Book Two Episode Nine: Scylla and Charybdis

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The life esoteric is not for ordinary person. O.P. must work off bad karma first.

~ SD

Bubble, bubble toil and trouble

Now we're into the thick of it. "Scylla and Charibdis" (S&C), the famous library episode. Many consider this to be one of the best episodes in Ulysses, and I concur. There are lots of cover-worthy issues in S&C as it is an episode that begs interpretation, however, in keeping with the prime directive I will try to do this as unobtrusively as possible.

Ulysses is like a giant witches caldron, and Joyce has just about finished adding all of the ingredients to his magic potion. "Scylla and Charibdis" is where he begins to stir them all together. The fact is, whether I like it or not we are now at the point in the novel where we need to discuss the substance of Ulysses and not just its form. Of course we may have to deal with a couple of minor issues concerning form too, but the goal in this week's blog is to try to help you advance your understanding of where this story is heading without giving it all away, and this requires us to unearth a couple of Joyce's hidden treasures.

Never know whose thoughts you're chewing

Speaking of giving it all away, I have to mention that I came across the Cliffs Notes analysis of S&C online*, and it made me even more steadfast in my belief that those types of guides should be avoided by first time readers of Ulysses. I certainly don't mean to knock the Cliffs Notes site or Cliffs Notes in general. I think that a lot of the information they provided is very informative and, under the right circumstances, useful, but talk about stripping the reading experience of independent discovery! It's hard for me to see any reason to read the actual book when someone has already chewed up, digested, and regurgitated the most nutritious portions for you to effortlessly woof down like a helpless baby bird.

Imagine going to see The Matrix for the first time and someone gives you Cliffs Notes so that you might better understand the subtext of the movie. (Yes, there is subtext to be found in The Matrix. What? Did you think it was just about special effects and blowing shit up? Okay, I'll grant you Reloaded and Revolutions, but the original is choke full of clever allusions, in-depth symbolism, and an actual message beyond the superficial story). Anyway...

*note that I did not provide a link to this site (hint!). Now, of course it looms before you like a shiny red button labeled Do Not Push.

What's the story morning glory?

One thing (or theme) that should be glaringly obvious to you in S&C is the father and son pairing. This episode is thick with it. The other theme that should jump out at you is that of transcendentalism (with emphasis on transcendence - hint, hint...). This is particularly evident in the early part of the episode while A.E. Russell is still present. We have briefly discussed the importance of the father and the son (a MAJOR theme), but I should also point out that these esoteric/hermetic/occult/transcendental allusions that populate S&C (and the rest of the book as well) are very important to understanding the story of Ulysses. In fact they combine with the father/son theme to lend significant meaning to the story.

So we're back on that old saw again, the story. Yep, if I've said it once I've said it a hundred times; your first read through Ulysses should be about learning how to navigate the narrative and cultivating a solid general understanding of the story. Again, we want to answer the question "what is Ulysses about?" So, going back to our simplistic description of the text, we know that Ulysses is the story of two men, one older and one younger, who meet. The greater question is why? What is the point of this meeting? What happens? With these questions in mind your job is to factor in the father/son (or Father/Son - hint, hint...) conversations that occur in S&C and the episodes and draw your own conclusions from there. Get together with friends and spitball some ideas. Or try to explain the book to someone who isn't reading it. Don't be afraid to think creatively on this point, and don't be afraid to be wrong. You probably are. (JK... kind of) :)

Well, that's it for your lecture on substance. I suppose you were expecting more, but, you know... that whole prime directive thing... But this little morsel of information should help you piece things together. This is the essence of the reading experience of Ulysses, you know, making sense of the story, order from chaos... stuff like that. Modernist art forms in all genres are about critically reflecting on the material and attempting to draw plausible conclusions, NOT arriving at a single codified answer. I said at the start that Ulysses required work, and I wasn't joking. But I also said it was worth the effort that you would put in. Of course, you'll have to make that determination for yourself, but I am confident that you'll be feelin' pretty good about yourself once you finish this book.

Form of forms

Now about those questions of narrative. For the most part there's nothing particularly difficult, or at least nothing new, in the way of narrative. It's generally us in Stephen's complicated head, as usual. There is a potentially confusing interior dialogue going on in Stephen's thoughts beginning with "How now sirrah..." and ending in the brilliant punchline A.E.I.O.U. This IM is more of a dialogue where Stephen interrogates himself about the debts he owes, particularly to A.E. Russell. If you want to know why the pun is so brilliant revisit episode 2, "Nestor" and reread the list of debts Stephen recalls. Maybe it's just me, but to set up a joke in episode two and spring the punchline in episode nine is pretty impressive.

Otherwise we also have that strange albeit short instance of what appears to be dialogue in free verse beginning with "to whom thus Eglington:" and ending in "Leftabed". To be honest, I don't have any explanation for that, so I would welcome any and all speculation on the subject. And toward the latter half of the episode we also see part of the dialogue laid out in the form of a play musical direction included. I also cannot give a satisfactory explanation for that. Again, your best guesses are encouraged.

Agenbite of Inwit

Oh! There is one other thing I wanted to mention since I'm doling out all this substantive info. In the interest of fair and balanced reporting I wanted to make explicit "Stephen's issue", to balance out the info you have on Bloom from the last entry.

So, as you might recall, I revealed to you that Bloom's wife Molly (Mrs Marion Bloom -- Boldhand) was about to embark upon an affair with her manager Blazes Bolyan, and this knowledge has preoccupied Bloom's thoughts throughout the day. Well, Stephen has been haunted by a recurrent ghost of his own: His mother "who's beastly dead". But its not so much the death of his mother per se as it is his guilt about his behavior at her deathbed and his refusal to honor her dying request to kneel and pray for her.

Like the information that I gave you concerning Bloom and his dilemma, this revelation of Stephen's guilt is clearly crossing the line of the prime directive (a.k.a. TMI). However, just as in the case of Bloom, I absolve myself of the transgression with the excuse that this issue has been at play for quite some time now, and it is highly likely that most readers have picked up on it (or at least formed suspicions about it). Thus the half-life of its interpretive potency has expired and it is safe to give it to you because it is no longer toxic*.

*bs

The only other thing I will say concerning Stephen's personal problem is that you might consider it in connection with Bloom's problem. Taken together their respective issues shape the story, how I won't say (in this blog), but I will say that they serves as a central drivers of the subtextual narrative.

Randomage

Note that the two principals of Ulysses once again find themselves in proximity of one another in this episode. Note also that at each interval of almost meeting they draw ever closer to one another. To remind you, the first instance was when Bloom spotted Stephen from the funeral carriage in "Hades", the second was when he spotted him with the pressmen in the "Aeolus" episode, and now we have them to close enough to speak with one another. Just another thing for you to consider in your ruminations.

Raw notes

Plato and Aristotle factor into this episode greatly (must do more research on this dichotomy)

"Upon my word it makes my blood boil to hear anyone compare Aristotle with Plato."

"God: noise in the street: very peripatetic. Space: what you damn well have to see... Hold to the now, the here, through which all future plunges to the past." (does Stephen align himself with aristotle here?)

Begin on the surface: what's going on in the text?

Next: what subtextual elements are important to understanding the story? (without giving away the store)

---> the father and son theme

Any narrative issues to address?

• "The life esoteric is not for ordinary person. O.P. must work off bad karma first".

• "He will have it that Hamlet is a ghoststory"

• "What is a ghost? Stephen said with tingling energy. One who has faded into impalpability through death, through absence, through change of manners."

• "Go to! You spent most of it in Georgina Johnson's bed, clergyman's daughter. Agenbite of inwit."

• "Wait. Five months. Molecules all change. I am other I now. Other I got pound." (Aristotelian?)

• "no man, not a woman, will ever know."

• "Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?"

• "an actress played Hamlet for the fourhundredandeighth time last night in Dublin."

• "Agenbite of inwit: remorse of conscience."

• "We walk through ourselves, meeting robbers, ghosts, giants, old men, young men, wives, widows, brothers-in-love, but always meeting ourselves."

• "...glorified man, an androgynous angel, being a wife unto himself."

• "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."

• "Come, Kinch. Come, wandering Aengus of the birds."

• "O, the night in the Camden hall when the daughters of Erin had to lift their skirts to step over you as you lay in your mulberrycoloured, multicoloured, multitudinous vomit!"

• "...feeling one behind, he stood aside. Part. The moment is now. Where then?"

• "A man passed out between them, bowing, greeting."

• "A dark back went before them, step of a pard..."