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- Title
Waking "for an equality of relations".
- Authors
Conley, Tim
- Abstract
The politics of Finnegans Wake, as well as the ways the book shapes communities of readers, often prove elusive subjects, too abstract and contradictory to see or discuss coherently. This essay suggests that a discreet focus on the notion of equality, various forms of which the Wake juggles even as it casts doubts upon them, provides a plausible way to tackle the problem, especially with careful consideration of the process of the text's composition. The ambiguous phrase "an equality of relations" (fw 283.11), probably a borrowing from Herbert Spencer, serves as a central motif: "an equality" encompasses contrariety (sounding a hint of "inequality") as well as multiplicity (not a singular, all-purpose "equality" but different forms and understandings of equivalence). In the course of attempting to untie this particular knotty expression, this essay ranges through discussions of hermeneutics, mathematical notation, and the communal dynamics of Wake readers.
- Subjects
FINNEGANS Wake (Book : Joyce); EQUALITY in literature; CONTENT analysis; HERMENEUTICS; MATHEMATICAL notation
- Publication
European Joyce Studies, 2015, Vol 24, p153
- ISSN
0923-9855
- Publication type
Essay