Book 1, Chapter 1 of Finnegans Wake consists largely of a survey of all existence to show that the fallen Finnegan/HCE is the substance of the world around us. Everywhere we look, from the landscape to the history found in museums to books and poems and stories, we find variations on the same story, the old tale of the Fall of Man peeking through.

One of the set pieces in the chapter concerns the encounter of “Jarl Van Hoother” with “the Prankquean.” It’s an example of how even a folk story and oral poem like this (the “first peace of illiterative porthery” or alliterative poetry) contains variations of the same Eternal Tale. In other words, it is Finnegans Wake condensed down into a paragraph (arguably every paragraph is Finnegans Wake condensed down into a paragraph — every part contains the whole).

“Jarl” is the Scandanavian word for “chief,” related to the English word “earl.” The telling of this story concerns variations of a real legend: The Earl of Howth and Grace O’Malley. Incidentally, Grace O’Malley is a fascinating historical figure, an Irish pirate queen who personally negotiated with Queen Elizabeth for the release of her sons when they were taken captive. Several legends have grown up around this figure, one of the most well-known running like this: Grace O’Malley was on her way back from her meeting with Queen Elizabeth when she stopped at Howth Castle to spend the night (…Howthe Castle and Environs). The family was at dinner, the Earl did not wish to receive guests, and O’Malley found the door shut. To get revenge at this insult, she kidnapped the heir of the castle and said she would not return him until the Earl apologized and promised to leave the doors of the castle open and always leave a place set at the table for a potential visitor.

In Joyce’s telling, a variant of this same story happens three times, corresponding to the three Books of Finnegans Wake (the fourth Book represents a pause before the cycle begins again), also corresponding to the three stages of the cycle of history according to Giambatista Vico (“commodius vicus of recirculation….”). Vico argues that human civilizations have a theocratic period, an aristocratic period, a democratic period, and then they descend into chaos/anarchy before beginning again with a new theocratic period.

In this post, I will glance at the Prankquean paragraph and give a brief overview with a few scattered comments. Future posts will look more in depth at parts of it.

The paragraph opens in the prelapsarian world:

It was of a night, late, lang time agone, in an auldstane eld, when Adam was delvin and his madameen spinning watersilts, when mulk mountynotty man was everybully and the first leal ribberrobber that ever had her ainway everybuddy to his lovesaking eyes and everybilly lived alove with everybiddy else, and Jarl van Hoother had his burnt head high up in his lamphouse, laying cold hands on himself. And his two little jiminies, cousins of ourn, Tristopher and Hilary, were kickaheeling their dummy on the oil cloth flure of his homerigh, castle and earthenhouse.

All was one, Adam and Eve were together (Eve is the “ribberrobber,” who took Adam’s rib  — “ainway” contains “Ain,” the Hebrew word for “not,” which is located at the top of the Qabalistic Tree of Life, the Nothingness from which Everything comes). Everyone was everyone else. Individuality, as we understand it, did not exist. The Fall had not yet occurred.

The two sons and the daughter (Shaun, Shem, and Issy) exist as part of HCE. All’s right with the world.

[“jiminies” sounds like Gemini, twins. The names Tristopher and Hilary are from a motto of Giordano Bruno: “In tristitia hilaris, in hilaritate tristis” (“Cheerful in gloom; gloomy in cheer”)

Bruno taught that the opposites of the universe were ultimately one. Good and evil, light and dark, inward and outward…each contains the other and is necessary for the other, and all opposites are ultimately resolved in a unity. This view is precisely the perspective of the Wake: Shem and Shaun are the halves of a more cohesive humanity.

Tristopher corresponds to Shaun, Hilary to Shem.]

And, be dermot, who come to the keep of his inn only the niece-of-his-inlaw, the prankquean. And the prankquean pulled a rosy one and made her wit foreninst the dour. And she lit up and fireland was ablaze. And spoke she to the dour in her petty perusienne: Mark the Wans, why do I am alook alike a poss of porterpease? And that was how the skirtmisshes began. But the dour handworded her grace in dootch nossow: Shut! So her grace o’malice kidsnapped up the jiminy Tristopher and into the shandy westerness she rain, rain, rain. And Jarl van Hoother warlessed after her with soft dovesgall: Stop deef stop come back to my earin stop. But she swaradid to him: Unlikelihud. And there was a brannewail that same sabboath night of falling angles somewhere in Erio. And the prankquean went for her forty years’ walk in Tourlemonde and she washed the blessings of the lovespots off the jiminy with soap sulliver suddles and she had her four owlers masters for to tauch him his tickles and she convorted him to the onesure allgood and he became a luderman.

You can see the actual Grace O’Malley legend refracted here in the weird dreamspeak. The Fall consists of the female figure snatching a piece of HCE, ending the prelapsarian peace and inaugurating theocratic age by making this part of him a “luderman.” [It’s unclear to me whether this is a passage from prelapsarian to theocratic or theocratic to aristocratic…in true Wake spirit, it’s likely both at once] That’s probably supposed to be “Lutheran,” but it mixes in the Latin for “to play (an instrument)” (ludere) and the German for “minx” (luder). In Irish, “ludraman” means a lazy idler. It also reminds me of “letter man” — later in the book, HCE’s son Shaun becomes a mail carrier (Shaun the Postman) to bring good news (gospels, literature, Finnegans Wake itself) to the future.

The Fall is again identified with the flood, forty days and forty nights. Her running is raining (it’s sometimes thought that it’s raining outside the window of the dreamer of Finnegans Wake while the dream is going on).

There’s a ton to say here, obviously. One could write an entire essay on each of these words and their relationship to this passage and the rest of the book. For example, she “convorted” him — it mixes convert with cavort. It’s conversion and seduction, it’s a kidnapping and an illicit affair (like the cuckolding of King Mark, Mark the Wans [the First]). It reverberates across the entire book. I get an echo of “vortex” from it, too, which is William Blake’s word for a passageway between worlds (here, ages). It’s perhaps worth remarking that “convortare” in Latin means to turn around, as if these different ages are just the backside of other ages (turning in bed?).

One could spend a long, long time on this paragraph alone.

For this post, I will leave aside the question of what the Prankquean’s riddle might mean, but it’s a question that echoes again and again in Finnegans Wake and will require much discussion.

The Prankquean returns for a second round:

So then she started to rain and to rain and, be redtom, she was back again at Jarl van Hoother’s in a brace of samers and the jiminy with her in her pinafrond, lace at night, at another time. And where did she come but to the bar of his bristolry. And Jarl von Hoother had his baretholobruised heels drowned in his cellarmalt, shaking warm hands with himself and the jimminy Hilary and the dummy in their first infancy were below on the tearsheet, wringing and coughing, like brodar and histher. And the prankquean nipped a paly one and lit up again and redcocks flew flackering from the hillcombs. And she made her witter before the wicked, saying: Mark the Twy, why do I am alook alike two poss of porterpease? And: Shut! says the wicked, handwording her madesty. So her madesty ’a forethought’ set down a jiminy and took up a jiminy and all the lilipath ways to Woeman’s Land she rain, rain, rain. And Jarl von Hoother bleethered atter her with a loud finegale: Stop domb stop come back with my earring stop. But the prankquean swaradid: Am liking it. And there was a wild old grannewwail that laurency night of starshootings somewhere in Erio. And the prankquean went for her forty years’ walk in Turnlemeem and she punched the curses of cromcruwell with the nail of a top into the jiminy and she had her four larksical monitrix to touch him his tears and she provorted him to the onecertain allsecure and he became a tristian.

A huge part of the meaning is the repetition with a difference – performing on the page the way that history tends to repeat itself with differences. This is one of the foundational points of the Wake’s philosophy: the same eternal story plays out in each generation with little variations here and there.

One could spend a lot of time thinking about what changes in each round of the Prankquean and why it changes. For instance, now she “provorted” him — perverted? Society becomes decadent as the cycle continues. That he becomes a “tristian” suggests Tristan more directly (ready to replace HCE in the next cycle). Why is King Mark identified with Mark Twain? Perhaps as the author of Huck Finn(egan), and an absolute master of American literature, Twain repeats the literary cycle in the New World (which is always a symbol for the world of HCE’s children in the Wake, doublin their mumper all the time). Finn. Again.

All of this is what Joyce elsewhere calls the “Seim anew,” the “olde butte new.”

I like also how in the change between Tourlemonde and Turnlemeem she goes from touring the world to touring the memories (of the last cycle), or turning the memories (convortat), or touring/turning the memes, or the me, the self.

So then she started raining, raining, and in a pair of changers, be dom ter, she was back again at Jarl von Hoother’s and the Larryhill with her under her abromette. And why would she halt at all if not by the ward of his mansionhome of another nice lace for the third charm? And Jarl von Hoother had his hurricane hips up to his pantrybox, ruminating in his holdfour stomachs (Dare! O dare!), ant the jiminy Toughertrees and the dummy were belove on the watercloth, kissing and spitting, and roguing and poghuing, like knavepaltry and naivebride and in their second infancy. And the prankquean picked a blank and lit out and the valleys lay twinkling. And she made her wittest in front of the arkway of trihump, asking: Mark the Tris, why do I am alook alike three poss of porter pease? But that was how the skirtmishes endupped.

I notice that “skirtmishes” – one of my favorite puns in the book – has lost one of its s’s. I’m wondering if this is related to the driving out of the snakes of Ireland (earlier in the chapter, Joyce describes the letter s as the snake: “Our durlbin is sworming in sneaks”). [Also, “skirtmishes” shows how love and war are always together, much as in Greek mythology Aphrodite and Ares (love and war) were illicit lovers…it also puts me in mind of mishe, mishe (I am) from the first page….]

The All-Father appears, and we get the novel’s second thunderword:

For like the campbells acoming with a fork lance of lightning, Jarl von Hoother Boanerges himself, the old terror of the dames, came hip hop handihap out through the pikeopened arkway of his three shuttoned castles, in his broadginger hat and his civic chollar and his allabuff hemmed and his bullbraggin soxangloves and his ladbroke breeks and his cattegut bandolair and his furframed panuncular cumbottes like a rudd yellan gruebleen orangeman in his violet indigonation, to the whole longth of the strongth of his bowman’s bill. And he clopped his rude hand to his eacy hitch and he ordurd and his thick spch spck for her to shut up shop, dappy. And the duppy shot the shutter clup (Perkodhuskurunbarggruauyagokgorlayorgromgremmitghundhurthrumathunaradidillifait itillibumullunukkunun!) And they all drank free. For one man in his armour was a fat match always for any girls under shurts.

Some future posts of mine will discuss what might be going on here.

And we conclude:

And that was the first peace of illiterative porthery in all the flamend floody flatuous world. How kirssy the tiler made a sweet unclose to the Narwhealian captol. Saw fore shalt thou sea. Betoun ye and be. The prankquean was to hold her dummyship and the jimminies was to keep the peacewave and van Hoother was to git the wind up. Thus the hearsomeness of the burger felicitates the whole of the polis.

Here, this story is said to be another version of Kersse and the Norwegian Captain, which is coming much later in the book (“Saw fore shalt thou sea”).

We end with the idea that HCE is the captain of the ship of life, and the parts of him all play a vital role in conducting it. To “get the wind up” is an expression that can mean to be afraid, but the phrasing here also suggests to wind someone up, to fart, and to get it up (an erection, sexual desire) — these are the winds that fill our sails, “wind up” the parts of the cosmic machine, and move our life forward (and wind us up). Has anyone ever summed up the human condition so beautifully and disgustingly?

The last sentence is a parody of the Dublin city motto: “Obedientia Civium Urbis Felicitas,” or “The obedience of the citizens makes a happy city.” That is, each part doing its job makes the whole thing work and produces joy. This is true not just of a city, but of each person, who is the microcosm of a city, insofar as we each contain multitudes: our parts contribute to the whole.

Here, it’s not obedience but “hearsomeness” (fearsomeness? to be paired with the fear definition of “get the wind up”?). HCE’s fall comes from rumors spreading about him, which his constituent parts hear, which is the sound of the thunderclap/fart/defecation. Again, the Fall gives the energy to the parts.

It’s worth noting that the whole story compresses a lot of energy contained in other episodes of the book, including the scandalous nature of whatever sin was committed in the Park (a version of original sin). The Prankquean comes across Van Hoother touching himself. She “plucks a rose” (slang for a woman urinating or defecating). The “alook alike” of her riddle implies (both in content and in the appearance of the words) the two temptresses in the Park. The Prankquean “makes her witter” – makes her water, or makes her wetter. The word “shut” is both “shoot” (the shooting of HCE/the Russian General in some tellings) and “shit” (his defecation in the Park). And the thunderclap itself could be the sound of defecation or flatulence.

The entire novel is squeezed into this paragraph, and the Prankquean, along with the letters P and Q, and her riddle recur many times in Finnegans Wake. The female principle of the universe breaks the male principle and then gathers up the pieces to “puff the blaziness on.” Much more remains to be said about this.