Joyce the Postmodernist: A Glance at Finnegans Wake

  • Javad Zangouei English Department, Faculty of Literature and the Humanities, University of Birjand, Birjand 9717851367, South Khorasan
Keywords: Black humor, Finnegans Wake, metanarratives, parody, pastiche, postmodernist fiction

Abstract

Postmodernism criticizes metanarratives. Modern metanarratives including Enlightenment, Hegelianism, and Marxism present general claims about knowledge and truth. Under postmodern condition metanarratives are damageable, criticizable, and finally negligible. In this essay metanarratives are explained and the incredulity towards them is traced. In Finnegans Wake, which is under postmodern condition, metanarratives are targets of Joyce's parody. In this novel, religion is bitterly criticized, Enlightenment is mocked, and Hegelianism and Marxism are disfigured. Joyce shows his incredulity towards metanarratives and employs postmodernist techniques. Finnegans Wake's world is postmodern.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Benstock, B. (1965). Joyce-again's wake: An analysis of Finnegans Wake. Seattle and London: University of Washington Press. Booker, M. K. (1991). Two modern myths of the Fall. Critique 32, 190-207. Bowen, Z. (1996). Barth and Joyce. Critique, 37, 261- 69. Budgen, F. (1963). Joyce's chapters of going forth by day. In Givens, S. (Ed.), James Joyce: Two decades of criticism (pp. 343-367). New York: The Vanguard Press. Burgess, A., Ed. (1965). A shorter Finnegans Wake . London: Faber and Faber. Calinescu, M. (1987). Five faces of modernity: modernism, avant-garde, decadence, kitsch, postmodernism. Duke University Press: Durham. Campbell, J. & Robinson, H. M. (1994). A skeleton key to Finnegans Wake. London: Faber and Faber. Eco, U. (1984). Postmodernism, irony, the enjoyable (W. Weaver, Trans.). New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Findley, J. N. (1958). Hegel: A re-examination. London: George Allen and Unwin LTD. Frye, N. (1957). Anatomy of criticism. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Gilbert, S. (1963). James Joyce. In S. Givens (Ed.), James Joyce: Two decades of criticism (pp. 450-467). New York: The Vanguard Press. Goldman, A. (1968). James Joyce. London: Rout-ledge and KeganPaul. Hassan, I. (1987). The postmodern turn: essays in postmodern theory and culture. Columbus: Ohio State University Press. Hitchcock, P. (1999). Answering as authoring: or, Marxism’s Joyce. Mosaic, 32, 55-69. Hoffman, F. J. (1963). Infroyce. In S. Givens (Ed.), James Joyce: Two decades of criticism (pp. 390-435). New York: The Vanguard Press. Hofheinz, T. C. (1995). Joyce and the invention of Irish history: Finnegans Wake in context. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hutcheon, L. (1998). A poetics of postmodernism: History, theory, fiction. New York and London: Routledge. Joyce, J. (1942). Finnegans Wake. London: Faber and Faber. Joyce, J. (1969). A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. London: Penguin. Kant, I. (1992). An answer to the question: What is Enlightenment? In P. Waugh (Ed.), Post-modernism: A reader (pp. 89-95). London: Edward Arnold Publishers. Knowlton, E. (1998). Joyce, Joyceans, and the rhetoric of citation. Gainesville: Florida University Press. Lawrence, K, Seifter, B., & Ratner, L. (1985). The McGraw-Hill guide to English literature vol. 2. New York: McGraw Hill. Levin, H. (1960). James Joyce: A critical introduce-tion. London: Faber and Faber, 1960. Litz, A. W. (1961). The art of James Joyce: Method and design in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. New York: Oxford University Press. Lyotard, J. F. (1984). The postmodern condition: A report on knowledge (G. Bennington & B. Massumi, Trans.). Manchester: Manchester Uni-versity Press. (Original work published 1979) Maharaj, S. (1997). Monkeydoodle: Annotating the anti-essay: After history. Art Journal, 56, 65-74. Mays, M. (1998). Finnegans Wake, colonial non-sense, and postcolonial history. College Litera-ture, 25, 20-34. McGee, P. (2001). Joyce beyond Marx: History and desire in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. Gaines-ville: Florida University Press. McHale, B. (1987). Postmodernist fiction. London and New York: Routledge. McQuillan, M. (2001). Paul de Man. London and New York: Routledge. Miller, W. L. (1996). Male and female creativity in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake. Sydney: Uni-versity of New South Wales Press. Nicol, B. (1999). Reading paranoia: paranoia, epi-stemophilia and the postmodern crisis of interpretation. Literature and Psychology, 45, 44-62. Parrinder, P. (1984). James Joyce. New York: Cam-bridge University Press. Selden, R. & Widdoson, P. (1993). A reader's guide to contemporary literary theory. New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Solomon, M. C. (1969). Eternal geomater: The sexual universe of Finnegans Wake. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Spencer, L. (2001). Postmodernism, modernity, and the tradition of dissent. In S. Sims (Ed.), The Routledge companion to postmodernism (pp. 158-169). London and New York: Routledge. Tindall, W. Y. (1950). James Joyce, his way of interpreting the modern world. New York: Scribner. Troy, W. (1963). Notes on Finnegans Wake. In S. Givens (Ed.), James Joyce: Two decades of criticism (pp. 302-318). New York: The Vanguard Press. Wang, J. (1992). To wielderfight his penisolate war: The lover's discourse in postmodernist fiction. Critique, 34, 63-79. Waugh, P. (1992). Postmodernism: A reader. London: Edward Arnold Publishers.
Published
2013-12-01
How to Cite
Zangouei, J. (2013). Joyce the Postmodernist: A Glance at Finnegans Wake. K@ta, 15(2), 93-100. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.9744/kata.15.2.93-100