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A talk by the co-editor of a controversial new edition of Finnegan’s Wake will highlight a weekend of James Joyce celebrations April 16 and 17 at Boston College, including the University’s annual “Bloomsday-in-April” event that brings to life Joyce’s legendary book Ulysses.
Danis Rose — who collaborated with John O’Hanlon to produce the new Finnegan’s Wake — will speak at BC on April 16 at 2 p.m., as part of the Boston Joyce Forum “Joyce, Gender and History.”
The Rose-O’Hanlon edition generated a debate when it was released last year in Ireland over alterations in spelling, punctuation, syntax, placing of phrases and other aspects to “facilitate a smooth reading of the book’s allusive density and essential fabric,” according to Rose and O’Hanlon. Irish Times reviewer Terence Killeen criticized what he called “the complete absence of any rationale or basis for the choices made.”
Other reviewers, such as Seamus Deane and Bruce Arnold, have praised the book — Arnold called it “the greatest publishing event” in Irish literature since Joyce’s Ulysses first appeared in 1922.
“Given the 9,000 changes Rose has made in his magnificent edition, this promises to be a lively conversation,” said forum co-coordinator Joseph Nugent, an adjunct assistant professor of English who teaches in BC’s Irish Studies Program. “The controversy over some of Danis Rose’s work — such as his ‘reader’s edition’ of Ulysses — speaks to a basic question about the motivations and methodology a scholar uses. We look forward to exploring this matter at the forum.”
Other events at the forum — a collaboration between Boston College and Northeastern University — include lectures by University of Buffalo Professor of English Joseph Valente and Bowdoin University Professor of English Marilyn Reizbaum, and a roundtable discussion. For more information, see http://joycegenderandhistory.wordpress.com.
The program for April 17’s “Bloomsday-in-April” includes “Joycean Moments,” dramatizations and readings from Ulysses and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and songs from Joyce’s works — with introductions by WGBH-FM host Brian O’Donovan — and a series of workshops on how to read Joyce, and a “relay reading” of Ulysses.
The afternoon ends with a screening of “Faithful Departed,” a documentary on Joyce’s Dublin based on the collection of period photographs by William Lawrence, creating a photographic impression of Dublin on June 16, 1904 — “Bloomsday,” the day on which Ulysses takes place.
For more see the “Bloomsday-in-April” blog.
Both the Joyce Scholars Forum and “Bloomsday-in-April” will take place at Connolly House (300 Hammond Street), the location of Boston College’s Center for Irish Programs.