Three visits:-

Thursday 29th June
Saturday 5th August
Thursday 17th August

…having worked with an employer who claimed the absolute right to making decisions that did not appear to be rational...

I was always a bit wary of the artist’s who based their ‘process’ on the work of others meaning that ‘I’ would have to ‘know’ the work of others by way of mediation and without that knowledge I could not hope to appreciate ‘the art’!

So Alfred Jarry’s "science of imaginary solutions" Pataphysics, may be a crutch of obfuscation for all I know...

“ace of arts, deuce of damimonds, trouble of clubs, fear of spates;” (I had read the words and remembered the position on the page to find them again in chapter six)

I find expression in Finnegan’s Wake that has been mirrored elsewhere but I did not know the probable source.

“Phall if you but will, rise you must” is on the second page of chapter one, so when I decided to address Anselm Kiefer’s interest in the book it was good to find a quick point of reference. I also needed to find a title to the reinforced concrete and barbed wire ‘piece’ occupying the large exhibition space at White Cube, Bermondsey and mistrusted the Grauniad reference in the interview by Jonathan Jones, 8th June 2023. I remembered the words but not the order.

The low level lighting troubled me at first but the diffraction grating device suggested that the spectrum was actually complete. My memory of the 1982 Whitechapel Art Gallery exhibition is incomplete but the spirit is present!

Typically, I found extensive background access to Finnegan's Wake today on the WWW

Godforsaken scapulars, neverworn breeches, cutthroat ties, counterfeit franks, best intentions, curried notes, upset latten tintacks, unused mill and stumpling stones, twisted quills, painful digests, magnifying wineglasses, solid objects cast at goblins, once current puns, quashed quotatoes, messes of mottage, unquestionable issue papers, seedy ejaculations, limerick damns, crocodile tears, spilt ink, blasphematory spits, stale shestnuts, schoolgirls', young ladies' milkmaids', washerwomen's, shopkeepers' wives, merry widows', ex nuns', vice abbess's, pro virgins', super whores', silent sisters', Charleys' aunts', grand-mothers', mothers'-in-law, fostermothers', godmothers' garters, tress clippings from right, lift and cintrum, worms of snot, toothsome pickings, cans of Swiss condensed bilk, highbrow lotions, kisses from the antipodes, presents from pickpockets, borrowed plumes, relaxable handgrips, princess promises, lees of whine, deoxodised carbons, convertible collars,

...Larry's on the focse and Faugh MacHugh O'Bawlar at the wheel, one to do and one to dare, par by par, a peerless pair, ever here and over there, with his fol the dee oll the doo on the flure of his feats and the feels of the fumes in the wakes of his ears our wineman from Barleyhome he just slumped to throne. So sailed the stout ship Nansy Hans. From Liff away. For Nattenlaender. As who has come returns. Farvel, farerne! Good-bark, goodbye! Now follow we out by Starloe!

With her tup. It's a long long ray to Newirgland's premier. For korps, for streamfish, for confects, for bullyoungs, for smearsassage, for patates, for steaked pig, for men, for limericks, for waterfowls, for wagsfools, for louts, for cold airs, for late trams, for curries, for curlews, for leekses, for orphalines, for tunnygulls, for clear goldways, for lungfortes, for moonyhaunts, for fairmoneys, for coffins, for tantrums, for armaurs, for waglugs, for rogues comings, for sly goings, for larksmathes, for homdsmeethes, for quailsmeathes, kilalooly. Tep! Come lead, crom lech! Top.

Lowly, longly a wail went forth. Pure Yawn lay low. On the mead of the hillock lay, heartsoul dormant mid shadowed land-shape, brief wallet to his side, and arm loose, by his staff of citron briar, tradition stick-pass-on.

Hark! Tolv two elf kater ten (it can't be) sax. Hork! Pedwar pemp foify tray (it must be) twelve. And low stole o'er the stillness the heartbeats of sleep.

Last line...

If I seen him bearing down on me now under whitespread wings like he'd come from Arkangels, I sink I'd die down over his feet, humbly dumbly, only to washup. Yes, tid. There's where. First. We pass through grass behush the bush to. Whish! A gull. Gulls. Far calls. Coming, far! End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thous-endsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the
(p628)

...First line

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.
(p1)