Back tracking a little, forgot about Thomas Aquinas
Haines seems dead set on Stephen's thoughts on Hamlet
Buck, getting to the point, "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."
"Buck Mulligan slung his towel stolewise around his neck"
Buck is awfully wordy... he directs his attention to Stephen,"O, shade of Kinch the elder, Japhet in search of a father!"
I'm getting the relationship vibe from the 2 of them, Stephen and Buck, as maybe to two house dogs going on a walk. Buck is the annoying poodle that constantly barks and jumps around, while Stephen is the quiet old hound, well mannered and not interested in bothering folks.
While buck is carrying on, Stephen explains that it's a long story, Maybe later.
Haines corrects himself, I guess, not to be misunderstood,"I mean to say... This tower and these cliffs here remind me some Elsnoire . That beetles o'er his base into the sea, isn't it?
HamletAct 1,
Scene 4
Lines 48-53
Buck say's more things and gloomy Stephen is self reflecting again until Buck bust out into a poem.
I'm the queerest young fellow that ever you heard
My mother's a jew, My father's a bird.
With Joseph the joiner, I cannot agree.
So here's to disciples and Calvary
If anyone thinks that I amn't divine
He'll get no free drinks when I'm making wine
But have to drink water and wish it were plane
That i make when the wine becomes water again.
Buck stops, does a little whimsical farewell, and runs toward a place called the forty foot hole. Yells the last part of the poem...
Goodbye, now, goodbye! Write down all I said,
And tell Tom, Dick, and Harry I rose from the dead.
What's bred in the bone cannot fail me to fly
And Olivet's breezy... Goodbye now, goodbye!
I found this part interesting
"He capered before them down towards the fortyfoot hole, fluttering his winglike hands, leaping nimbly, Mercury's hat quivering in the fresh wind that bore back to them his brief birdsweet cries."
I'm really loving this whole mess of flying, bird, Mercury, Mercury's hat, Buck's flippant and manic attitude. Buck telling us, in a sense, and jokingly, that he is Jesus, and showing us that he is the opposite of Christ, he is the roman god Mercury (Which the roman motif has been floating around most the last pages). If I reread it with just his dialogue, I get the thought that Buck is also acting as Christ, and Antichrist. And also more simply, he loves to showboat his blasphemy whenever he finds the chance, Which, you know, I can get behind.
Haines, not sure how to act, gave to ol' fake laugh and asked the about that poem, Stephen say's the name, "The ballad of joking Jesus" and he hears it three times a day
The page finishes off with Haines-" You're not a believer, are you? I mean, a believer in the narrow sense of the word. Creation from nothing and miracles and a personal God"
Stephen- "There's only one sense of the word, it seems to me.
Glossary
Japhet- is another way to spell Japheth. He is one of Noah's three sons, probably his favorite. He has two brothers, Ham and Shem. Considering the world, at that time, was sowing some pretty wild oats, Japhet was as ok guy. One time Ham, found their dad, Noah, passed out naked in front of a cave, making all the uptight housewives guffaw at his business flopping around in the wind. Ham went to Japheth and Shem, to take care of it
So the Brothers show up with a blanket to block the neighbors from peaking, While Ham stood there not helping, probably dying of embarrassment.
Eventually Noah woke, without a thought about his own life choices, decided he was to curse his grandson Canaan, Ham's son. Yeah, a dick move.
Anyway... I think that business which Canaan caused some drama down the line, But according to early Europeans, old boy Japhet went ahead and started banging out offspring that would become the European people. Good for him.
Stolewise- A Stole is the fancy scarf that priests wear at mass. To hang something stolewise, means drop a fabric over something where both end of the fabric hang down both sides, parallel to each other. I think this might be a word that James Joyce made up.
Places-
Muglins (...and a sail tacking by the Muglins) - are a group of rocks on the east shore a Dalkey Island, where the guys currently are. Back in the day, They executed some pirates and displayed there bodies on these rocks
Fortyfoot hole- a local Dublin swimming spot, for men only, until the 70's when the warriors of the Women's Liberation Movement, jumped in and took their fair share. There is still a guy's club, but in name only, anyone is allowed in it. and the money goes to keeping it in good shape.
History lessons huh? I bet there was a whole lot of bees in a whole lot of gentlemen's bonnets in regards to the ladies causing trouble at the swimming hole, but wikipedia seems to make it a pretty boring affair.
Other Things
Elsinore- This is where Hamlet takes place
The ballad of joking Jesus- It was first called "The song or the Cheerful (but slightly Sarcastic) Jesus". Written by J.J.'s friend Oliver St. John Gogarty. in 1904
Thomas Aquinas- A Vatican hot shot, lived in the 1200's, He told everyone that reason was found in God, which ended up being the basis of philosophy called Thomism
