Genetic Connections in Finnegans Wake: Lucia Joyce and Issy Earwicker

The subject of Lucia Joyce’s alleged schizophrenia and her role in her father’s writing have gained popular attention since the publication of Carol Shloss’s controversial biography Lucia Joyce: To Dance in the Wake (2003). However, Shloss’s text has inspired a series of interpretations that do not verify her biographical claims: there is as of yet little academic scholarship on how Lucia can be understood as a direct influence on Joyce’s work. In this article, I seek to overcome the discrepancy through the use of genetic criticism, arguing that Lucia’s first breakdown in February 1932 and her increasing mental instability during the mid-1930s impacted the composition of portions of Finnegans Wake. I cross-reference available biographical material with draft changes in the James Joyce Archive, the pre-book publications of Finnegans Wake, issues of the modernist journal transition and artwork Lucia created for Joyce’s texts. In doing so I provide original and tangible scholarship on how Lucia Joyce contributed to the compositional development of Finnegans Wake.