Love's Old Sweet Song

JOURNEY #13: TO THE DEAR DEAD DAYS BEYOND RECALL

“Frseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeefrong that train again weeping tone once in the dear deaead days beyondre call close my eyes breath my lips forward kiss sad look eyes open piano ere oer the world the mists began I hate that istsbeg comes loves sweet sooooooooooong Ill let that out full when I get in front of the footlights...”

 ―  James Joyce, Ulysses

(Note: don't be intimidated by this quote...it'll all make sense after reading this post.  MS)

James Joyce on keyboards

When you think of a popular television show, it usually doesn't take too long for the theme song to start playing in your head.  

Just think of Seinfeld's signature slap-bass theme.  Or take the theme from the original Star Trek where William Shatner begins by reciting the words "Space: the final frontier" followed by a memorable fanfare that boldly goes where no theme song has gone before.  

You get the idea.  You don't really appreciate the full impact of a show or movie without knowing its music.

The novel Ulysses also has a theme song.  It's a charming sentimental tune called "Love's Old Sweet Song," and references to the song are scattered throughout the novel.  

Please click on the video below and listen to it as an accompaniment as you continue reading this post.       

In the fourth chapter of Ulysses, Leopold Bloom's wife, Molly, tells him she's decided to sing "Love's Old Sweet Song" at an upcoming concert -- and the song hovers in the characters' heads for a good part of the day.

The song begins in almost a dirge-like fashion. It mentions the "dear dead days beyond recall" -- and paints a dark and misty picture of the world, and it refers to an old sweet song that "softly wove itself into our dream."

Then there's a shift.  As you hear the words "Just a song at twilight" the song brightens up, the time signature transforms into a waltz, and the listener somehow feels transported into a turn-of-the-century parlour.  I'd be surprised if some of you weren't swaying back and forth to the refrain.   

We learnt in an earlier post that June 16th was the day in which Molly Bloom had an affair with her manager, Blazes Boylan. This song serves as a motif for her planned, and eventually consummated, tryst.   

Here are the lyrics to the song...you might wish to play the video once again as you read the lyrics.  

Once in the dear dead days beyond recall,
When on the world the mists began to fall,
Out of the dreams that rose in happy throng
Low to our hearts Love sang an old sweet song;
And in the dusk where fell the firelight gleam,
Softly it wove itself into our dream.

Just a song at twilight, when the lights are low,
And the flick'ring shadows softly come and go,
Tho' the heart be weary, sad the day and long,
Still to us at twilight comes Love's old song,
comes Love's old sweet song.

Even today we hear Love's song of yore,
Deep in our hearts it dwells forevermore.
Footsteps may falter, weary grow the way,
Still we can hear it at the close of day.
So till the end, when life's dim shadows fall,
Love will be found the sweetest song of all.

Just a song at twilight, when the lights are low,
And the flick'ring shadows softly come and go,
Tho' the heart be weary, sad the day and long,
Still to us at twilight comes Love's old song,
comes Love's old sweet song.

* * * * *

Up until now, we haven't spoken about the final chapter of Ulysses.  The remarkable chapter, known as Penelope, is presented as an unbroken stream of consciousness with virtually no punctuation and few capital letters.  It this chapter, Molly lies in bed in a dream-like state and the thoughts that float through her mind end up on the page.

When you first read a section of the Penelope chapter it's a daunting jumble -- but when you begin to dissect its constituent elements, it begins to take shape and become clearer.

Here's an example of a few lines from Penelope; read this quote and see what you can make of it:

"Frseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeefrong that train again weeping tone once in the dear deaead days beyondre call close my eyes breath my lips forward kiss sad look eyes open piano ere oer the world the mists began I hate that istsbeg comes loves sweet sooooooooooong Ill let that out full when I get in front of the footlights..."

Confused?  Don't be...Molly is lying in bed and the song "Love's Old Sweet Song" is, quite literally, weaving itself into her dream.  

Now that you know the song, you should be able to follow along.   Here are a few pointers:

1.  First of all, don't be put off by the word: "Frseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeefrong" -- it's just the sound of a train that Molly hears as she lies in bed.  If you say it aloud, it kind of captures the Doppler effect sound of a train rushing by.  Try it -- you'll see.   And she confirms it's a train when she says "that train again."

2. Next, Molly starts thinking about the "weeping tone" of the first line of Love's Old Sweet Song, and she remembers the lyrics "once in the dear deaead days beyondre call."   The lyrics are somewhat distorted as she's thinking about the way she'll actually sing the words, elongating several syllables in the process.

3. Then she starts imagining what she will do when she sings the part.  She reminds herself to "close [her] eyes" then hints that she should take a "breath" and keep "[her] lips forward...kiss...sad look...eyes open..."   It's all stage directions.

4.  After that she starts thinking about the words again: "ere oer the world the mists began I hate that istsbeg comes loves sweet sooooooooooong."  Now you'll note that half way through the excerpt she says "I hate that istsbeg" -- what is she talking about there? She's pondering how tricky it is to pronounce each of the consonants in the phrase "the mists began" -- and she's hammering home the need to articulate the final "s" in the word "mists" before singing the next syllable in the song ("beg").

5.  And finally she thinks to herself that she'll "let that out full when I get in front of the footlights..."   So once again, she's just imagining what she'll do when she sings the song.

So, once you know the songs and music of James Joyce...what initially seemed like a daunting and dense section of the book starts to make sense.

* * * * *

One final word on "Love's Old Sweet Song" -- most James Joyce aficionados know the words and music of this song so well that when they get together each June 16 to celebrate "Bloomsday" the participants eventually stand together and break into a version of the song.   If you'd like to start becoming familiar with Ulysses, it wouldn't hurt to get to know this song.  Some people would say: If you don't know this song, you don't know Joyce.