IX.A.10.i.
*IX.A.10.i: Miscellaneous Manuscripts: Loose Sheets: Typescript of " Twilight of Madness Descends on Swift" with Glossary (1928)
Material Description and Collation
The manuscript consists of 2 sheets of double-spaced typewritten black ribbon top (original) copies, with corrections in Beach’s hand in black ink.
Title
Page [1] is headed: "Twilight of blindness madness descends on Swift."
Measurements
The sheets measure approximately 26.9 x 21.2 cm.
Contents
The text at the top of p. [1] is followed by a glossary of some of the words, which is continued on p. [2]. There is an earlier scribal version of the text on Buffalo MS VI.B.23, pp. [14] and [15], possibly in Stuart Gilbert’s hand; it is not known if it served as the copy text for the typescript.
Stuart Gilbert writes: "I well remember Joyce reciting to me this passage, which he had just composed, on an appropriately gloomy October afternoon. He was particularly pleased with, and moved by, it and asked me to type a copy. At my request he gave an exact explanation of each of the words employed and I took this down in the form of a glossary. Before I started on this he asked me the Burmese word for twilight, obviously intending to ‘work it in’ (I had spent many years in Burma and Joyce was interested in that unique and difficult language); hence its intrusion on this page" (LI 273 n. 1). This might not be the typescript that Gilbert prepared.
Dating
Joyce composed this text in October 1928. In a letter to Harriet Shaw Weaver, Joyce wrote: "I will send you in a day or two the only thing I have written in the last four months, a short description of madness and blindness descending on Swift in what Gilbert calls the damned trinity of colours, with a commentary" (23 October 1928; LI 273).
Other Markings
There is an envelope with the manuscript and on the recto Beach wrote, "typescript of Swift piece JJ gave to SB" in blue ink, and below that wrote in black ink "Twilight of Madness descends on Swift".
Notes
The sheets were folded in half horizontally and vertically. Joyce gave this manuscript, together with MS IX.A.10.ii, to Beach. This manuscript was not listed in Spielberg.