Maria L.

Plochocki

Written in the Sand: A Derridean Reading of the Nausicaa Episode of James Joyces Ulysses

Leopold Bloom's musings toward the end of the "Nausicaa" episode, while necessarily reflecting on the unstable and transitory nature of writing on sand, also imply the instability and impermanence of all writing. All types of messages and texts, Bloom concludes, may be unstable, either because of their incomprehensibility or their subjection to physical erasure or other disappearance. This is all, of course, very reminiscent of the Derridean palimpsest. Bloom's first thoughts on this happen when he "stop[s] and turn[s] over a piece of paper near the strand." In attempting to figure out its provenance and hence significance, "He brought it near his eyes and peered. Letter? No. Can't read. ... Page of an old copybook. All those holes and pebbles. Who could count them? Never know what you find. Bottle with story of a treasure in it, thrown from a wreck" (13. 1246 - 50). The very intersection of what of the message or text he can decipher versus what he understands it to be, or signify, is worth investigating. The "piece of paper near the strand" could be a "letter" - except he cannot read it, with the narrative implication that it cannot, then, be a letter. By a sort of unconscious or inadvertent process of elimination and definition, then, letters must be readable - though it is not known whether physically, that is, legible, or comprehensible, which could be a whole different matter. This seems logical enough; why, after all, send a letter if it is not going to be understood by the recipient? The answer to this question, however, raises more complications and new questions than it solves. If the letter is for a particular recipient (reader), then all the writer need ensure, of course, is that this person will understand it, with the question of whether anyone else does being irrelevant; in fact, such a private letter may even be encoded in such a way as to make comprehension for anyone but the intended reader and writer impossible. While Bloom only thinks, "Can't read," not "can't read it" or "can't read the letter," in the context of the above stream of thought, the letter is implied as an object of the "reading" - or perhaps not. In other words, the reader of Ulysses may read the above lines as referring to the letter - but they may very well also refer to Bloom's state of mind at the time: after all, he does also admit to being tired, so maybe he cannot read anything at all. It could also be a combination of these factors: the writing may be very faded or incomplete, and this, combined with Bloom's fatigue and the fading daylight, as well as his having to leave the beach, could make the whole enterprise of reading - on so many levels, of course - nearly impossible. As thus becomes evident, any enterprise of reading or textual decoding necessarily has many factors, at the risk of understatement. The reader may fail altogether, as he seems to here, or, at the very least, the interpretation will differ depending on the presence and influence of various factors. On the other hand, Bloom's thinking that he "[c]an't read" here may not so much signify failure as a conscious decision not to engage with the text in this particular instance - another reading choice, one could easily say. In typical Derridean fashion, then, there is no stable (or even initial) fixed meaning for the text; it is always already unstable and lacking a center, and even the interpretation is difficult to trace back to any stable source. Bloom next starts to think the piece of paper may be a "[p]age of an old copybook," but he seems to abandon this thought just as swiftly and go on to other possibilities. The next thought concerns "holes and pebbles" which seem beyond anyone's ability to count - features of the beach, in other words. Now, the piece of writing seems to have sprung up organically from its surroundings; this is an especially strong possibility given Bloom's lack of knowledge of its

provenance. In other words, since he does not know the paper's origin, he both decides not to try to read it (at least partly for this reason) and shifts his thoughts back to the background or context of the note, the beach itself. The placing of these strands of thought relative to each other further associates the piece of paper with the beach; perhaps Bloom does not mean (yet another complication) to form this association or relationship, but the stream of his thoughts, as transcribed, accomplishes this. While there may be a textual decentering, then, or at least a recognition of the instability of meaning springing from a variety of factors and influences on the act of reading, this does not do away with the narrator's ability to manipulate, or at least arrange, the elements in such a way that they seem like these very factors. The last bit in this excerpt, about a message in a bottle, seems like the most straightforward, and, at the same time, the most romanticized possibility. A piece of paper found on the beach, with the writing faded to illegibility, would, far-fetched as it seems, quite likely be either an old message in a bottle or, at any rate, something flung from the sea. This is another attempt to give the writing some origin, which will, in turn, impact interpretation; the very improbability of finding a piece of writing on the beach that has actually originated there actually makes a "romantic" notion (for who would write a note on the beach, and why?), such as a message in a bottle, more likely. Of course, part of the attraction of the "message in a bottle scenario is the seeming randomness, the vision of someone who has no other means to communicate with another (or perhaps just signal his/ her presence somewhere) resorting to directing a message to an unknown recipient, just on the slight chance that it may be read and acted on. This also, again, plays into deconstruction, for a recipient of a message is not necessarily stable or fixed, either - if his/ her identity is even known. On the other hand, it also goes to show just to what extent the perceived reader affects - is a factor in - composition, as well as the composer's identity being a factor in interpretation. In other words, even absent any concrete knowledge of these details, the reader will try to impose them on the text so as to stabilize its identity - or at least create an illusion of this, without which there is no proceeding with interpretation. Waiting and hoping for Gerty's return, Bloom considers leaving her a message in the sand, at the same time realizing the futility of such a task, in the sense that the message is likely to be washed away or stepped on and rendered illegible. From this realization, however, must also follow the futility of perhaps any writing, as one never knows whether it will reach the intended recipient or be interpreted in the way one intends. Bloom's thoughts at this juncture also introduce another complication: that the text, in the mind of the "author," may shift, as well. That is, specifically in this instance, Bloom's realization of the impermanence of any message he leaves also affects his estimation of the entire endeavour. Once the message becomes hopeless in its reception, it not only is not left - in fact, what Bloom does write he does not finish and proceeds to erase - but he also grows firmer in the conviction that Gerty must remain in the fantasy realm, that he is destined never to see her again and condemned to cuckoldry. This is how Bloom's thoughts proceed: Will she come back tomorrow? Wait for her somewhere for ever. Must come back. ... Mr. Bloom with his stick gently vexed the thick sand at his foot. Write a message for her. Might remain. What? ... Some flatfoot tramp on it in the morning. Useless. Washed away. ... All these rocks with lines and scars and letters. 0, those transparent! Besides they don't know. What is the meaning of that other world [emphasis added]. ...

No room. Let it go. Mr. Bloom effaced the letters with his slow boot. Hopeless thing sand. Nothing grows in it. All fades. ... He flung his wooden pen away. The stick fell in silted sand, stuck. How if you were trying to do that for a week you couldn't. Chance. We'll never meet again. (13. 1253 72) First, then, as he realizes the futility of leaving a message in the sand, he also, again, gives up on seeing Gerty once more - and, quite possibly, thus also gives up on other means of leaving a message for her, perhaps a more permanent one, like on a lamppost near the beach. What he purports to want - meeting Gerty again, or at least contracting her - is thus as if identified with the writing, as if the act of leaving her a message united with actually meeting or contacting her. The modern human's self-definition and identification through the written word, then, so deeply affects Bloom's readiness to act and optimism that, as even the possibility of the text becomes elided, so does the act the text is to help accomplish. Even the "What?" following the initial consideration has an unclear referent: Bloom may be asking himself what to write in the message, or, in a moment of self-disassociation, posing a rather outraged "What?" to himself, as if amazed at the very act he is contemplating. Likewise, when, in the second paragraph excerpted above, Bloom thinks to himself, "Useless," it is not clear to what he is referring: the leaving of the message, or meeting again, even hoping to do so. More likely, since he next thinks, "Washed away," he means the message, but the density of the wording makes a definite determination impossible - another Derridean desirable. That one act is supposed to lead to the other does have some impact, of course; that is, if he leaves no message, their never meeting again is practically guaranteed. However, the consideration of these two alongside and even through each other is worthy of investigating here. He next calls the sand (and, quite clearly, just the sand) "hopeless," interestingly enough because nothing can grow in it, but not in terms of his own purpose. Sand is, of course, one of the most sterile or most hostile types of soil - yet, for Bloom's original intended purpose, it would have been more suitable than, say, moist planting soil. Even here, it is not the sand itself that will not support or will interfere with the message, but, rather, the presence of other factors, such as water and other beachgoers. Now, then, the medium or background becomes a factor, as well; a medium with a very limited application or utility will also limit the message, not only in its composition but in the mind of the composer. As with the original palimpsest (more on this later), what one imagines happening to the medium affects what will be written on or in it; clearly, for a potentially life-altering message, Bloom decides, sand will not work because of the impermanence of anything one may inscribe on it. As if to continue the issue of medium, Bloom's thoughts above the "hopeless" part turn to the "rocks with scars and lines and letters." The beach, then, even if not the sand itself, already seems inscribed - and, possibly, unable to be written over? Perhaps all the other uses of the beach, whether walking, bathing, or writing other messages in the sand, make Bloom's own task impossible, or at least not worthwhile, in the end. The presence of those others - like other voices, or other obligations on Bloom himself- nullifies anything he himself may want to do. Specifically, he knows what is going on in the world around him, especially his own world - all the other voices he himself must contend against, like the patriotic/ anti-Semitic ones, as well as his awareness of Molly's adultery - and this stops him in his proverbial tracks. In the end, Bloom himself erases what he has written, as if admitting to not only the futility but even the illegitimacy of his own message, as if it had no right to exist or be composed in the midst of all

else. All these other voices, whether inscribed/ written or spoken, also crowd out his own, as shown by the series of "Cuckoos" ("cuckold" ?) in the end (13. 1289 - 1305). No act of composition, then, ever happens in a void; it also takes place in the midst of and is affected by the presence and perception of others. The irony of succeeding in making his stick land upright in the sand despite the failure of the message composition is not lost on the over-intellectual Bloom, either -- but it is also more than irony. He himself even refers to [c]hance" by way of explaining his luck with the stick -but he is also referring to any likelihood of a future meeting with Gerty: that it would truly have to be by chance, considering that, as of now, he neither has left her a message or even feels particularly authorized (in every sense of the word) to leave one. The aforementioned irony lies in the implied expectation that, since the communication via sand has failed, so will any attempts at controlling the stick. A further irony, however, lies in Bloom's not trying to guide the stick in any way or direction; he is described as having "flung" it away. Perhaps, then, it is giving up control or attempts at it that will allow any kind of success - but, then, also, what success can there be without any intention, without, that is, any attempt at control of the outcome? What has one "succeeded" in, in such an instance? Yet it is an unplanned interlude that leads to this significant encounter in the first place; the stop at the beach is simply fortuitous, and yet he has met Gerty there, setting off the present chain of events. As in a series of I Ching operations, then, one entirely random or chance event can set off or otherwise affect a series of others, but the entire sequence is always already predicated on randomness. In this context, then, even choosing not to compose, stopping mid-message, or obliterating what one has written is a type of composing situation (this time highly reminiscent of John Cage). Finally, some discussion must go to the choice of words in the narrative, namely the describing of the stick as a "wooden pen" and what Bloom starts to write, then erases: "I.... AM. A" (13. 1258, 1264, 1270). The composition situation, then, clearly also dictates what is an implement or not. More significantly, to put it another way, a stick becomes a pen depending on its implementation, showing that a compositional instance affects the interpretation of many things, even everyday objects, as well as that not only do the aforementioned "factors" impact composition but are also determined by it. That is, Bloom will use what he has available, in this instance a stick, to start a message - but his own need for a writing implement has made the difference between its being a mere stick and a pen. Additionally, he erases what is not even really a sentence but would be with the periods removed - though not one making much sense. The sentence would read, "I am a": erasing these words elides not only Bloom himself (now identifying self with text) but also any possibilities there may exist for him. That is, form and context are truly unified here in that, by erasing the message, Bloom not only makes future encounters with Gerty largely impossible but also erases himself and any possibilities of what he could be. Whatever could complete the sentence, coming after the "a," is now voided, sabotaged - and this may be far more than meeting Gerty. One may also, quite justifiably, see many phallic/ psychosexual implications in this passage. For one, the stick landing upright is highly evocative of an erection, very significant in this context, where Bloom is using his encounter with, and feelings for, Gerty, to counteract those aroused by his knowledge of Molly's adultery. As is made clear, he would never betray their marriage the way she has, but this does not mean that he will not welcome some affirmation of his own attractiveness, even if it is from a complete stranger whom he will likely never see again. Perhaps, when he stops being an attentive, even insistent husband, his body will act like a husband's should and produce an erection, thereby enabling intercourse (though no mention of

any impotence on Bloom's part is made in Ulysses, one can easily imagine the "emasculating" effect of an openly adulterous wife). Just as giving up on the message to Gerty seems, by virtue of narrative framing, to "make" the stick land upright, giving up on seeking affirmation of his own attractiveness, or even masculinity, may seem to activate it somehow. Again, this purpose is nullified by Bloom's giving up on the message; without contacting Gerty, he will very likely never see her again, which will end any hopes of a flirtation with her, and all that he may hope to gain from it. The lonely stick, a temporary (though accidental) instance of Bloom's success, seems lonely indeed amidst the abovementioned chorus of "cuckoos." Perhaps most critical to this discussion is the definition of "palimpsest," a piece of parchment used repeatedly, necessitating that any previous writing on it be scraped off to make room for new text. Given the high price of hides in medieval times, such scraping off and reusing was common practice, and such parchments would even be cut up and reused in, for example, binding manuscripts. Not until the twentieth century was it possible to "read" some of the scraped-off texts, revealing the presence of writing that had been replaced. This is a useful concept in deconstruction because it points to the instability of texts and signifiers which initiated this discussion. Every text, this concept implies, can be replaced, whether physically (as by literal overwriting) or a new interpretation dependent, as has been shown, on a whole new set of factors. The question that seems raised here, then, is of what happens to the replaced writing. As mentioned, some has been recovered through a sort of X-ray process, in some cases revealing the presence of classics thought long lost in the bindings of manuscripts, for example. What has been a happy discovery for scholars -- the presence of these texts, not lost, after all, or at least partially available -- also points at what was valued in other times and cultures. That is, a piece of parchment was obviously thought valuable enough to warrant the erasure (of sorts) of whatever was on it, no matter the potential future value of that text. The written word, already distrusted in some ways in the Middle Ages, was thought less valuable than the medium containing it, a piece of treated hide. The cultural and ideological implications of this, not to mention the shift in valuation to the modern day, would easily generate a whole other paper, but it is worth mentioning at least tangentially here because it emphasizes the little in Blooms own situation that is lasting and stable: the sand, however "useless," will always be there, where he, his message, and even his stick will not. Even though texts such as Bloom's note to Gerty, however incomplete, are impermanent -- even in the contemporary, paper- and document-driven culture, this is clearly the case -- but perhaps something underlying them has permanence. This underlying thing, heretofore reduced to a medium, may be more significant than even Bloom has indicated -- perhaps because medium will outlast message, even after determining it. Also where palimpsests are concerned, even the abovementioned manuscript recovery has often rendered only partial success, that is, where palimpsests have been X-rayed to reveal what has been erased, certainly a whole original manuscript has not resulted. This partial availability of texts raises its own set of issues, such as forcing or necessitating interpretations based just on what one has to hand. Certain leaps of interpretation, or other connective acts, thus seem necessary -- or maybe not, given the seeming Derridean permission to read just what is and not concern oneself with any whole, with what lies beyond what one knows or has available. There is also, of course, the question of what constitutes a complete text: just considering the noted critical puzzlement over the aforementioned unfinished sentence of Bloom's, one can easily see that "partial" texts not only imply or contain many more possibilities than "finished" ones but may also have their own sort of wholeness. In this case, for example, the sentence was

complete enough for Bloom to erase it -- no one but he knows what would have come after "a." Another sort of lesson for future scholars may also lie in the Derridean (and medieval) palimpsest: as some texts thought scraped off have been recovered, after all, so may other underlying messages, or other texts given up for lost. This may manifest itself in the chorus of "Cuckoos" and other voices/ texts/ narratives drowning out Bloom here, as well as in the underlying content he persists in seeing on the beach, whether the letters on the rocks or whatever he sees in or behind the "page out of a copybook." For all their impermanence, then, perhaps pre-existing texts never truly disappear but will, rather, always affect what comes after, or on top of, them. One type of such "preexisting text" may be society itself, or at least ideology: Bloom cannot overwrite this in any way because it pre-exists him ("always already a subject," this from psychoanalytic theory) as well as being louder and more numerous. It is much like the tide he fears may sweep away his message. In the palimpsest of his psyche, the voices and other forces conspiring to make a cuckold of him, or to drown out his own rational voice elsewhere, render impossible even entertaining the thought of breaking out of the pattern he is in. This is why he asks himself about the meaning of "that other world," where the italicized portion could just as easily, and probably have been, "word." Bloom's language limits and circumscribes his possibilities; he wants to know what the other world/ word means but cannot because ideology will not allow it, will not allow the transcendence of that which he finds himself in. That which seems somewhat stable because permanent - preexisting - also forces itself on one and, in the end, resists articulation, this being perhaps its ultimate form of power. It also may very well direct the above-discussed "interpretation," the connecting of partial texts and other fragments into something that at least gives the illusion of coherence and stability.

Work Cited Joyce, James. Ulysses. Ed. Hans Walter Gabler et al. Afterword Michael Groden. New York: Vintage, 1986.