Intellectual Bearings of Finnegans Wake

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The aim of this study was to investigate the meaning of James Joyce's Finnegans Wake and explore its intellectual bearings. The text is based mainly on English but consists of over sixty languages. It also depends on a dream work including enormous systems of knowledge. It is an interesting book, bur it is not clear what the book is. For that reason I first tried to explain the contents of the book in as plain Japanese as possible, adding to the commentaries in the form of annotations. Second, I analyzed the role of characters, its structural principle, how the meaning of the text is produced, the meanings of dream work, the significance of numerous episodes in the text, the importance of puns, and the relationship between narration and nation. I cannot boast that I have understood every meaning of the book, but I could elucidate its main themes. In addition, I could find the connection between the book and Ireland, though the book has been thus far read only from the continental points of view. I hope this study will stimulate the further search for the book both in Japan and abroad.