Monday, October 13, 2014

"Thyme, that chef of seasoners"

(235.6-237.9)  Today's passage begins with the Floras' orison rising to the sky.  They then present a vision of an idyllic, suburban future in which "we and I" -- seemingly both one and all of the Floras -- will live the good life with Chuff.  I get the impression that this is Joyce parodying the sort of middle class dream of the time (one which was crushed by his father's financial troubles) and also mocking some literary style with which I'm not familiar.  There's also some mocking of T.S. Eliot here:  the Chuff in this vision is in the same line of work as Eliot as "a bank midland mansioner," among other things, and both "The Waste Land" ("Xanthos!  Xanthos!  Xanthos!") and "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" ("wibfrufrocksfull of fun!") are referenced in the paragraph.

On the literal level, the vision has the couple settling down in an upper-class suburb of Dublin on a lot teeming with trees of all varieties.  Their house is outfitted luxuriously "to make Envyeyes mouth water and wonder when they binocular us from their embrassured windows in our garden rare."  They have servants, a car, a chauffeur, a dog, and a cat.  They welcome distinguished guests like Lady Marmela Shortbred and Prince Le Monade and sing songs.  (The songs here are parodies of popular tunes, such as the previously-alluded to "So come on, ye wealthy gentrymen wibfrufrocksfull of fun!" for "God rest ye merry, gentlemen, let nothing you dismay.")  In short, they've got it made.

The narrator says that since the days of "Roamaloose and Rehmoose" (Romulus and Remus, again), there's been continuous dancing (reminiscent of the dance of the Floras around Chuff).  While ostensible progress has been made, the dancing has continued (and will continue), with the "danceadeils and cancanzanies . . . as lithe and limbfree limber as when momie mummed at ma."

The reading concludes today with a brief passage that can best be described as "The Flower Dance of the Floras."  The young women are compared to flowers, and they look toward Chuff as the life-sustaining sun.  Their reaction to Chuff is thus the complete opposite from their reaction to Glugg, and it's significant that unlike Glugg, who is unable to see the colors of the Floras, Chuff "can eyespy through them, to their selfcolours."

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