Search results
The core of Stephen’s theory suggests that all literature is autobiographical; this is particularly interesting due to the fact that Joyce himself was self-exiled from Ireland. Stephen’s theory also implies (indirectly) that Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom were modeled after Joyce.
Stephen's interpretation of Hamlet is admirably introduced when T. W. Lyster, the librarian (who in life was author of a biography of Goethe), says: "And we have, have we not, those priceless pages of
Hamlet ponderingly hesitates and is lost; Odysseus successfully navigates a safe path between the cliff-monster Scylla (representing Aristotelian experience) and the whirlpool Charybis (representing Platonic aestheticism). In terms of his artistic journey, Stephen is allied with Odysseus.
- Introduction
- Parallels
- Overview
- Analysis
In “Telemachus,” the first episode of James Joyce‘s Ulysses, Haines inquires of Stephen as they leave the Martello Tower, “What is your idea of Hamlet?” to which Buck Mulligan interjects, “No, no… Wait till I have a few pints in me first.” Mulligan later summarizes Stephen’s argument, stating, “It’s quite simple. He proves by algebra that Hamlet’s ...
Episode 9 of Ulyssesis inspired by Odysseus’ encounter with the six-headed monster, Scylla and the “whirling maelstrom” Charybdis in Book XII of the Odyssey (Odyssey, 212). After Odysseus has buried the body of Elpenor at the house of Circe, Circe approaches him and warns of his future travels, “One of two courses you may take” : In her warning, Ci...
Stephen begins this oratorical battle by challenging Eglinton’s assertion that “Hamlet is a ghoststory” (9.141). He asks, “What is a ghost?” and rhetorically responds, “One who has faded into impalpability through death, through absence, through change of manners” (9.147-9). Stephen continues to imagine a past performance of Hamlet, in which Shakes...
In “Scylla and Charybdis,” Scylla, the six-headed monster is associated with Stephen and Aristotelian dogmatic rhetoric, while Charybdis is likened to the whirling Platonic dialectic of the artists of Joyce’s time. These associations are constructed by way of the following logic. Scylla, the monster, is associated with the rock on which she rests. ...
Stephen’s theory of Hamlet shows that Shakespeare often wrote his life and times into his work (the culmination being Hamlet as an expression of his bitterness at his wife’s infidelity) and thus presents examples of how masterpieces can still be tied to the realities of lived experience.
Stephen declines the invitation, but later in the book he does perform his interpretation of Hamlet, an aesthetic theory based on various accounts of Shakespeare’s life. Hamlet and the Ghost, engraving by R. Thew after an 1879 painting by Henry Fuseli, published in Boydell's Shakespeare Prints, vol. 2, plate XLIV.
People also ask
What is Stephen's theory of Hamlet?
Why did Shakespeare write 'Hamlet'?
Is Stephen a hamlet?
How important is Stephen's interpretation of Hamlet?
Stephen Dedalus is James Joyce 's literary alter ego, appearing as the protagonist and antihero [2] of his first, semi-autobiographic novel of artistic existence, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), and as a major character in his 1922 novel Ulysses. Stephen mirrors many facets of Joyce's own life and personality.
