Finnegans Wake, Ulster and Partition

This book explores the rich seam in Finnegans Wake of references to Ulster, to its geography, myth and history: a subject which has received relatively little attention in Joyce studies. Joyce portrays Ulster as sharing a complex relationship with the rest of Ireland, one which combines difference with inclusion. He makes many references in the Wake to the historical factors, from the sixteenth-century plantations to the Anglo-Irish War, which contributed to the gradual estrangement of the province (at least its majority population) from the rest of Ireland. Joyce wrote Finnegans Wake between 1923 and 1939. He was, therefore, ideally placed to interrogate the trauma of partition and the growing pains of the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland. He sketches these historical moments and times satirically, and with disappointment and heartfelt regret. A century after partition, borders are again prominent physical and symbolic markers of difference, of exclusion of the outsider, not just in Ireland and Britain, but across the world. Joyce's satirical assault on intolerance, national and global, is as pertinent today as it was when he embarked on Finnegans Wake a century ago.