The fall of the great forests of Ireland provided James Joyce with a rich literary trope laden with cultural memory and socio-political resonances, which he utilised throughout his works and most fully in Finnegans Wake. The trope taps into a chain of historical events well-rehearsed by nationalist rhetoric: the arrival of the English into Ireland; colonial exploitation of people and resources; fears concerning fertility and famine; the loss of an indigenous culture. And thus, it is compatible with Joyce’s innovative utilisation of repeated motifs with multiple textual resonances. Joyce’s last work both recalls the ancient bardic tradition of lamenting the lost trees, and parodies its use in nationalist discourse by contextualising and thus de-politicising this particular deforestation within the cyclical pattern of its repeated natural occurrence.
If Finnegans Wake has a tale, it concerns the fall of a giant who now lies buried in the landscape of Ireland. Ten “thunderwords” recreate the sound of the lamented event. In this podcast I argue that these sounds might be read as the giant oaks falling to the earth, each instance resonating with further events and tropes. The unprecedented, and as yet unrepeated, ferocious hurricane which battered Ireland in 1839, known as the Night of the Big Wind, Oíche na Gaoithe Móire, also has a striking presence in Finnegans Wake. Both the falling trees and the big wind become leitmotifs which recur through the text, provoking questions concerning the interplay of the environment and cultural memory.
Series edited by: Malcolm Sen
General Editor: P.J. Mathews
Scholarcast original theme music by: Padhraic Egan, Michael Hussey and Sharon Hussey.
Recording, audio editing, photography, video editing and development by: John Matthews, Vincent Hoban & Brian Kelly at UCD IT Services, Media Services.
