The narrative arc of this episode corresponds to the Alexandrine school of thought for the composition of dramatic plays. In fact, Stephen Dedalus makes mention of this schema in relation to Shakespeare’s plays (in the Scylla and Charybdis episode). Like Hamlet, "Nausicaa" also starts with an introduction of the scene and protagonist, the “protasis,” followed by a continuation of the main action, the “epitasis,” after which the action meets its climax, the “catastasis,” before attaining its final event, the “catastrophe,” such as a death in a tragedy or a marriage in a comedy. The climax of this episode is obviously the orgasm accompanied by fireworks. The protasis (the introduction of Gerty to the narrative) and epitasis (the flirtation) lead up to this moment from which the catastrophe acts as a refractory period. An analysis of the structure of Nausicaa’s narrative arc expounds Bloom’s response to Citizen’s assumptions of Irishness as presented in "Cyclops" as well furthering the opinion of the impotence of Irish revivalism as Stephen Dedalus projects in his parable A Pisgah Sight of Palestine or The Parable of the Plums (in the "Aeolus" episode).
In the epitasis, Gerty is presented as a Nausicaa-figure, a Mary-figure, and a personification of Ireland. Sitting on the shore with the Mary, Star of the Sea cathedral behind her, remark the similarities in her stance to these portrayals of Mary, Star of the Sea.
3.Mary, Star of the Sea portrayed on a card from Slovenia
These two latter roles suggest Gerty undermines the three “nets” Stephen Dedalus vows to “fly by”: religion, nationalism, and language (from Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man). Then, as Citizen’s granddaughter (from the "Cyclops" episode), Gerty again subverts the nationalist argument. She is also related to her fictional counterpart Gerty Flint, the heroine of Maria Cummin’s sentimental novel The Lamplighter (of which Gerty makes mention). Lastly, Gerty can be seen as a representative Nora Barnacle, Joyce’s lifelong partner with whom he had his first date on June 16, 1904. The explicit passage from a letter from Joyce to Barnacle on December 3, 1909, adds credence to my position. Because of its explicit nature, read it here if you desire. Like Nora, Gerty “leads the way” near Ringsend. Also Nora's “saintlike eyes” echo Gerty’s association to the Virgin.
After introducing Gerty to the narrative, the action rises when Bloom becomes aware of Gerty’s presence on the beach. The epitasis begins when the twins, whom Gerty and her two companions are baby-sitting, kick a ball towards Bloom. The adman comes in contact with the consumer. Gerty, as consumer, has been influenced by the beauty standards projected in the London magazines she consults, The Princess’s Novellettes and Lady’s Pictorial, from which she decides to purchase English products such as Beetham’s Larola, Widow Welch’s female pills, and Dolly Dyes. By packaging herself as a feminine woman, Garry Leonard argues that “Gerty has a better understanding of sexuality than Bloom does”. Based on Lacan’s theory of “The Woman,” he contends that Gerty has realized that women must masquerade as what they are not in order to capture the attention of men who want to imagine that they are who they believe themselves to be. Of course, her masquerade hides the fact that she has a limp. Bloom is glad that he didn’t know of this “defect” until after she put herself “on show”. Although Bloom thinks of her as a commodity for whom “[n]o reasonable offer [is] refused”, Gerty voluntarily offers herself to satisfy his sexual appetite. In fact Gerty considers Bloom in terms of the colonizer, her “new conquest”. Both feminist critical theory and political readings of the scene interpret Gerty as a commodity; as a woman, Gerty tries to attain a “male-defined standard” (Leonard) and as Ireland, she is subject to England not by force, but by choice. Neither Gerty nor Ireland are portrayed as “raped” but rather “whoring” themselves.
Although the catastasis, the ejaculation, is the climax of the episode, it is in fact an anti-climax. Bloom’s spermatozoid are useless, like the plumstones the “[t]wo Dublin vestals” spit out of their mouths from Nelson’s Pillar in Dedalus’s Parable of the Plums (from the "Aeolus" episode). As an Irishman, as Bloom insists he is, Bloom’s failure to produce a male heir forebodes the downfall of the Irish nationalist movement. Without a new generation to “grasp the baton,” its efforts will also be ineffectual and vain. This national impotence can be seen apart from his ejaculation and may also suggest the irrelevance of the Catholic faith. For example, he notices that his watch has stopped which is immediately linked to his reproductive abilities as Cissy remarks that “his waterworks [are] out of order”. This is followed by a reference to the second verse of the hymn they hear coming from the church. The hymn, the Tantum ergo, finishes with the lyric “omnipotence”, which paired with the imagery of the candles setting fire to the flowers at the altar bring to mind Bloom’s “languid floating flower,” “the limp father of thousands”. In this context then, consider the phrase “the memory of the past”. Of itself the line seems insignificant until reconnected to its origin as a lyric in the song “There is a Flower that Bloometh,” at which time the pun becomes clear.
Lastly, the action falls to a catastrophe, which in the Alexandrine use of the term may refer to a tragic ending, but may just as well refer to a joyous occasion. In the case of “Nausicaa” both readings are possible, although I find that the evidence for a tragic conclusion is more compelling. One symbolic example is the bat which flies above both Gerty and Bloom. As archetype, the bat is the primordial enemy and portent of peril or torment. As vampire, it recalls man feeding on woman in sexual frenzy, such as in Dedalus’ poem in which “he comes, pale vampire...his bat sails bloodying the sea, mouth to her mouth’s kiss” (in the "Proteus" episode), then as he develops the poem the mouth heads south. In Finno-Urgic tradition, the bat is one of the forms the soul takes when it leaves the body during sleep. Similarly, “ba,” the expression Bloom repeats in reference to the bat, is “the soul,” pictured by ancient Egyptians as a bird with a human head, which was thought to leave the body at death. Lastly, the nine “cuckoos” which complete the episode could foretell Bloom and Gerty’s marriage in nine years after its traditional connotation, but “nine” in the numerological chart refers to eternity, which would mean Gerty never marries. As a tragedy, Bloom’s association of the sunset with Home Rule’s “sun setting in the southeast”, as opposed to the northwestern sunrise of Home Rule represented on the headpiece of the Freeman’s Journal predicts the downfall of the movement.
My main sources and references for this essay are:
Gifford, Don and Robert J. Seidman. Ulysses Annotated. Berkeley: University of California
Press, 2008. Print.
Joyce, James. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. New York: Oxford University Press,
2008. Print.
---. Selected Letters of James Joyce. New York: Viking Press, 1976. Print.
---. Ulysses. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.
Leonard, Garry. Advertising and Commodity Culture in Joyce. Gainesville: University Press of
Florida, 1998. Print.
No comments:
Post a Comment