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The surviving pages of Stephen Hero, written in Pola and Trieste in 1904-5, overlap in many places with chapter five of A Portrait.
If you came to this page directly, use this frames version to compare both.
...One day when Stephen had gone to the College by accident he found McCann standing in the hall holding a long testimonial. Another part of the testimonial was on the hall-table and nearly all the young men in the College were signing their names to it. McCann was speaking volubly to a little group and Stephen discovered that the testimonial was the tribute of Dublin University students to the Tsar of Russia. World-wide peace: solution of all disputes by arbitration: general disarming of the nations: these were the benefits for which the students were returning their thanks. On the hall table there were two photographs, one of the Tsar of Russia, the other of the editor of the Review of Reviews: both of the photographs were signed by the famous couple. As McCann was standing sideways to the light Stephen amused himself by tracing a resemblance between him and the pacific Emperor whose photograph had been taken in profile. The Tsar's air of besotted Christ moved him to scorn and he turned for support to Cranly who was standing beside the door. Cranly wore a very dirty yellow straw hat of the shape of an inverted bucket in the shelter of which his face was composed to a glaucuous calm.-- Doesn't he look a wirrasthrue Jaysus? said Stephen pointing to the Tsar's photograph and using the Dublin version of the name as an effective common noun.
Cranly looked in the direction of McCann and replied, nodding his head:
-- Wirrasthrue Jaysus and hairy Jaysus.
At that moment McCann caught sight of Stephen and signalled that he would be with him in a moment:
-- Have you signed? asked Cranly.
-- This thing? No-- have you?
Cranly hesitated and then brought out a well deliberated 'Yes.'
-- What for?
-- What for?
-- Ay.
-- For... Pax.
Stephen looked up under the bucket-shaped hat but could read no expression on his neighbour's face. His eyes wandered up to the dinged vertex of the hat.
-- In the name of God what do you wear that hat for? It's not so terribly hot, is it? he asked.
Cranly took off the hat slowly and gazed into its depths. After a little pause he pointed into it and said:
-- Viginti-uno denarios.
-- Where? said Stephen.
-- I bought it, said Cranly very impressively and very flatly, last summer in Wickla.
He looked back into the hat and said, smiling with a sour affection;
-- It's not... too bloody bad... of a hat... D'ye know.
And he replaced it on his head slowly, murmuring to himself, from force of habit 'Viginti-uno denarios.'
-- Sicut bucketus est, said Stephen.
The subject was not discussed further. Cranly produced a little grey ball from one of his pockets and began to examine it carefully, indenting the surface at many points. Stephen was watching this operation when he heard McCann addressing him.
-- I want you to sign this testimonial.
-- What about?
-- It's a testimonial of admiration for the courage displayed by the Tsar of Russia in issuing a rescript to the Powers, advocating arbitration instead of war as a means of settling national disputes.
Stephen shook his head. Temple who had been wandering round the hall in search of sympathy came over at this moment and said to Stephen:
-- Do you believe in peace?
No-one answered him.
-- So you won't sign? said McCann.
Stephen shook his head again:
-- Why not? said McCann sharply.
-- If we must have a Jesus, answered Stephen, let us have a legitimate Jesus.
-- By hell! said Temple laughing, that's good. Did you hear that? he said to Cranly and McCann both of whom he seemed to regard as very hard of hearing. D'you hear that? Legitima' Jesus!
-- I presume then you approve of war and slaughter, said McCann.
-- I did not make the world, said Stephen.
-- By hell! said Temple to Cranly. I believe in universal brotherhood. 'Scuse me, he said, turning to McCann, do you believe in universal brotherhood?
McCann took no heed of the question but continued addressing Stephen. He began an argument in favour of peace which Temple listened to for a few moments, but, as he spoke with his back to Temple, that revolutionary young man who could not hear him very well began to wander round the hall again. Stephen did not argue with McCann but at a convenient pause he said:
-- I have no intention of signing.
McCann halted and Cranly said, taking Stephen's arm:
-- Nos ad manum ballum jocabimus.
-- All right, said McCann promptly, as if he was accustomed to rebuffs, if you won't, you won't.
He went off to get more signatures for the Tsar while Cranly and Stephen went out into the garden...
Skipping several chapters: [compare]
...By an epiphany he meant a sudden spiritual manifestation, whether in the vulgarity of speech or of gesture or in a memorable phase of the mind itself. He believed that it was for the man of letters to record these epiphanies with extreme care, seeing that they themselves are the most delicate and evanescent of moments. He told Cranly that the clock of the Ballast Office was capable of an epiphany. Cranly questioned the inscrutable dial of the Ballast Office with his no less inscrutable countenance:-- Yes, said Stephen. I will pass it time after time, allude to it, refer to it, catch a glimpse of it. It is only an item in the catalogue of Dublin's street furniture. Then all at once I see it and I know at once what it is: epiphany.
-- What?
-- Imagine my glimpses at that clock as the gropings of a spiritual eye which seeks to adjust its vision to an exact focus. The moment the focus is reached the object is epiphanised. It is just in this epiphany that I find the third, the supreme quality of beauty.
-- Yes? said Cranly absently.
-- No esthetic theory, pursued Stephen relentlessly, is of any value which investigates with the aid of the lantern of tradition. what we symbolise in black the Chinaman may symbolise in yellow: each has his own tradition. Greek beauty laughs at Coptic beauty and the American Indian derides them both. It is almost impossible to reconcile all tradition whereas it is by no means impossible to find the justification of every form of beauty which has ever been adored on the earth by an examination into the mechanisms of esthetic apprehension whether it be dressed in red, white, yellow or black. We have no reason for thinking that the Chinaman has a different system of digestion from that which we have though our diets are quite dissimilar. The apprehensive faculty must be scrutinised in action.
--Yes...
-- You know what Aquinas says: The three thngs requisite for beauty are, integrity, a wholeness, symmetry and radiance. Some day I will expand that sentence into a treatise. Consider the performance of your own mind when confronted with any object, hypothetically beautiful. Your mind to apprehend that object divides the entire universe into two parts, the object, and the void which is not the object. To apprehend it you must lift it away from everything else: and then you perceive that it is one integral thing, that it is a thing. You recognise its integrity. Isn't that so?
-- And then?
-- That is the first quality of beauty: it is declared in a simple sudden synthesis of the faculty which apprehends. What then? Analysis then. The mind considers the object in whole and in part, in relation to itself and to other objects, examines the balance of its parts, contemplates the form of the object, traverses every cranny of the structure. So the mind receives the impresion of the symmetry of the object. The mind recognises that the object is in the strict sense of the word,a thing, a definitely constituted entity. You see?
-- Let us turn back, said Cranly.
They had reached the corner of Grafton St and as the footpath was overcrowded they turned back northwards. Cranly had an inclination to watch the antics of a drunkard who had been ejected from a bar in Suffolk St but Stephen took his arm summarily and led him away.
-- Now for the third quality. For a long time I couldn't make out what Aquinas meant. He uses a figurative word (a very unusual thing for him) but I have solved it. Claritas is quidditas. After the analysis which discovers the second quality the mind makes the only possible synthesis and discovers the third quality. This is the moment which I call epiphany. First we recognise that the object is one integral thing, then we recognise that it is an organised composite structure, a thing in fact: finally, when the relation of the parts is exquisite, when the parts are adjusted to the special point, we recognise that it is that thing which it is. Its soul, its whatness, leaps to us from the vestment of its appearance. The soul of the commonest object, the structure of which is so adjusted, seems to us radiant. The object achieves its epiphany.
And, for good measure, my favorite passage, which falls between the two above and is entirely omitted from Portrait:
...Outside of the University he came alongside of the object which he had been pursuing.-- Good morning!
-- Stephen...! Have you been running?
-- Yes.
-- Where are you going to?
-- I saw you from the window.
-- What window?
-- In the college. Where are you going?
-- I am going to Leeson Park.
-- This way, said Stephen taking her arm.
She seemed as if she were about to resent such an act in broad daylight but after a quick glance of remonstrance allowed him to escort her. Stephen held her arm tightly to his side and discomposed her somewhat by speaking very close to her face. Her face was glistening with mist and it had begun to glow in answer to his excited and passionate manner.
-- Where did you see me?
-- I was in the window at my Italian lesson with Father Artifoni. I saw you come through the Green and cross the road.
-- Did you?
-- So I jumped up at once and asked him to excuse me as I had to keep an appointment and flew downstairs and out after you.
The colour had begun to deepen very much on her cheek and it was plain that she was trying to appear quite at her ease. At first she had been flattered but now she was becoming a little nervous. She laughed nervously when he told her that he had run out after her.
-- Goodness! Why did you do that?
Stephen did not answer but he pressed her arm fiercely to his side. At the end of the terrace she turned into a side street instinctively. Here she walked more slowly. The street was very quiet and they both lowered their voices.
-- How did you know it was I? she said. You must have good sight.
-- I was gazing out of the window, he answered, looking at the sky and the Green. Lord God! I was so full of despair. Sometimes I am taken that way: I live such a strange life-- without help or sympathy from anyone. Sometimes I am afraid of myself. I call those people in the college not men but vegetables... Then while I was cursing my own character I saw you.
-- Yes? she said looking at the disorderly figure beside her out of her large oval eyes.
-- You know I was delighted to see you. I had to jump up and rush out. I couldn't have sat there another minute... I said, Here is a human creature at last... I can't tell you how delighted I was.
-- You strange boy! she said. You mustn't go running about like that. You must have more sense.
-- Emma! cried Stephen, don't start talking to me like that today. I know you want to be very sensible. But you and I-- we are both young, aren't we?
-- Yes, Stephen.
-- Very good, then. If we're young we feel happy. We feel full of desire.
-- Desire?
-- Do you know when I saw you...
-- Yes, how did you know me?
-- I knew the stride.
-- Stride!
-- Do you know, Emma, even from my window I could see your hips moving inside your waterproof? I saw a young woman walking proudly through the decayed city. Yes, that's the way you walk: you're proud of being young and proud of being a woman. Do you know when I caught sight of you from my window-- do you know what I felt?
There was no use in her essaying indifference now. Her cheeks were covered with a persistent flush and her eyes shone like gems. She gazed straight before her and her breath began to be agitated. They stood together in the deserted street and he continued speaking, a certain ingenuous disattachment guiding his excited passion.
-- I felt that I longed to hold you in my arms-- your body. I longed for you to take me in your arms. That's all... Then I thought I would run after you and say that to you... Just to live one night together, Emma, and then to say goodbye in the morning and never to see each other again! There is no such thing as love in the world: only people are young...
She tried to take her arm away from his and murmured as if she were repeating from memory:
-- You are mad, Stephen.
Stephen let go her arm and took her hand in his, saying:
-- Goodbye, Emma... I felt that I wanted to say that to you for my own sake but if I stand here in this stupid street beside you for much longer I shall begin to say more... You say I am mad because I do not bargain with you or say I love you or swear to you. But I believe you hear my words and understand me, don't you?
-- I don't understand you indeed, she answered with a touch of anger.
-- I will give you a chance, said Stephen, pressing her hand close in his two hands. Tonight when you are going to bed remember me and go to your window: I will be in the garden. Open the window and call my name and ask me to come in. Then come down and let me in. We will live one night together-- one night, Emma, alone together and in the morning we will say goodbye.
--Let go my hand, please, she said, pulling her hand away from him. If I had known it was for this mad talk... You must not speak to me any more, she said moving on a pace or two and plucking her waterproof out of his reach. Who do you think I am that you can speak to me like that?
-- It is no insult, said Stephen colouring suddenly as the reverse of the image struck him, for a man to ask a woman what I have asked you. You are annoyed at something else not at that.
-- You are mad, I think, she said, brushing past him swiftly without taking any notice of his salute. She did not go quickly enough, however, to hide the tears that were in her eyes and he, surprised to see them and wondering at their cause, forgot to say the goodbye that was on his lips. As he watched her walk onward swiftly with her head slightly bowed he seemed to feel her soul and his falling asunder swiftly and for ever after an instant of all but union.
cf? Mary Colum [ofjj12] "The first I heard of James Joyce was under odd circumstances. I was living in a university residence house in Dublin, studying for the matriculation examination. It happened that one of the girl students in the house-- a graduate, I seem to remember-- got a postcard from one of the men students that annoyed her very much by its contents. At the time, though Queen Victoria was dead, girls took offense in Ireland at any uncalled-for communication or approach from the male sex. The contents of the postcard became known to a number of us younger girls: the writer, I remember, suggested a meeting or rendezvous of some sort; the signature was 'James A. Joyce.' The recipient of the postcard seemed to know who the writer was, for, highly indignant, she penned a haughty answer that was meant to humiliate and insult this James A. Joyce. In due time she received an equally haughty reply, phrased with extreme politeness but conveying to her that it was foolish to imagine that he, James A. Joyce, would have perpetrated such a missive, as he never remembered to have seen her, and anyhow never communicated with girl students unless they were family friends.... there was no resemblance between the handwriting on the postcard and that in the second communication." [cf e53]
Costello identifies 'Emma' as Mary Cleary (graduated Oct1902), who admitted Joyce "had been keen on her" but she rejected him because he was vulgar, told dirty stories, and picked his nose. [pc189]
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