Annotations to Finnegans Wake

Roland McHugh’s classic Annotations to Finnegans Wake provides both novice readers and seasoned Joyceans with a wealth of information in an easy-to-use format uniquely suited to this densely layered text. Each page of theAnnotations corresponds directly to a page of the standard Viking/Penguin edition ofFinnegans Wake and contains line-by-line notes following the placement of the passages to which they refer, enabling readers to look directly from text to notes and back again, with no need to consult separate glossaries or other listings.

McHugh’s richly detailed annotations distill decades of scholarship, explicating foreign words, unusual English connotations and colloquial expressions, place names, historical events, song titles and quotations, parodies of other texts, and Joyce’s diverse literary and popular sources. This thoroughly updated fourth edition draws heavily on Internet resources and keyword searches. For the first time, McHugh provides readers with a synopsis of the action ofFinnegans Wake. He also expands his examination of possible textual corruption and adds hundreds of new glosses to help scholars, students, and general readers untangle the dense thicket of allusions that crowds every sentence of Joyce’s nearly inscrutable masterpiece.

Roland McHugh moved to Dublin in 1973 in order to understand Finnegans Wake more completely and has lived there ever since. He is the author ofThe Sigla of ‘Finnegans Wake’ and The ‘Finnegans Wake’ Experience.