(407.10-409.7) Today's passage begins with words indicating some type of performance is about to take place: "Overture and beginners!" The narrator says that he heard the "the voce of Shaun" sweeping like a breeze across Europe and toward North America. Shaun now appears, and the narrator describes the hand gestures he made before beginning his address.
That address of Shaun's starts with an overly humble or even self-deprecating tone, but only after the narrator notes that he yawned (as a result of his previous feast) and, speaking as if giving a dress rehearsal, complained about the venue and audience. With that out of the way, Shaun wiped his teeth off with his fingers and sat down on the ground, "exhaust as winded hare, utterly spent." He was a bit put off by the fact that he's so portly: "Well, I'm liberally dished seeing myself in this trim!" A "mere mailman of peace, a poor loust hastehater of the first degree," Shaun professed that he believed himself "all too unwordy" for his position as postman. In fact, he said, the job should have gone to Shem: "It should of been my other with his leickname for he's the head and I'm an everdevoting fiend of his."
Shaun didn't defer too much to his brother, though. "He looks rather thin, imitating me," he stated. Later, he added, "But he' such a game loser!" In fact, Shaun concluded that Shem was best off dead: "Down among the dust bins let him lie! Ear! Ear! Not ay! Eye! Eye! For I'm at the heart of it." Yet, even given this opinion, Shaun still presented himself with that humility: "Yet I cannot on my solemn merits as a recitativer recollect ever having done of anything of the kind to deserve of such. Not the phost of a nation!"
As evidenced here, the chapter continues to be "easy reading" compared to some of the previous parts of the Wake. We'll see how things progress as we move forward . . . .
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