The Tradition of the Marketplace: Joyce’s Nice Use of Diction

Abstract

THE TRADITION OF THE MARKETPLACE: JOYCE'S NICE USE OF DICTION RONALD BATES University of Western Ontario I n his discussion with the dean of studies in A Portrait of the Artist Stephen Dedalus refers to a distinction in vocabulary which can have a wider and more important place in discussion of literary technique than may at first appear. - One difficulty - said Stephen - in aesthetic discussion is to know whether words are being used according to the literary tradition or according to the tradition of the marketplace. I remember a sentence of Newman's in which he says of the Blessed Virgin that she was detained in the full company of the saints. The use of the word in the marketplace is quite different. I h o p e i a m n o t d e t a in i n g y o u . - - Not in the least - said the dean politely. - No, no - said Stephen, smiling - I mean ... - - Yes, yes: I see - said the dean quickly - 1 quite catch the point: d e t a i n . - ( 2 19 ) 1 The reader cannot miss that it is the same kind of humorous epiphany employed in this interchange as in the definition of the epiphany given in Stephen Hero (188).2That the dean mistakes the last sentence of Stephen's first remark to him simply exemplifies the difficulty Stephen is referring to: the dean takes the word in the tradition of the marketplace. The point of this distinction, however, lies in its emphasis on levels of vocabulary. It is an explicit recognition of a linguistic fact which may not only be a difficulty but, if recognized and con­ trolled, may be an effective part of compositional technique. It is, as a matter of fact, very much connected with the interior monologue. Joyce, of course, looms large in any discussion of the technique of interior monologue in the modern novel. Although much has been written on this subject, it is still one which demands some clarification, particularly when it comes to actual analysis of the prose devices involved. Most attempts to deal with the stream of consciousness in the novel start from the psychological point of view. This was almost bound to happen for at least two reasons: the immense popular importance of psychology in many areas of the modern age, and the fact that the term “ stream of consciousness" E n g l is h S t u d ie s in C a n a d a , 1 , 2 (su m m e r 19 7 5 ) 204 English Studies in Canada was coined by a psychologist, William James. That these are valid methodologi­ cal reasons for emphasizing the psychological aspect is, however, another matter. There are indications in the work of some of these critics of confusion which arises mainly from the psychological basis of their approach. Robert Humphrey, for instance, in Stream of Consciousness in the Modern Novel notes: Marcel Proust has written a modern classic which is often cited as an example of stream-of-consciousness fiction, but A la recherche du temps perdus is con­ cerned only with the reminiscent aspect of consciousness. Proust was delib­ erately recapturing the past for the purpose of communication; hence he did not write a stream-of-consciousness novel. Let us think of consciousness as being in the form of an iceberg- the whole iceberg and not just the relatively small sur­ face portion. Stream-of-consciousness fiction, to follow this comparison, is greatly concerned with what lies below the surface. With such a concept of consciousness, we may define stream-of-consciousness fiction as a type of fiction in which the basic emphasis is placed on exploration of the prespeech levels of consciousness for the purpose, primarily, of revealing the psychic being of the characters.3 Others, however, as Humphrey's quotation shows, consider Proust's novel to be stream of consciousness. Humphrey goes on to differentiate between stream of consciousness, which is a kind of fiction, not a single technique, and the various techniques, such as internal monologue, which are used to present it. Other critics, again, do not follow this kind of discrimination. When...