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"...I later irritated Joyce by enquiring into the details of what actually occurred during Bloom's encounter with Gerty MacDowell on the beach.
--Nothing happened between them, he replied. It all took place in Bloom's imagination." --Arthur Power Conversations with James Joyce p32"The Projected Mirage" --Linati schema's 'meaning' for Nausikaa [more]
The purpose of this page is to explore two questions: 1) in what sense does the episode take place in Bloom's imagination? and 2) how old is Gerty?
Power seems very reliable in general, and I'm pretty sure Joyce said the same thing to another memoirist (that I'll eventually track down).
But for me, the most convincing argument is that Gerty's exhibitionism is a classic male fantasy, and probably happens a million times in men's imaginations for every once it happens in real life.
Some issues to explore:
- Do Gerty's thoughts reveal things Bloom couldn't know/imagine? (yes: her surname, details of Catholic ritual, her limp)
- Do Gerty's thoughts reflect Bloom's quirks? (maybe: underwear, bikes, 'Tableau!')
- Do we see or hear things that reflect Bloom's quirks? (yes: Cissy on spanking bottoms)
- Are Gerty's thoughts inconsistent with what we (seem to) see and hear? (yes: underwear changes from blue to white, she wrinkles her nose as parting judgment)
- Do the ages attributed to her friends make sense? (no: Edy's 21 seems improbably old, Reggie's 16-or-less far too young)
- What age(s) do Gerty's thought reflect? (makeup and marriage: over 16?)
- Is she really old enough to be menstruating? (yes: her thoughts dwell on it; maybe not: reference to Edy's monthlies lacks 'too'; no: next year in drawers?)
- What do Bloom's afterthoughts suggest? (over-16: he might have flirted, he wonders if she's Martha; under-16: none of them are 'grownups', green apples, next year in drawers)
And regarding her age, I offer this image from Finnegans Wake:
"...infantina Isobel (who will be blushing all day to be, when she growed up one Sunday... when she took the veil, the beautiful presentation nun, so barely twenty, in her pure coif, sister Isobel, and next Sunday... still as beautiful and still in her teens, nurse Saintette Isabelle, with stiffstarched cuffs but on... Easter mornings... the wonderful widow of eighteen springs, Madame Isa Veuve La Belle, so sad but lucksome in her... weeper's veil)..." FW556
The suggestion is that Bloom starts off lying to himself about her age, but by the end of the chapter starts to acknowledge it: "I begin to like them at that age. Green apples." and "next year in drawers" (If I understand correctly, girls would start wearing drawers when they start menstruating? So earlier references to her period would be part of his denial.
Edy and Cissy have brought their little brothers, a one-year-old and 4yo twins. If they're over 18, how did their mothers manage to have kids 15 years apart, and where are the intervening siblings?
Quotes in order:
old enough to be menstruating: "those iron jelloids she had been taking of late had done her a world of good much better than the Widow Welch's female pills and she was much better of those discharges she used to get and that tired feeling"
old enough to use makeup: "eyebrowleine"
young enough to have a crush on a high school boy: "She knew right well, no-one better, what made squinty Edy say that because of him cooling in his attentions when it was simply a lovers' quarrel. As per usual somebody's nose was out of joint about the boy that had the bicycle off the London bridge road always riding up and down in front of her windows. Only now his father kept him in in the evenings studying hard to get an exhibition in the intermediate that was on and he was going to go to Trinity college to study for a doctor when he left the high school... Yet he was young and perchance he might learn to love her in time... the way he turned the bicycle at the lamp with his hands off the bars and also the nice perfume of those good cigarettes and besides they were both of a size too he and she and that was why Edy Boardman thought she was so frightfully clever because he didn't go and ride up and down in front of her bit of a garden."
"As for undies they were Gerty's chief care and who that knows the fluttering hopes and fears of sweet seventeen (though Gerty would never see seventeen again) can find it in his heart to blame her?"
preoccupied with marriage: "She was wearing the blue for luck, hoping against hope, her own colour and lucky too for a bride to have a bit of blue somewhere on her because the green she wore that day week brought grief because his father brought him in to study for the intermediate exhibition and because she thought perhaps he might be out"
contradicted below: "She was wearing the blue for luck"
close in age to Reggie, known him since pre-13 shortpants: "He was too young to understand. He would not believe in love, a woman's birthright. The night of the party long ago in Stoers' (he was still in short trousers) when they were alone and he stole an arm round her waist she went white to the very lips. He called her little one in a strangely husky voice and snatched a half kiss (the first!) but it was only the end of her nose and then he hastened from the room with a remark about refreshments. Impetuous fellow!"
she doesn't act it! "Edy, little spitfire, because she would be twentytwo in November"
suspiciously Bloomlike: "Give it to him too on the same place as quick as I'd look at him."
over 16? "the evening she dressed up in her father's suit and hat and the burned cork moustache and walked down Tritonville road, smoking a cigarette"
older brother? "Charley was home on his holidays"
over 16? "She was glad that something told her to put on the transparent stockings thinking Reggy Wylie might be out but that was far away."
Bloom-like: "She was a womanly woman not like other flighty girls, unfeminine, he had known, those cyclists showing off what they hadn't got"
[Gerty understands Mass better]
repeated by Bloom shortly: "Tableau!"
menstruation: "She felt a kind of a sensation rushing all over her and she knew by the feel of her scalp and that irritation against her stays that that thing must be coming on because the last time too was when she clipped her hair on account of the moon."
not much older than Reggie: "she just answered with scathing politeness when Edy asked her was she heartbroken about her best boy throwing her over"
Bloom doesn't know yet: "but for that one shortcoming she knew she need fear no competition and that was an accident coming down Dalkey hill and she always tried to conceal it"
menstruation: "and besides it was on account of that other thing coming on the way it did."
contradicted above: "and he could see her other things too, nainsook knickers, the fabric that caresses the skin, better than those other pettiwidth, the green, four and eleven, on account of being white" [a wise anonymouse suggests the knickers were white, but with a blue ribbon]
Edy: "That squinty one is delicate. Near her monthlies, I expect"
Bloom echoing Gerty's thoughts, above: "Tableau!"
not a kiddy herself, but close? "Go home to nicey bread and milky and say night prayers with the kiddies."
implausible if she's young: "Suppose I spoke to her. What about? Bad plan however if you don't know how to end the conversation. Ask them a question they ask you another. Good idea if you're stuck. Gain time. But then you're in a cart. Wonderful of course if you say: good evening, and you see she's on for it: good evening."
impossible if she's young: "Yet if I went the whole hog, say: I want to, something like that. Because I did. She too. Offend her. Then make it up. Pretend to want something awfully, then cry off for her sake. Flatters them. She must have been thinking of someone else all the time. What harm? Must since she came to the use of reason, he, he and he."
sounds young: "Want to be grownups. Dressing in mother's clothes. Time enough, understand all the ways of the world. And the dark one with the mop head and the nigger mouth. I knew she could whistle. Mouth made for that."
wrinkles nose: "And Cissy and Tommy and Jacky ran out to see and Edy after with the pushcar and then Gerty beyond the curve of the rocks. Will she? Watch! Watch! See! Looked round. She smelt an onion. Darling, I saw, your. I saw all."
over 16: "Might have made a worse fool of myself however. Instead of talking about nothing. Then I will tell you all. Still it was a kind of language between us. It couldn't be? No, Gerty they called her. Might be false name however like my and the address Dolphin's barn a blind."
inconclusive: "Sad however because it lasts only a few years till they settle down to potwalloping and papa's pants will soon fit Willy"
16 or younger? "O sweet little, you don't know how nice you looked. I begin to like them at that age. Green apples. Grab at all that offer."
not yet menstruating? "O sweety all your little girlwhite up I saw dirty bracegirdle made me do love sticky we two naughty Grace darling she him half past the bed met him pike hoses frillies for Raoul de perfume your wife black hair heave under embon seņorita young eyes Mulvey plump bubs me breadvan Winkle red slippers she rusty sleep wander years dreams return tail end Agendath swoony lovey showed me her next year in drawers return next in her next her next."
drawers
An authority on Victorian underwear has responded to my query:
"Finding information on children's clothing is difficult period, and in nearly every case the sources are English. I do have two of the most well known books on children's dress in my collection: "Children's Clothing" (Clare Rose) and "Clothes and the Child" (Anne Buck). The other item that has to be considered is what social class the character in question is, and where in the world they are - these both can be determining factors too."I doubt I will be able to give you any hard and fast answers, but usually an answer can be puzzled out from the information available. Looking through the Buck, she cites a source that suggested putting drawers on children even while they were still in napkins (diapers). The only reference date in that paragraph refers to a certain type of safety pin available around 1870. Hmm, here she cites "The Lady's Economical Assistant" of 1808 as suggesting they be worn by children about the age of two. I think that's about as definitive as you're going to get (despite the fact it's about 100 years too early). *g* ) A little further along on the same page she comments that in the 1880's a child of 2 or 3 might wear a "combination" which I believe I discussed in my article. Everything else I saw in this book dated later than that is for older children or teens, so I would use the age of about 2 or 3. The one other item that was mentioned though was that the type of knickers worn changed around age 9-10; they were no longer buttoned to the corset, but were a separate piece. So this too might be another interpretation - that the girl was moving to "adult" style drawers." -- Marissa Goldenman [more]
a Giltrap?
Two hints suggest that Gerty might be Stephen's cousin: "grandpapa Giltrap" at 13.232 implies that her mother is either Aunt Jo Giltrap Murray or another Giltrap sister, and Gerty's cameo appearance at 10.1206, fetching work home for her father, associates her with William Murray and/or Richie Goulding. In 1904, Alice Murray was 15, Katsy was 14 (being courted in Fairview by 19yo Stannie), Mabel was 8 and May was 5.
Stannie claims Katsy had previously been Joyce's love-interest, despite the eight year difference in their ages. Gorman's 1939 bio depicts Joyce in 1900 returning at dawn from a dance "with the young lady whose attributes are set forth in the character of Gerty MacDowell" [hg69] whom Ellmann [e74] identifies as Susie McKernan and who Costello [pc165] claims was just ten years old!??
anonymous writes:
I don't know if this pertains to Dublin or this time or not, but according to "Pleasures Taken" by Carol Mavor, in England, in 1875, common law changed the age of consent for marriage for girls from 12, which it had been since the 13th Century, to 13. The sense I get from this is that the entire western world was moving away from an agricultural to an industrial one and gradually the need for a longer childhood in which to be educated was becoming necessary. My guess is that with this cultural attitude-shift came a recognition that not allowing girls to grow up and develop fully was harmful, and therefore 'scandalous'
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