|
|
|
|
|
In your ps. CJ you mentioned the "yellow teeth" that Joyce treated us to in _Sisiters_ and again in an encounter. This use of the grotesque is something that has struck right from day one reading Joyce. There seems to be something repulsive in every story. Worse even than the Priest's yellow teeth are his "black cavernous nostrils". Time and again Joyce gives us a extra, close-up view of his characters, and its seldom pretty - the "straggling mouth which lay open in a contented leer" of Corley's ill put upon prostitute girlfriend in _Two Gallants_ , for example. And at some point this week we'll be gazing into the bloodied mouth of Mr Kernen. This is part of Joyce's style that may well have come from his interest in, medicine. Jean Kane has some interesting thoughts about this in her essay "Imperial pathologies: Medical Discourse and Drink in _Dubliners Grace_" to be found at http://www.jough.com/joyce/essay/kane.htm . This grotesqueness in the context of such a high! degree of verisimilitude reminds me of Zola's Theres Raquin, and of Gor'kii's Na Dne. I think it is a key to the general ambience of Dublin as Joyce portrays it...any thoughts. Kiri |
|
|
|