October 1923? Plebiscite (&c) level one

The data, did we possess them are too few to warrant certitude, the testifiers too irreperible but certain it is that ere winter turned the leaves of the book of nature the shade of the great outlander had stood at the bar of the hundred tribunals, here condemned before trial with Jedburgh justice, there acquitted against evidence with benefit of clergy. The heroic shade looms up big, human, erring, forgivable behind the varied speeches of his fellow men & women. Three soldiers of the Coldstream guards were walking in Montgomery street. One gave an opinion in which all concurred. It was the women, they said; he showed himself a man afterwards. A leading actress was interviewed in a beauty parlour and said: she hoped he would be acquitted and: Then he has been so truly wonderful, she added. A dustman named Churches in the employ of Bullwinkle and ?McHanger was asked and replied: We have just been discussing this case. All the fellows say he is a game one. A taxi driver said: He is a damned scoundrel in private life but he has parliamentary privilege. A barmaid: it would be a shame to jail him on account of his health. A sailor, seated on the granit setts of the fish market, was encouraged to speak by his fiancee & said: [...] he was to blame about the two slaveys but I think there was someone else behind it about the 3 drummers. [FDV]


First these outrages were thought to have been instigated by either or both of the rushy hollow heroines but one drank carbolic shortly after and her sister in love, finding she stripped well, felt her hat too small for her. But a little thought will allow the facts to fall in and take up their due places. If violence to life, limb and goods has as often as not been the expression, direct or through male agents, of offended womanhood has not levy of blackmail from the earliest ages followed upon in worldlywise?
First, there was a gateway for the suroptimist had bought and enlarged that shack to grow old & happy in and when everything was got up for the purpose he put a gate on the place and the gate was locked to keep HCE in, in case he felt like tempting providence. It ought to be always remembered that there was a commercial stopping in the hotel and he missed six pounds fifteen and he found his overcoat disturbed. The gate business was all threats & abuse. Humphrey's unsolicited visitor said through the gate first that he would break his head next that he would then break the gate over his head and finally give him his (Humphrey's) blood to drink. He kept abusing him from ten thirty till one in the afternoon without a lunch interval. Earwicker, longsuffering, compiled a long list of all the abusive names he was called but did not other wise reply because, as he afterwards explained, the dominican mission was on at the time & he thought that might reform him. The bullocky finally rang off & left the scene after exhorting him to come out so that he cd burst him up, proceeding in the direction of the deaf & dumb institute. [FDV]



the plebiscite vignette is unique in its origin as quotes from a single tabloid newspaper article, from the "Daily Sketch" for 14 Dec 1922, regarding the Bywaters murder trial: [more] [more]
[we need a full transcript to see the order and context of these]

Joyce must have saved the article a year before he used it, foreseeing someone's character being debated. He told Arthur Power he thought the trial "gruesome and inhuman" while he disliked the British atmosphere he imagined surrounding the murder itself. Somehow the way the various opinions were expressed impressed him as universal. (Could they represent England debating Ireland?)


Three soldiers were walking together in Fleet-street; one gave an opinion in which all concurred. It was the woman who was to blame. Bywaters played a bad part in the crime, but he was coerced. He proved himself a man afterwards...

Miss Sheila Courtenay, who is appearing in "The Cat and the Canary" at the Shaftsbury Theatre, put the same view: "I do sincerely hope," she said, "that Bywaters will not be hanged. He is very young, and was egged on by a woman older than himself to do what he did. and then he has been so wonderful in his behaviour at the Old Bailey"

A dustman named Churches, in the employ of the City Corporation, said:— "We have been discussing the case at our wharf, and most of the fellows will sign the petition; in fact, I believe we shall all sign it. Bywaters is only a young fellow, and ought to be let off the death sentence. The woman dominated him and led him astray...

A taxicab driver: Bywaters is a silly young fellow, but he ought not to pay the full penalty...

A barmaid in the West End: It would be a shame if Bywaters died...

A taxicab driver: Bywaters is a silly young fellow, but he ought not to pay the full penalty...

A sailor, on the Embankment, was encouraged to speak by his fiancée, and said: I think the woman was more to blame than Bywaters, but I think there was someone else in it...

two more bits used later:

Large bills with the words, "Bywaters' reprieve, sign here", will draw attention to the petition and can be had for the asking

A commercial traveller: I have discussed the case with many people, and in every instance the view has been expressed that Bywaters should escape the gallows


1919


The data, did we possess them are too few to warrant certitude, the testifiers too irreperible

Italian 'irreperible' = undiscoverable (used in Spanish and French too?)


but certain it is that ere winter turned the leaves of the book of nature the shade of the great outlander had stood at the bar of the hundred tribunals,

VI.B10.47: "Winter turned leaves of book of nature" (Irish Times 21Nov22: 'Nature's Book' article on nature conservation)

between April and December?
"leaves... shade" HCE = tree?

 "the hundred"?


here condemned before trial with Jedburgh justice, there acquitted against evidence with benefit of clergy.

"here... there"

VI.B10.57: "Jedburgh justice (shoot, then try)"
Jedburgh justice: hanging first and trying after (named after the Scottish border town)

benefit of clergy: originally, clergymen's privilege of exemption from secular court trial; later extended to all who could read
cf benefit of the doubt

Kipling published a novel called 'Without Benefit of Clergy' in 1899 (his Mowgli will seem to get a nod in the Mamafesta a few months later)


The heroic shade looms up big, human, erring, forgivable behind the varied speeches of his fellow men & women.

(pre-Revered Letter)
"the shade... the heroic shade"
"looms up... behind" melodramatic threat

Bywaters won supporters because he loved the wife, thought he was rescuing her, refused to incriminate her even as she incriminated him


Three soldiers of the Coldstream guards were walking in Montgomery street. One gave an opinion in which all concurred. It was the women, they said; he showed himself a man afterwards.


'Three soldiers were walking together in Fleet-street; one gave an opinion in which all concurred. It was the woman who was to blame. Bywaters played a bad part in the crime, but he was coerced. He proved himself a man afterwards...'


now Foley street [map] in Ulysses, the redlight district 'Monto' controversially patrolled by British soldiers


A leading actress was interviewed in a beauty parlour and said: she hoped he would be acquitted and: Then he has been so truly wonderful, she added.

"beauty parlour" seems to be a recent coinage having previously been used only for parlours in houses where pretty pictures were hung

'Miss Sheila Courtenay, who is appearing in "The Cat and the Canary" at the Shaftsbury Theatre, put the same view: "I do sincerely hope," she said, "that Bywaters will not be hanged. He is very young, and was egged on by a woman older than himself to do what he did. and then he has been so wonderful in his behaviour at the Old Bailey"' her play would be filmed several times [youtube-90min]


A dustman named Churches in the employ of Bullwinkle and ?McHanger was asked and replied: We have just been discussing this case. All the fellows say he is a game one.

the name Churches was not unknown in Ireland

'A dustman named Churches, in the employ of the City Corporation, said:— "We have been discussing the case at our wharf, and most of the fellows will sign the petition; in fact, I believe we shall all sign it. Bywaters is only a young fellow, and ought to be let off the death sentence. The woman dominated him and led him astray...'

obscure fictional 'Bullwinkle and Bullwinkle'


A taxi driver said: He is a damned scoundrel in private life but he has parliamentary privilege.

"benefit of clergy... parliamentary privilege"

'A taxicab driver: Bywaters is a silly young fellow, but he ought not to pay the full penalty...'


A barmaid: it would be a shame to jail him on account of his health.


'A barmaid in the West End: It would be a shame if Bywaters died...



A sailor, seated on the granit setts of the fish market, was encouraged to speak by his fiancee & said: [...] he was to blame about the two slaveys but I think there was someone else behind it about the 3 drummers.

"setts" are paving stones (were they piled here temporarily, or was he sitting on the ground?)
a municipal fishmarket opened in Dublin in 1897 on St Michan's street


anachronistic Magritte
'A sailor, on the Embankment, was encouraged to speak by his fiancée, and said: I think the woman was more to blame than Bywaters, but I think there was someone else in it...'


First these outrages were thought to have been instigated by either or both of the rushy hollow heroines but one drank carbolic shortly after

carbolic acid = toxic antiseptic


and her sister in love, finding she stripped well, felt her hat too small for her.

VI.B10.117: "he strips well"
VI.B10.116: "her hat became too small" (Evening Standard 27Jan23: 'Woman's Hair-Dyeing': 'Plaintiff stated that... she... had her hair dyed with "Inecta" at the shop. After about two hours her head began to swell until her hat was too small, and there was great pain'

swelled head


But a little thought will allow the facts to fall in and take up their due places. If violence to life, limb and goods has as often as not been the expression, direct or through male agents, of offended womanhood has not levy of blackmail from the earliest ages followed upon in worldlywise?

"offended womanhood" 19thC cliche
'worldly wise' is usually a compliment
maybe 'in the way the world has of doing things'?


First, there was a gateway for the suroptimist had bought and enlarged that shack to grow old & happy in and when everything was got up for the purpose he put a gate on the place and the gate was locked to keep HCE in, in case he felt like tempting providence.

sur- = more than usually (optimistic)
the Soroptimist Club was the female version of the Optimists
"that shack" ??
"to grow old & happy in" cf Bloom's Flowerville


It ought to be always remembered that there was a commercial stopping in the hotel and he missed six pounds fifteen and he found his overcoat disturbed.

"hotel" = shack? = ROC's pub??
about $1000 today


The gate business was all threats & abuse. Humphrey's unsolicited visitor said through the gate first that he would break his head next that he would then break the gate over his head and finally give him his (Humphrey's) blood to drink.

is this still the commercial traveler? cf ROC's guests fleeing?

Cad3, which may have been written later, seems to set up this gate reference via an allusion to Macbeth II.3 "How true on first time of hearing his statement that he had had a lot too much to drink and was only falling against the gate yet how lamely proceeds his then explanation that he was merely trying to open the bottle of stout by hammering it against the gate for the boots in the place, Maurice Behan, who hastily threw on a pair of pants and came down in his socks without coat or collar, attracted by the noise of gunplay, said he was safe in bed when he was wakened up out of the land of byelo by hearing hammering emanating from the gate. This battering all over the door and sideposts, he always said, was not in the very remotest like a bottle of stout which would not rouse him out of sleep but far more like the overture to the last day, if anything."


He kept abusing him from ten thirty till one in the afternoon without a lunch interval. Earwicker, longsuffering, compiled a long list of all the abusive names he was called but did not other wise reply because, as he afterwards explained, the dominican mission was on at the time & he thought that might reform him.

2.5 hours, 150 minutes

i find one hit for 'Dominican mission in Ireland 1886-98' but was it something that went on for years?


The bullocky finally rang off & left the scene after exhorting him to come out so that he cd burst him up, proceeding in the direction of the deaf & dumb institute.

Bullocky: 19th century Australian Aboriginal cricketer/wicketkeeper (traditional name: Bullchanach)
(no-one remembers who's who)
in Joyce's time, there were two deaf-and-dumb institutions in Dublin