History Literature / FinnegansWake

* HurricaneOfPuns: Almost '''''every single word of the book''''' is a wordplay of some sort, or part of a wordplay. And Joyce didn't limit the puns to English, either -- by some official estimates, he crammed words from about '''''sixty separate languages''''' into the book, and you would have to know at least ''nine'' different languages other than English (including Latin, Greek, and especially Gaelic) to get half of the jokes.

** TheWalrusWasPaul
* {{Neologism}}

* NoPlotNoProblem

* ShoutOut: Not in, but from the book, we have three. "Quark" was borrowed from here to name the subatomic particle. JosephCampbell also first saw the word "monomyth" in its pages, and GeorgeRRMartin named a castle in Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire after the first word, "riverrun".

* ShownTheirWork: And ''how!''

->''"Despite these obstacles, readers and commentators have reached a broad consensus about the book's central cast of characters and, to a lesser degree, [[NoPlotNoProblem its plot]]."''

* AnthropomorphicPersonification: HCE represents the landscape of Dublin, Anna Livia [[note]]from ''Amhain Life''[[/note]] the river Liffey, Issy takes the form of clouds and light rain.

* FootnoteFever: Many scholarly editions of the book.

* BookEnds

* RuleOfSymbolism: Extensive, if cryptic, references to CelticMythology, the Phoenix Park Murders of 1882, the Egyptian Book of the Dead and EgyptianMythology, among many many others.

->''Despite these obstacles, readers and commentators have reached a broad consensus about the book's central cast of characters and, to a lesser degree, [[NoPlotNoProblem its plot]].''

* ShoutOut: Not in, but from the book, we have two. "Quark" was borrowed from here to name the subatomic particle. JosephCampbell also first saw the word "monomyth" in its pages.

* ArcWords: more like Arc Cadences, really. Many phrases throughout the book -- such as "Buckley shot the Russian general", "hitherandthithering waters of. Night", "Earwicker", and of course "Finnegan's wake" itself -- reoccur in highly modified forms, so that often only the broad rhythm survives. The effect is like that of variations in a musical theme.

* InterruptedByTheEnd: The novel ends in mid-sentence, with the words "''Away alone at long at last the''" implying that the ''real'' story is just about to begin.

* WrittenSoundEffect: The thunderclap on page one.[[note]]Bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk![[/note]]

* DoingItForTheArt: The man spent 17 years writing a novel that's borderline impossible to read. The man had gone ''partially blind'' by the time he finished it. Parts of it were ''dictated''. Read a paragraph and just imagine having to write and edit it without being able to see what you're writing it on.

* WordOfDante: See the top quote on this page.
* WordOfGod: And thankfully quite a bit of it; although even this can be [[DeathOfTheAuthor debated among critics]]. One that stands out is Joyce saying he was "[[AllJustADream writing of the night]]".

* ArcWords: more like Arc Cadences, really. Many phrases throughout the book -- such as "Buckley shot the Russian general", "hitherandthithering waters of. Night", "Earwicker", and of course "Finnegan's wake" itself -- reoccur in highly modified forms, so that often only the broad rhythm survives.

If you would like to read a description written in the same style as the book, see ''SelfDemonstrating.FinnegansWake''.

* WrittenSoundEffect: The thunderclap on page one:
--> Bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk!

* ArcNumber: 1132 appears repeatedly, both as a date and in various addresses. [[note]]AD 1132 saw the defilement of a nunnery at Kildare, particularly marked by the rape of the abbess; the man who ordered the attack, Dermot mac Murrough, did so as a move to make the abbess unfit for her office and force her removal in favor of a kinswoman of his own. Mac Murrough's lust for power caused a great deal of internal strife, and it was he who, some thirty-seven years later, offered an allegiance with the Normans which became the second (after the Vikings came in in the 9th century( of many long and humiliating occupations of Ireland. James Joyce, like many, traced Ireland's history of oppression, treachery, and sectarian strife firmly back to the rape of the abbess of Kildare.[[/note]]

* ArcNumber: 1132 appears repeatedly, both as a date and in various addresses. [[note]]AD 1132 saw the defilement of a nunnery at Kildare, particularly marked by the rape of the abbess; the man who ordered the attack, Dermot mac Murrough, did so as a move to make the abbess unfit for her office and force her removal in favor of a kinswoman of his own. Mac Murrough's lust for power caused a great deal of internal strife, and it was he who, some thirty-seven years later, offered an allegiance with the Normans which became the first of many long and humiliating occupations of Ireland. James Joyce, like many, traced Ireland's history of oppression, treachery, and sectarian strife firmly back to the rape of the abbess of Kildare.[[/note]]

* PerfectlyCromulentWord: so full of them that you'll reach the same level of comprehension if you tried to achieve osmotic pressure by holding the book in your hands.

* BilingualBonus: More like ''Nonalingual'' Bonus. As the HurricaneOfPuns entry below states, you'd have to be fairly knowledgeable in nine different languages (not including English) to even get more than half the jokes.

* BilingualBonus

* ArcNumber: 1132 appears repeatedly, both as a date and in various addresses. [[hottip:*:AD 1132 saw the defilement of a nunnery at Kildare, particularly marked by the rape of the abbess; the man who ordered the attack, Dermot mac Murrough, did so as a move to make the abbess unfit for her office and force her removal in favor of a kinswoman of his own. Mac Murrough's lust for power caused a great deal of internal strife, and it was he who, some thirty-seven years later, offered an allegiance with the Normans which became the first of many long and humiliating occupations of Ireland. James Joyce, like many, traced Ireland's history of oppression, treachery, and sectarian strife firmly back to the rape of the abbess of Kildare.]]

* GenreBusting: To the point where TheOtherWiki, which is usually very good at finagling a book into a particular genre, simply gives its genre as ''sui generis''.[[hottip:*:That's "one of a kind" for those unfamiliar with the expression.]] Of course, the first sentence of the article identifies it as "a work of [[SurrealHumor comic fiction]]" as well.