Every old skin in the leather world, infect the whole stock company of the old house of the Leaking Barrel, was thomistically drunk, two by two, lairking o' tootlers with tombours a'beggars, the blog and turfs and the brandywine bankrompers, trou Normend fashion, I have been told down to the bank lean clorks?
Thursday, June 18, 2009
An appeal to readers ...
... Dave Lull sends along this link: Finnegans Wake: Page 510. It was brought to his attention because of the use of the term blog. But what Dave - and I - would like to know is what does it mean to be "thomistically drunk"?
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Perhaps it means to be drunk in a methodical, painstaking, detail-oriented, logical way? Or am I, a non-Catholic, misunderstanding Aquinas?
ReplyDeleteI agree with Levi Stahl. Overlooking the insurmountable challenge of "decoding" all (or even a significant portion) of Joyce's diction and syntax in FINNEGAN'S WAKE, it is nevertheless fun to imagine Joyce embracing (participating in and poking fun at) the blissful act of becoming intoxicated as a purely logical (Thomistic) exercise, a throughly considered reaction to the seductive chaos at the Leaking Barrel (i.e., the secular and profane world).
ReplyDeleteI'm inclined to agree, especially since, when I was a drunk, that's exactly how I went about it. It may also, as I suggested to Dave, mean being drunk on thomism as well, to such an extent that even your imbibing is affected.
ReplyDeletePerhaps it is sinless drunkenness:
ReplyDelete""Drunkenness, meaning the mere loss of reason that comes of drinking much wine, does not denote any guilt, but a penal loss consequent on guilt. Taken in another way, drunkenness may mean the act by which one incurs this loss. That act may cause drunkenness from the excessive strength of the wine beyond what the drinker looked for. Thus understood again, drunkenness may happen without sin."
QUESTION CL.: OF DRUNKENNESS.- St. Thomas Aquinas, Aquinas Ethicus: or, the Moral Teaching of St. Thomas, vol. 2 (Summa Theologica - Secunda Secundae Pt.2) [1274]
Since I was almost always a reasonable drunk, may I assume that my drunkenness was therefore sinless, I wonder?
ReplyDeleteMy friend Roger sent me this comment:
ReplyDelete"Perhaps Joyce has in mind the third ("Proteus") episode of "Ulysses." Here Stephen Dedalus ruminates on metaphysics, is indeed intoxicated with it. St. Thomas plays a part here, and though (at this point) Stephen is not drinking, he surely is drunk with thought."
I think the discussion reaches a conclusion with the above comment so regrets for adding on but I think "thomistically" is t' home, to home, mystically, thomist. I disagree with the idea he is making fun of being drunk.
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