Introduction
This is a work in progress. Its purpose is to give readers of Finnegans Wake information not found in the latest edition (as of this writing, the fourth) of Roland McHugh’s Annotations to Finnegans Wake. My method has been to read through a given FW chapter, making notes, then to turn to McHugh’s Annotations, crossing out everything in my notes already included there, then to work with the remainder. Although of course I have learned from other sources over the years, McHugh has been my one benchmark throughout. Without doubt, some of the following will also be available elsewhere. Essential as Annotations is, McHugh’s decision to have the layout of each of its pages match that of the corresponding page in FW means that, sometimes, relevant material must be severely abbreviated. So, this. It can be an advantage to have more scope.
July 15, 2020: I have completed the second and in all probability my last page-by-page run-through of FW. Still, still a work in progress. Future changes will be a matter of review-and-correct. Also, let me see if some bells and whistles - links to pertinent pictures, songs, etc. - can be added to the program.
As is customary, entries are by page and line number, for instance 43.7: page 43, line 7. Because, in FW, the difference between what is a name and not, what is a quotation and not, is frequently blurred, I have followed a policy of minimizing capitalizations not in FW and of quotations marks for any words not directly from FW. Perhaps needless to say, this has required some judgment calls along the way, and I make no claim for any high degree of consistency.
John Gordon
[email protected]
July 15, 2020: I have completed the second and in all probability my last page-by-page run-through of FW. Still, still a work in progress. Future changes will be a matter of review-and-correct. Also, let me see if some bells and whistles - links to pertinent pictures, songs, etc. - can be added to the program.
As is customary, entries are by page and line number, for instance 43.7: page 43, line 7. Because, in FW, the difference between what is a name and not, what is a quotation and not, is frequently blurred, I have followed a policy of minimizing capitalizations not in FW and of quotations marks for any words not directly from FW. Perhaps needless to say, this has required some judgment calls along the way, and I make no claim for any high degree of consistency.
John Gordon
[email protected]