The project isn’t the first to respond to Finnegans Wake with music - John Cage’s 1979 Roaratoriowas inspired by the book - or to attempt to unravel its meaning artistically (such as the 2014 Folio Society release with illustrations by John Vernon Lord), but its shareable and collaborative nature makes it a distinct digital-age experiment. Joyce himself was a singer, and played the guitar and piano, so in a way creating a rhythm for his words is a fitting tribute to the author’s perplexing prose. The main requirement is that the lyrics have Joyce’s unabridged words, and that they be audible. Some contributors are just Joyce-obsessed, like Adam Harvey who has memorized whole chapters. They include amateurs, as well as professional musicians, like bassist Mike Watt, former Mercury Rev members Jason Sebastian Russo and Paul Dillon, Irish pianist John Wolf Brennan, and electronica artist Schneider TM. He lived in poverty until the last ten years of his life and was. He only returned to Ireland briefly from the continent but Dublin was at heart of his greatest works, Ulyssesand Finnegans Wake. Pyle said that while they “definitely attract people who lean towards experimentation” in music, they’ve had contributions from jazz, punk, classical, and folk artists. A new illustrated edition of Finnegans Wake, as imagined by artist John Vernon Lord for the Folio Society, matches James Joyces extravagant word games with elaborately collaged pictures, shedding a brilliant new light on Irish literatures book of the dark. James Joyce (1882-1941), the eldest of ten children, was born in Dublin, but exiled himself to Paris at twenty as a rebellion against his upbringing. Art by Sara Jewell for Waywords and Meansigns (courtesy the artist)

Folio society finnegans wake