Dublin James Joyce Summer School, 5-11 July 2009

Abstract

If the Abbey Theatre had a marquee, and if the Dublin James Joyce Summer School participants met there on opening night instead of two nights later, then Joycean star names like ‘Fritz Senn!’ would almost certainly flash boldly in neon. Instead of neon lighting, heat lightning, or even light reflecting from Buck Mulligan’s ‘untonsured hair’ (U 1.15), the reigning sky-god Jupiter offered a rainy night in Dublin on 5 July 2009. On this night Joyce scholars from around the world met about two blocks from St Stephens Green, at Houricans pub, to chat about the outpourings of Jupiter and the epiphanies of Ulysses. In addition to week-long seminars on Ulysses, directed by Fritz Senn (Zurich James Joyce Foundation) and Tom Halpin (Dublin City University), the Summer School offered seminars on other Joyce texts: Dubliners, directed by Peter van de Kamp (Institute of Technology, Tralee); A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, directed by Christine O’Neill (Arts Council); and Finnegans Wake, directed by Terence Killeen (The Irish Times). The seminars took place each afternoon (5–11 July) following morning lectures at Newman House, University College Dublin and Boston College, Ireland. The Summer School also offered workshops, one in the late afternoon during the first three days of the school. These workshops included ‘Possibilities of the Archive: Social and Cultural Historical Documents’, presented by the Director of the UCD James Joyce Research Centre and President of the International James Joyce Foundation, Anne Fogarty; ‘Genetic Approaches to Ulysses’, presented by the Associate Director of the Dublin James Joyce Summer School, Luca Crispi (University College Dublin); and ‘Work in Preprogress: Before King Roderick’s Times (Genetic Approaches to Finnegans Wake)’, presented by Robbert-Jan Henkes (The Netherlands). The Finnegans Wake seminar focused on the ‘buried letter’ section (FW 104– 25) and read it as a meta-commentary on the entirety of the Wake. The seminar investigated the ever-expanding universe of Finnegans Wake, how to approach a text that is not rigidly structured – ‘writing thithaways end to end and turning, turning and end to end hithaways writing and with lines of litters slittering up and louds of latters slettering down’ (FW 114.16–18) – and its capacity to increase curiosity about what language was, is, and can be. Comprised of students, an investment banker, a journalist, a secretary, and DUBLIN JAMES JOYCE JOURNAL