“Everyword
for oneself but Code for us all!”:
The Shapes of Sigla in Finnegans Wake.
By Jonathan
McCreedy
The following is a
brief historic-critical examination on Joyce’s sigla shape design in Finnegans Wake. Rose’s chapter
“Hieroglyphics” in The Textual Diaries of
James Joyce charts Wake sigla development throughout the
In
short, the sigla are a collection of symbols or pictorials which Joyce composed
for use in his Finnegans Wake
notebooks. Each character: HCE, ALP, Shaun, Shem, Issy etc. has a sigla, which
would represent their name in shorthand. Joyce detailed his basic sigla system to
Harriet Shaw Weaver, in a March 1924 letter. The eight protagonists are listed here in
their purest forms:[2]
(Earwicker, HCE by moving letter around)
Anna Livia Plurabelle
Shem
Shaun
Snake
S.Patrick
Tristan
Isolde
Mamalujo
This
stands for the [novel’s] title but I do not wish to say it yet until the book
has written more of itself.[3]
Since not all the
sigla are pictorials, or indeed symbols, I have used the generalised term shape
throughout to describe their appearance. I have examined Joyce’s sigla design methods in the first ten Buffalo
notebooks: VI.B.10-VI.B.14. By ‘design’, I reference Joyce’s technique of
making ‘shapes’. Taking the view that
Joyce’s sigla are a rationale for the characterology in the text, and not the
origin of the protagonists, I discuss how Joyce used single letter
abbreviations for characters in the first five notebooks: (VI.B.10, VI.B.3,
VI.B.25 and VI.B.2), which function as proto-sigla. Between Winter 1923 and
Spring 1924 (in VI.B.11, VI.B.6 and VI.B.1), Joyce devised the sigla for 
, 
, 
, 
, 
, 
,
, 
, 
and 
. Although I detail the origin of most sigla on
this list, my research allows me to argue against the theory that Shem and Shaun
are
stylised abbreviations of ‘C’ and ‘A’ (representing ‘Cain and Abel’). On the
basis of units
from VI.B.11, VI.B.6 and VI.B.1, it is possible to argue
that and were in
very early development at this stage, and that Joyce did not establish their
warring brother relationship until VI.B.14 (August –November 1924). Therefore,
the theory that he envisaged and as Cain
and Abel in VI.B.6 is a chronological error. Instead, I would like to suggest that the code-like shapes of the
Masonic alphabet supplied Joyce with a design source for, and . The three shapes of the alphabet (also known
as the ‘Pigpen Cipher’ or the ‘Freemasonry Cipher’) are identical in design
with the sigla for Shaun, Shem, and ‘Finnegans Wake’. Through scanned images,
quotes from Finnegans Wake, and
Masonic genetic sources, I argue that Joyce adopted and 
to
collect character attributes for Shaun and Shem in VI.B.11, VI.B.6 and VI.B.1.
At this point, Joyce had barely formulated Shaun and Shem. Joyce created first
(just prior to VI.B.11), out of a desire to give Finnegans Wake a young male ‘voice’. was
adopted in VI.B.1, (late February-April 1924), when Joyce decided that a second
male perspective was needed.
Most theories
determining Joyce’s ‘design’ principals have been by locating similarities
between esoteric ‘shapes’ and sigla[4].
A well known example is that the Chinese ideograph for ‘mountain’ designs the sigla. However, ‘San’
(or ‘yama’ in Japanese) is shaped differently from , nor is there genetic evidence proving this source. 
(the accurate ideogram) has two ‘tails’, and a
middle line with a slightly extended length. It points upwards also, unlike which faces down.
Another theory in electronic circulation is that E.A Wallis Budge’s
transcription of ‘hieroglyphics’ in The
Book of the Dead inspired the code-like design of the sigla. But Joyce did
not begin transcribing Budge’s text until 1929.[5]
and ) on their parents HCE and ALP ( and ).
Simply,
if a line is removed from it becomes , and if a line is added to it becomes . He also incorporates the ‘box’
siglum :
would then be
not only a castrated 
but also an incomplete (open) , a mere preface to the real thing.
[…] – and also that the sign is not only an incomplete , it is also the shape of a caret, the
typographical sign which marks the incompleteness of the sentence and keeps
writing in perpetual expansion.[6]
Joyce first integrates sigla designs together in VI.B.14,
dated
Autumn/Winter 1924. Here, the 
sigla (a pictorial
‘fusion’ of and ) makes two appearances: ‘ you villain’ (VI.B.14.197f) and ‘ bilingual’ (VI.B.14.1986). As I shall show, Joyce’s initial
sigla design in Winter 1923 was simpler, based on the need for clear-cut
character abbreviation. and ’s shape is noted within Finnegans Wake in fact, as part of an
encrypted pictorial list of sigla in I.5:
[...] why not take the former
for a village inn (),
the latter for an upsidown bridge (),
a multiplication marking for crossroads ahead (),
which you like pothook for the family gibbet (
),
their old fourwheedler for the bucker’s field (),
a tea anyway for a tryst someday (
),
and his onesidemissing () for an allblind alley ( ) leading to an Irish plot in the Champ de Mors [...][7]
[My edification]
and share no genetic heritage, as I shall show
later. The shape connection ‘onesidemissing’ (i.e. with ‘one side missing = ) is an addition to I.5, made after
Joyce’s letter to Harriet Shaw Weaver in March 1924. Beginning in late July-September 1925, (with
VI.B.8), Joyce
began to stylistically ‘toy’ with sigla, interpreting graphics of all kinds into their ‘shapes’. In
the following examples from VI.B.8, the personalities and ‘appearance’ of
characters are linked to their respective sigla ‘shapes’:
‘ crossroads ahead’ (VI. B.8.143j),
‘ village’ (VI.B.8.143.k),
‘ assback bridge over stream’ (VI.B.8.144a),
‘ hillock’ (VI.B.8.144b),
‘ Culdesac deadwallend of a graveyard’ (VI.B.8.144c),
‘delta (ie. ), pyramid’ (VI.B.8.144d),
‘ pastrycook carrying on his brainpan a mass of lovejelly’
(VI.B.8.144e),
‘ girl lying on causeway with one leg heavenwards, lacing her
shoe’ (VI.B.8.145a)[8]
‘Onesidemissing’ (FW 119.31) is
not a conceptual explanation of the conceptual design of . If we seek shape linkages between sigla we are
playing around in a similar fashion. Ferrer’s interpretation that the typographical caret (^) is
a pictorial for is another example of
sigla play, similar to Joyce’s own in VI.B.8. But it is certainly not Joyce’s
genetic source. A caret ^ is a small superscript chevron. Shaun’s siglum is larger and
base-level. Joyce’s sigla shape is simply different
to ^. Ferrer defines as a ‘preface’, which
is similar to the theory that it is actually a square parenthesis bracket ([ ).
However, and [ are essentially
different too. A square bracket [, on close inspection, has unsuitably short
horizontal lines whereas Shem’s horizontal lines
extend the same length as its vertical height. In short, ^ and [ are not Shaun
and Shem since the ‘shapes’ do not match.
Vincent
Deane states, to unanimous critical agreement, that Joyce conceptualised his
sigla in the period between VI.B.11 and VI.B.6. The creative period in question
is estimated as being late September 1923-February 1924. This leaves us with a
frustrating problem, namely that all the intervening documents wherein Joyce
designed his sigla have been lost. Rose names this missing notebook N7 (VI.X.2)[9].
The notebook may be lost because Joyce did not keep his workings once his fixed system of abbreviations was in
place. Devising character abbreviations is quite different from transcribing
external source words onto a page, Joyce’s main genetic technique in the
notebooks. Indeed, in Finnegans Wake,
he refers to his collected character system as: ‘The Doodles family, , , , , , , .’[10]
which perhaps indicates the method of their composition. Were they ‘doodled’ on
scraps of paper, or restaurant napkins, and not in a notebook at all?
The alphabetical
capital letters ‘
’ and ‘T’ are the basis for HCE and Tristan’s sigla design: and [11]. Clearly, Joyce did not
foresee the establishment of a sigla system in his early notebooks. However,
Tristan’s basic character shorthand ‘’, and the usage of alphabetical abbreviation did eventually
lead to this. Tristan is abbreviated to ‘Trist’ and ‘’ throughout VI.B.3: ‘ said/negrily’ and ‘Trist’, ‘Tr’ and ‘’ appear throughout VI.B.25 and VI.B.2. Issy appears as ‘I’
and ‘Is’: ‘Is & schoolboys’ (VI.B.3.086i). Her //
sigla remains undeveloped until VI.B.11. Here, Joyce uses
‘rotation’ as a sigla design technique with Issy, specifically by turning the
shape of upside down: ‘ mirror of mirror’ (VI.B.11.105a). The first instance of
rotation in VI.B.11 involves Tristan and Isolde. However in this case it is the
letter ‘F’, not the , that is reversed:
‘She loves letters/ Peoples
press, starts / w (sitting down) / F 
(talking together)’
(VI.B.11.39a-b). Joyce took the section ‘F (talking together)’
from Frédéric Queyrat’s Les jeux des
enfants, a French text about children’s behaviour, which describes how
children sometimes transform letters into persons. This is a specific account of a child who twists the letter F
around, and declares that the F and its mirror image are having a
conversation.[12]
Deane states that sigla are ‘first used
tentatively in VI.B.11[13],
composed roughly September- November 1923. He indicates that the sigla had yet
to be systematised, and that design of the pictorials was still in progress.
Indeed, VI.B.2, the notebook chronologically prior to VI.B.11, dated August
–September 1923, doesn’t have a single sigla shape. There are four distinct
sigla shapes in VI.B.11 namely , , and . ALP’s equilateral triangle design is defined in VI.B.11:
VI.B.11.2h: ‘ multiply’. ALP’s sigla indicates Joyce’s
shift towards symbolic sigla design, which he employs to , 
and 
in later
notebooks. Joyce had not designed HCE’s
sigla at this juncture. It
was not established until ‘V B D = ’ (VI.B.6.045e). Joyce used ‘’ as shorthand for Earwicker in VI.B.2: ‘eye bottle guta/
‘HCE wins UH H’: (VI.B.11.3b)
‘HCE hears ballad sung’:
(VI.B.11.30d)
‘HCE Santa Claus’: (VI.B.11.54b)
‘ablution national / sigla of HCE’.
(washing)’: (VI.B.11.83a)
Joyce designed HCE’s sigla last of all,
following , , , and which originate in
VI.B.11. E is a 90° clock-wise rotation of the capital letter ‘’.
Vincent Deane
states, in his introduction to Brepols VI.B.6: “The sudden appearance of Cain and Abel
in VI.B.6 and the fact that their signs are already being used as graphic
symbols for Shem and Shaun leaves little doubt that, like much else in the
present notebook, they had been fully conceptualised by the time Joyce began to
enter his notes.”[14] This interpretation, that Joyce based the design of
and on the letters 'C' and 'A' for 'Cain' and
'Abel' is well accepted within genetic criticism. However, my research suggests that this
theory may be open to challenge. The first half of VI.B.6 concerns HCE and ALP,
defined respectively as the fixed sigla and . The first appearance of in VI.B.6 and in all extant
notebooks occurs as part of a list of sigla:
‘ I 
’ (VI.B.6.101f). This unit is important, and we will return
to it shortly. Shem’s sigla appears semi-regular
from this point, first used independently at: ‘ firstborn of Israel’ (VI.B.6.107k), and closely followed
at: ‘’s birthday & place’ (VI.B.6.108a). Ingeborg Landuyt has
identified Joseph Lamy’s Commentarium in
Librum Geneseos as the source for this section.[15]
Joyce’s Lamy transcription begins on VI.B.6.109l: ‘Abel kills 1st
born/fat/1st fruits’ and ends VI.B.6.113g: ‘Enos, s of Seth, founds
cult’. is used for ‘Cain’
references. Joyce notes the similarity in shapes between and ‘C’ at
VI.B.6.112g: ‘C ^ +^ calls city after eldest’. He superimposes a ‘C’, turned
90° anti-clockwise, inside the С sigla. Deane states that this indicates:
‘[’s] origin and function as a stylised form of that ‘C’[16]
and he adds that Joyce ‘stylised’ the physical shapes of the character
abbreviations ‘C’ and ‘A’ by re-designing ‘C’ as a parenthesis or bracket () and by removing the middle line from the symbol for ‘A’ ().[17]
However, the removal of lines is atypical to Joyce’s 1923/4 methods of sigla
construction. Unlike ‘rotation’, which Joyce establishes with , and Joyce’s missing sigla
workings call for a critical ‘leap of faith’ here. Joyce’s transformation of
‘C’ into could be interpreted
as an attempt to show affinity with , which has a similar shape as discussed previously.
However, since Joyce composed prior to in VI.B.11, this
design concept is very unlikely indeed.
It is the appearance of ‘writer’s cramp ’ (VI.B.11.88l) that damages the primary argument of the ‘C’
and ‘A’ theory. Shem’s sigla shape is introduced
in VI.B.11 quite separate from the genetic source of Lamy’s book, wherein the
‘Cain’ reference is said to originate. This unit opens up the
possibility of a differently sourced genetic design to ‘Cain’/‘C’. doesn’t appear in
VI.B.11 or indeed VI.B.6, strictly speaking. The three appearances listed on
VI.B.6’s back cover are part of a complex notebook filing system by Joyce, and
they were added much later:[18]
‘d (b) (c) ’ (VI.B.6.bcr:a).
‘Shem (b) Cain (c) (d) b’ (VI.B.6.bcv: a)
‘d’ (VI.B.6.bcr.a) and ‘b’ (VI.B.6.bcv.d) do not indicate the sigla but rather the
chapters III.4 and III.2 respectively. This indicates the locations wherein
Joyce destined much of VI.B.6’s material. The absence of from VI.B.6 is
puzzling, if we accept the ‘C’ and ‘A’ theory. Indeed, Joyce refers to Abel by
name not when transcribing
Lamy:
VI.B.6.109l: ‘Abel kills 1st
born/fat/1st fruits’.
VI.B.6.110a: ‘Abel off milk
and wool/(Grotius)’.
VI.B.6.110b: ‘Abel butcher’.
Why does VI.B.6.109l not read: ‘ kills 1st born/fat/1st fruits’? It
seems unlikely that Joyce conceptualised as being Abel.
Returning to ‘
I ’ (VI.B.6.101f), Rose interprets this unit as a pictorial of
the Garden of Eden, before and after the fall. This is despite ‘ I 
’ preceding Joyce’s transcription of Lamy’s Commentarium in Librum Geneseos by 10
pages in VI.B.6. ‘ I ’ appears between the ‘Growth of the English Language’ and Irish Independent sections of the
notebook, prior to the first Genesis unit: ‘Abel kills 1st
born/fat/1st fruits’ (VI.B.6.109l).
Rose defines and as ‘Cain’ and ‘Abel’,
S as the Snake, and and I (Tristan and
Isolde) as Adam and Eve. He states: “The presence of Tristan and Isolde can be
explained if we assume that they represent HCE and ALP before the fall’[19].
But this is very problematic. and are also in ‘ I ’ so why are there two sets of lovers in Rose’s image of the
Garden of Eden? It is more likely that
Joyce is simply writing out a phonetically possible word with the sigla that he
had thus far devised, namely ‘MATISEA’. The shapes of the sigla represent
letters. = ‘M’, = ‘A’ and and are an ‘E’ and an ‘A’
respectively. ‘
’ (VI.B.1.006g) or ‘MACATIX’ is another such example of
sigla ‘word’ arranging. The ordering of ‘ I ’ and ‘
’ is untypical of most notebook sigla lists, which are
distinctly non-lexical. For example:
: (VI.B.26.101)
Since the ‘Cain’
and ‘Abel’ theory shows critical weaknesses, I hypothesise that Joyce based and on an entirely
different genetic ‘model’. Namely, ‘writer’s cramp ’ (VI.B.11.88l) illustrates a new shape which is an exact
match for a letter design in the Masonic alphabet.[20]
The shape , a three sided symbol connected via right angles, is a
letter in its alphabet; so is Shaun’s sigla and also the Finnegans Wake sigla which Joyce first used
in his letter to Harriet Shaw Weaver, in March 1924. The Masonic alphabet consists for the
most part of and shapes, with and appearing 16 and 8
times respectively. The other is 
, which appears twice. The similarity of these shapes to
Joyce’s sigla is striking. Avery’s A
Ritual and Illustration of Freemasonry, (which Ulrich Schneider surmises
Joyce read[21]),
transcribes it in full.[22]
The three shapes of the Masonic alphabet rotate in 90° and 45°
combinations:
However, different lodges
frequently used variations of the alphabet to increase its difficulty. In fact,
Avery prints a second alphabet wherein , and read ‘y’, ‘k’ and
‘i’.[23]
‘ Béresniak’s Symbols of Freemasonry
defines , and as ‘z’, ‘m’ and ‘i’,[24]
and in Harwood’s The Secret History of
Freemasonry’, v’, f’ and ‘e’ are its meanings.[25]
Essentially, the Masonic alphabet has no standardisation in relation to the
ordering of the letters. However, the interpretative ‘method’ of the cipher
remains constant. Each alphabet derives from a grid layout, with a letter
configuration. The following de-codes Avery’s transcription of the
alphabet:
The popular nick-name of the
alphabet, ‘The Pigpen Cipher’, derives from its visual arrangement. Joyce references it in II.3 of Finnegans Wake: ‘I’ll tittle your
barents if you stick that pigpin upinto meh!’[26]
(FW 331.12-13) ‘Pidgin’ and ‘pin’ itself are additional meanings of ‘pigpin’.
To de-code the Masonic alphabet, the lines around the gridded letter must be
written down as a shape. Half of the letters require the use of dots. The most
common are the 90° rotation of shapes. However there are also 8 examples of 45°
rotation. This grid was officially called the ‘Trestle-Board’[27]
and it has symbolic links with the mosaic chess-board pavement (called ‘Moses
Pavement’) which decorates many Masonic lodges. Quoting Duncan’s Masonic Ritual and Calendar, Laura Peterson states that
King Solomon’s Temple had a chequered ground floor: ‘The mosaic pavement [...]
[represents] this world, which, though chequered over with good and evil, yet
brethren may walk together thereon, and not stumble’[28].
This symbolism was designed to make Freemasons think about ‘opposites’.‘Moses’
Pavement’ is referenced twice in Finnegans
Wake, with connection to floors: “That mon that hoth no moses in his sole
[...]’. (167.36) and ‘Humperfeldt and Anunska, wedded now evermore in
annastomoses by a ground plan of the placehunter [...]. (585.24-26)
‘Annastomoses’ is a homonym referencing scientific ‘anastomosis’, meaning the
connection of two blood vessels by a cross branch[29].
As Book I
developed, Joyce felt the need for a male voice other than HCE’s. In VI.B.11
and VI.B.6 he uses the siglum to facilitate and
construct this ‘role’. Since Joyce composed from scratch it
appears he used the Masonic letter shape to act as his blank
canvas. It seems that he does the same with ALP in VI.B.11. Here, Joyce uses a to symbolise a mature
female character, and wife to HCE.[30]
‘ multiply’ (VI.B.11.2h) and ‘ = III children’ (VI.B.6.189d) indicate motherhood. VI.B.1,
(written late February-April 1924), includes three units indicating that the
female genital region, provided inspiration for :
‘bush pyramid ’ (VI.B.1.0235b)
‘trees look at nude/legs in the
air/a whole grove [is]/looking on.(VI.B.1.055i)
‘delta = pubic ’ (VI.B.1.065i)
Indeed, II.2’s triangular
diagram[31],
(a dual image of ‘Proposition 1’ from Euclid’s ‘Elements’ Book 1), is also
Shem’s drawing of his mother’s genitals. ‘s initials, in Roman (ALP) and Greek (αλπ),
mark its three points. The anatomy of the vulva is quite detailed. The π
symbol, above the , is shaped like a clitoris, and the circles are her
outstretched legs. P and π symmetrically correspond since the two
triangles mirror each other about the AL axis.
Returning to
Shem’s sigla, ‘Writer’s cramp ’ (VI.B.11.88l) indicates a profession for his blank character
. However, in VI.B.6
the units relating to ‘writing’ are attributed to a figure called ‘Shem’: ‘Shem
cuts old books’ (VI.B.6.95a) and ‘Shem jots down notes for ’ (VI.B.6.117a). Joyce defines as Shem in a letter
to Harriet Shaw Weaver, in 16th January 1924. Here, he also gives three other personas,
including Cain: ‘[I include] a description of Shem-Ham-Cain-Egan etc. and his penmanship
[...]’.[32]
The character of ‘Shawn (sic) the post’ is also mentioned for the first time,
in this letter. ‘Shawn the post’ is a prototype since in
January 1924, prior to VI.B.1, Joyce had not yet created the sigla. Similarly,
note that Abel in VI.B.6 is neither nor Shaun. Abel is an
associative character partnered with Cain, who is clearly . In later revisions, V became Abel, but only after Joyce
had established the theme of Shaun and Shem as warring brothers. and are not paired as
Brunian opposites until VI.B.14, written August-late November 1924:
‘ we enjoy in plural/ suffer in sing’
(VI.B.14.215h),
‘ conte/ legend’ (VI.B.14.215e),
‘
objections to use
of/†ian name’, (VI.B.14.202d).
Between VI.B.6 and VI.B.1,
Shaun seems to have developed into the second young male voice in Finnegans Wake. The siglum is used throughout
VI. B.1: ‘ zigzag v spiral/corsi ricorso Vico’ (VI.B.1.029c), and ‘ has green paint/for doors’ (VI.B.1.028). Joyce’s decision to use as a shape is most
likely influenced by Shem’s sigla , which derives from the Masonic alphabet. This shared
genetic source respectively ‘bonds’ and together, which is
appropriate because and comprise the
collective young male voice. Incidentally, the third and final shape of the
Masonic alphabet, , became the ‘Finnegans Wake’ sigla, around this time (see
VI.B.1). is a ‘pictorial’
siglum, much like and . Its four sided nature clearly represented the ‘book’
itself (Finnegans Wake). The VI.B.1
unit: ‘competition for/ name of ’ (VI.B.1.066j) details Joyce’s future guessing game
involving his novel’s secret title. Ellmann states: ‘[Joyce] had often issued a challenge to his
intimates to guess [the title of Finnegans
Wake], and offered a thousand francs to anyone who succeeded.[33]
One reason for Joyce’s attraction to the Masonic alphabet may be its usage of
‘rotation’ as a design concept. Joyce chose out of 8 rotation
possibilities (and not 16, since the ‘dots’ add to, and do not change the
alphabet ‘shapes’). would hence have been
chosen out of 4 possibilities. These two directions appealed to him most, but
it is difficult to determine why. Joyce was clearly interested in rotation as a
concept. For instance, the unit: ‘F (talking together)’
(VI.B.11.39a-b) appears in Finnegans Wake
as ‘
ace to 
ace!’ (18.36). Similarly, is a ‘reflection’ of in design. However,
the directions of and remain fixed in the
notebooks.
The Masonic
alphabet’s identity as a secret coded language is a second reason for its
selection. Since , , and appear only in the
notebooks, in un-rotated forms, there is no secret message within Finnegans Wake based on Masonic symbols.
In fact, whether any coded messages
exist in the novel is debateable, unlike in Ulysses
where Martha Clifford sends a letter to Bloom in ‘boustophedontic’ code: ‘N. IGS./WI.UU. OX/W. OKS. MH/Y. IM’.
Solved, it reads “M RTH/DR FF LC/DLPH NS/B RN”[34]. However, Joyce does summarise
the sigla system, in relation to cryptology in the VI.A unit: ‘Everyword for
oneself but Code for us all’ (VI.A.755),[35]
(written approx. 1931-36). ‘Everyword for oneself’ details how Joyce’s
characters have multiple names and identities in Finnegans Wake. Indeed, ‘Everyword’ has replaced the single title
as a means of identification. ‘Code for
us all’ represents Joyce’s sigla system, (with ‘us’ meaning: , , , , etc.) VI.A.755 parodies the motto: ‘All for One,
and One for All!’ from Dumas’ The Three
Musketeers, which celebrates unity, loyalty and collective strength. Here,
Joyce references how his ‘Codes’/sigla are fixed titles for his characters, an
essential tool for him in the composition process.
The potentially
superficial objective of determining the shapes of sigla has consequences for
other genetic issues. The Buffalo notebooks clearly present Finnegans Wake characterisation in a
primordial state, as demonstrated in Shaun and Shem’s sigla development in
VI.B.11-VI.B.1. Indeed, Joyce’s notebooks are creatively experimental documents
wherein characterisation appears in a tentative and incomplete state. I have
found that some of the Wakean themes/relationships, and ‘s violent filial
opposition, for instance, have been incorrectly sourced to notebooks wherein
Joyce was only basically formulating character. The date of ‘s creation has been pre-empted in VI.B.6, for example,
because of confusion relating to the first appearance of Abel. In addition, the
process of analysing changing shorthand techniques, from previously listed
single letter abbreviations: ‘T’, ‘I’ and ‘’ to sigla, illustrates Joyce’s development of character in Finnegans Wake at a close reading level.
Initially, Joyce’s characters in Finnegans
Wake possessed either ‘fixed’ identities, or a single personality. The
early vignettes of Finnegans Wake:
“Roderick O’Connor”, “Tristan and Isolde”, “Mamalujo” and “St. Patrick and the
Druid” would be revised and incorporated into the main text of the book, in the
1930’s. Although Roderick O’Connor, Tristan and Isolde would later be revised
as HCE, Shem, and Issy avatars,[36]
their initial characterisation was very basic. Roderick O’Connor, the last high
king of Ireland, is presented as a staggering drunk in his palace, for
instance, quaffing the dregs of all the cups in the room before falling over
(FW 380.7-382.30). Sigla development in 1924 brought order and structure to
character in Finnegans Wake, focusing
the writing of Book I, concerning the Earwickers, and helping to find a
collective purpose for his early vignettes. Finally, sigla shape research
encourages new genetic interpretations, such as the Masonic alphabet being the
source for , and .
Works cited:
Avery, Allyn, A
Ritual and Illustration of Freemasonry, New York: William Gowans, 1865.
Béresniak, Daniel, Symbols
of Freemasonry, New York: Assouline Publishing, 2000.
Ellmann,
Richard, James Joyce, new and revised edition, New York, Oxford,
Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1982.
Gifford, Don; Seidman, Robert, Ulysses Annotated: Notes for Joyce's Ulysses.
2nd edition, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
Harwood, Jeremy, The
Secret History of Freemasonry, London: Anness Publishing Ltd, 2006.
Joyce, James, The
Letters of James Joyce, edited by Gilbert, Stuart, London: Faber, 1957.
Joyce,
James, Scribbledehobble: The Ur-Workbook for Finnegans Wake, edited by
Connolly, Thomas E., Evanstone: Northwestern University Press, 1961.
Joyce, James, Finnegans
Wake, London: Faber and Faber, 1975.
Joyce,
James, Finnegans Wake: A Facsimile of Buffalo Notebooks VI.B.5 – VI.B.8,
prefaced and arranged by Hayman, David, James Joyce Archive, vol.30, New York
and London: Garland Publishing, 1978.
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