User:Generalissima/James Joyce's letters to Nora Barnacle
(the common term appears to be "the Nora Letters". Names: "Joyce-Barnacle love letters", "Joyce's erotic letters",
Background
[edit]James Joyce (1882–1941) was an Irish poet and novelist. Born and raised in Dublin, he first began writing while attending Belvedere College, a Jesuit secondary school. During his teenage years, he came to strongly reject his Catholic upbringing in favor of an individualistic worldview which prioritized the pursuit of pleasure. He first became sexually active in 1896 with a prostitute in Dublin; he went on to frequent brothels throughout his secondary education, as well as his college career at the University of Dublin. After graduating from Dublin in 1902, Joyce briefly stayed in Paris, where he made a brief and ill-fated attempt to attend medical school. He returned to Dublin to care for his mother May, who was suffering from cancer. After her death in 1903, Joyce became increasingly aimless, turning to alcoholism, and intermittently pursuing work as a writer while distancing himself from his family.[1][2]
Nora Barnacle (1884–1951) was born in Galway, and spent much of her childhood under the care of her grandmother. She attended a Catholic school operated by the Sisters of Mercy in her youth, afterwards finding work as a porter at a local convent. Around the beginning of 1904, she moved to Dublin to escape abuse and found work as a hotel chambermaid. In June of that year, Barnacle and Joyce arranged a meeting after a chance encounter. They went to Ringsend, a deserted area near the harbour, where Barnacle reached into Joyce's pants and masturbated him. The two quickly fell into a romantic relationship. Four months later, with Joyce strongly critical of marriage as an institution, the two left Ireland in hopes of living together unmarried.[3][4][5] In early 1905, the couple settled in Trieste, then under the Austro-Hungarian Empire. After they had a son in 1905 and a daughter in 1907, Joyce was increasingly pressured by financial concerns, and frequently traveled in various attempts to secure money for his family.[6]
In June 1909, Joyce visited Dublin alongside his young son Giorgio to visit his family. While there, an acquaintance falsely confided that Barnacle had also been romantically involved with him after she first began seeing Joyce. Convinced and betrayed, Joyce wrote several letters to Nora accusing her of infidelity. Afterwards, a friend convinced him that the allegations were a lie, and he wrote again to her in apology.[7] He briefly returned home to Trieste in September, but was soon motivated to go back to Ireland the following month, seeking to organize a cinema in Dublin.[8][9]
Letters
[edit]The tone of Joyce's attested letters to Barnacle shift in the aftermath of his false allegations of infidelity. Initially filled with penitence and remorse, they shift towards expressions of lust and passion. He adopts a childlike attitude towards Barnacle, comparing their relationship to that of a mother and her child. In one letter, he tells Barnacle that he wishes he could "nestle in your womb like a child born of your flesh and blood" and "sleep in the warm secret gloom of your body".[10][11][12] Joyce also expresses sadomasochistic inclinations; in his letter on September 2nd, he writes that he has an "idea madder than usual" and requests that Barnacle try flogging him.[13][14]
Analysis
[edit]Influence on other work
[edit]Release and controversy
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Bulson 2006, pp. 1–6.
- ^ Maddox 1988, pp. 24–25.
- ^ Bulson 2006, pp. 6–7.
- ^ Maddox 1988, pp. 26–29.
- ^ Ellmann 1982, pp. 156–159.
- ^ Bulson 2006, pp. 7–8.
- ^ Ellmann 1982, pp. 279–284.
- ^ Selected Letters, p. 38.
- ^ Ellmann 1982, pp. 300–301.
- ^ Federici 2019, pp. 243, 246.
- ^ Ellmann 1982, p. 293.
- ^ Selected Letters, p. 169.
- ^ Balázs 2002, p. 160.
- ^ Selected Letters, pp. 166–167.
Bibliography
[edit]- Anderson, Chester G. (1977). "Review of Selected Letters of James Joyce". James Joyce Quarterly. 14 (2): 219–223. JSTOR 25476053.
- Balázs, Thomas P. (2002). "Recognizing Masochism: Psychoanalysis and the Politics of Sexual Submission in "Ulysses"". Joyce Studies Annual. 13: 160–191. JSTOR 26285163.
- Baylet, John (1976). "Review of Selected Letters of James Joyce". Journal of Beckett Studies (1): 92–96.
- Brockman, William S. (1999). "Learning to Be James Joyce's Contemporary? Richard Ellmann's Discovery and Transformation of Joyce's Letters and Manuscripts". Journal of Modern Literature. 22 (2): 253–263. JSTOR 3831735.
- Bulson, Eric (2006). The Cambridge Introduction to James Joyce. Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511607301. ISBN 9780511607301.
- Cotter, David (2013). Joyce and the Perverse Ideal. London: Routledge. ISBN 9781136711497.
- Ellmann, Richard (1982) [1959]. James Joyce. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195031034.
- Ellmann, Richard, ed. (1975). Selected Letters of James Joyce. New York: Viking Press. ISBN 9780670631902.
- Faris, Wendy B. (1980). "The Poetics of Marriage: Flowers and Gutter Speech, Joyce's Letters to Nora". CEA Critic. 43 (1): 9–13. JSTOR 44376048.
- Federici, Annalissa (2019). "'Dear Henry'/'Dear Jim'/'My Dearest Nora': Fictional and Private Language in Joyce" (PDF). Joyce Studies in Italy. 21: 233–250.
- Henke, Suzette A. (2015). James Joyce and the Politics of Desire. London: Routledge. ISBN 9781317291930.
- Houdebine, Jean-Louis (2000). "Joyce-Nora, Decembre 1909". L'Infini (in French). 70: 92–100. ISBN 9782070758982.
- Kain, Richard M. (1976). "Review of The Book is World, Selected Letters, and Forms of Modern British Fiction". Modern Fiction Studies. 22 (4): 633–637. JSTOR 26280414.
- Knowlton, Eloise (1993). "Joyce and the Stakes of Style: Or, The Case of the Copied Letter". Style. 27 (1): 81–90. JSTOR 42946022.
- Maddox, Brenda (1988). Nora: A Biography of Nora Joyce. New York: Ballantine Books.
- Neill, Crispian (2016). "The Afflatus of Flatus: James Joyce and the Writing of Odor". James Joyce Quarterly. 53 (3/4): 307–326. JSTOR 45172812.
- Ní Chonchúir, Nuala (15 March 2021). "Imagining Nora Barnacle's Love Letters to James Joyce". The Paris Review.
- Peterson, Richard F.; Cohn, Alan M. (1982). "James Job: The Critical Reception of Joyce's Letters". James Joyce Quarterly. 19 (4): 429–440. JSTOR 25476467.
- Updike, John (1 March 1976). "Simple-Minded Jim". The New Yorker. pp. 93–100.
- Van Boheemen-Saaf, Christine (2008). "The Nora Letters as a Source of Joyce's Performativity". James Joyce Quarterly. 45 (3/4): 469–479. JSTOR 30244389.