Dear reader, this is the toughest episode I've had to read yet, in terms of content. Stylistically, its similar to the first, relatively straight-forward. The challenge comes in the person of the aforementioned Mr. Deasy, who is the Nestor analog in this strange retelling of The Odyssey.
Stephen is teaching a class on Roman history to a bunch of more or less inattentive students. He only has their attention for a short while, and is apparently unfamiliar with their school and its program. His thoughts are occupied with scenes of bloody warfare and the chances of history—do the things which happen preclude their opposites? "Had Julius Caesar not been knifed to death…"
One student reads a poem rather badly, and the lecture ends. The students call on Stephen to tell them a riddle, but the one he comes up with is so far beyond their capabilities (and mine) as to be incomprehensible. They leave to play hockey in a rush, though one remains behind to obtain help from Stephen on solving what seem to be fairly basic math problems. Stephen dwells on this boy's unattractiveness and his relationship with a mother who probably cares for him anyway, as he goes to talk to the headmaster, Mr. Deasy, about his pay.
Deasy is an old man who can apparently remember the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s. He begins to lecture Stephen on the necessity of saving money, as he counts out the pay he owes him. Stephen has apparently been lectured the exact same way twice before, and is resigned to listening to it over again. Mr. Deasy claims that the national pride of the British is that they can say they "paid their own way," and never needed a loan from anyone. Stephen reflects gloomily on his own debts, which are considerable. His pay is worthless.
Deasy then asks Stephen to do him a favor. He has a letter he wants to publish in a couple newspapers, who's editors Stephen apparently knows. It concerns the "foot and mouth," disease, which afflicts cattle. Deasy begins slowly typing the last portion of the manuscript on an old typewriter, while Stephen admires pictures of racehorses on his wall. THe letter is full of cliches and rambling, though Deasy apparently doesn't think so.
It is at this point that the episode becomes hard to read. Deasy claims to be beset on all sides by difficulties, and makes a number of classic accusations against Jews, whom he claims are causing the downfall of "old England." Stephen tries to deflect his tirade with questions about the job of a merchant, be he Jew or gentile, but Deasy will have none of it. Stephen asks him at one point which country has not persecuted the Jews, and Deasy does not immediately have a reply.
Stephen claims that history is "a nightmare from which I am trying to awake," whereas Deasy claims that history has but one purpose, the manifestation of God. GOd is, according to Stephen, "A shout in the street," or the sounds of the distant hockey players enjoying themselves. At length, despite Deasy's chronic rambling, Stephen is able to understand what he wants to be done with the letter, though Deasy doesn't seem to actually care which journals it gets posted in. As Stephen leaves, Deasy runs after him to answer his earlier question: "Ireland, they say, has the honor of being the only country which never persecuted the Jews, because she never let them in." Deasy laughs his head off at this.
The most difficult thing about this episode, as I mentioned, was the frankness of the antisemitic remarks made by one of the characters. I'm not sure how much of this was Joyce's own viewpoint and how much a depiction of an old, bitter man. Stephen's reaction, or lack of it, also troubles me: he never expresses discomfort at being forced to listen to the rant, seeming rather to let it roll over him.
If this episode was hard to take due to its content, the next is almost impossible because of its style. Episode 3 is the place I gave up most of my previous attempts to read this novel. Prepare for massive stream of consciousness.
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