Letters

Sir:

I found that Susan L. Solomon’s article, “Inverted Commas, Unreality, and Chiasmus in ‘Aeolus’” (JJQ, 51 [Summer 2014], 613-30), brought up a perspective I hadn’t considered. I was content with the idea that Joyce’s use of the em dash began as a pretention he brought back from ordinary French typography for dialogue that he then rationalized when writing to publishers as a component of his poetic. I wonder how the discussion of the meaning of Joyce’s use of the dash applies to his precursive French texts. I am grateful for her work.

Solomon says that her quotation on p. 622 (U 7.20-24) is “the only rhetorical chiasmus to appear in the episode” (p. 623). The two palindromes quoted by Lenehan present the essence of the chiasmus at a literal level: “Madam I am Adam” and “Able was I ere I saw Elba” (U 7.683).

Sidney Feshbach
City College of New York, CUNY
now retired to Amherst, Massachusetts

Sir:

In her review of Flann O’Brien: Contesting Legacies (JJQ, 51 [Summer 2014], 736-739), Erika Mihálycsa writes that Joyce’s article “Ireland at the Bar” covers “the 1882 trial of John Joyce” (p. 739). This should read—perhaps fittingly, given the context!—”the 1882 trial of Myles Joyce.”

Richard Barlow
Queen’s University Belfast