[FW title song in FW]

as the title "Ulysses" declares the underlying parallel to Homer's Odyssey, so "Finnegans Wake" defiantly promises a parallel to this comic, stage-Irish ballad. removing the apostrophe adds the pun of Finnegans awakening (add a comma and they're being called to awaken, cf 383.10 "Fowls, up!"). the name 'Finnegan' itself puns on Finn-again, where Finn is an ancient Irish hero.

almost every line of the song is echoed somewhere in the text.


Tim Finigan's Wake (1867) by John F. Poole as sung by Tony Pastor [origins]
Air: The French Musician [abc notation]




Ireland's 1901 census  confirms 'Finnegan' as the most common spelling of the surname:
(3936 Finn)
2157 Finnegan
1283 Finegan
519 Finnigan
152 Finigan
25 Finnagan
1 Finagan

Joyce's punning versions of the song/book title:
006.14-.15 "Fillagain's chrissormiss wake"
358.22-.23 "at Fenegans Wick"
453.03 "primmafore's wake"
537.34 "aich Fanagan's Weck"
565.14 "jibberweek's joke"


you have to know the tune:




Tim Finigan lived in Walker street,

Joyce's versions:
004.18 "Bygmester Finnegan"
015.26 "Tim Timmycan"
093.35 "from Timm Finn again's"

291.08 "ages of our timocracy"
331.11 "And you Tim Tommy Melooney"
342.03 "Tomtinker Tim"
390.13 "Tom Tim Tarpey, the Welshman"
598.27 "Tim!"
622.07 "Uncle Tim's Caubeen"

alternate versions' spellings of the street: Wattling, Walken, Walkin, Walkin', Walker, Rankin

probably coincidentally, there's a Watling street next to the Guinness brewery in Dublin [1909 map] visited by Tom Kernan in episode ten p231 "Mr Kernan turned and walked down the slope of Watling street by the corner of Guinness's visitors' waitingroom."

Joyce's versions:
024.20 "Waddlings Raid"
042.26 "wayfared via Watling"
134.20 "earned in Watling Street"
328.03 "with her wattling way"
427.28 "you were the walking saint"


A gentleman Irishman-- mighty odd--

alternate wordings: gentle Irishman, gentleman Irish

Joyce's versions:
010.17-.18 "This is the Willingdone, bornstable ghentleman"
111.13 "some born gentleman"
116.25 "from a born gentleman"
120.09 "to mpe mporn a gentlerman"
150.26 "born like a Gentileman"
301.11 "gentlemine born"
365.04 "my baron gentilhomme"
370.07 "ungeborn yenkelmen"
460.34 "a born gentleman"
617.25 "a bawl gentlemale"

(Does anyone know how/why he's odd?)

alternate lyric: by God

Joyce's versions:
004.26 "during mighty odd years"
056.07 "whallrhosmightiadd" walrus
088.17 "trapper with murty odd oogs"


He'd a beautiful brogue, so rich and sweet,

or He had a tongue both rich and sweet
Or 'neat and sweet'

Joyce's version:
014.04 "illigant brogues, so rich in sweat" ('brogues' are shoes, too)


And to rise in the world he carried the hod.

Joyce's cycle of rising and falling often refers to its hero as a builder

Joyce's versions:
005.03 "with larrons o'toolers clittering up"
589.17 "Humbly to fall and cheaply to rise"

hod for carrying bricks

Joyce's versions:
004.26 "this man of hod, cement and edifices"
006.08 "His howd feeled heavy, his hoddit did shake"
130.33 "eorl of Hoed"
131.33 "the most conical hodpiece"
296.06 "Hoddum and Heave" (Adam and Eve)
621.27 "Maybe that's why you hold your hodd as if."


But, you see, he'd a sort of a tippling way--

or 'You see'

or 'bit of the'

drinking alcohol (tipple)

alternate: tippler's

Joyce's versions:
006.08 "Phill filt tippling full"
317.03 "I'm soured to the tipple"


With a love for the liquor poor Tim was born,

or 'of the whiskey'


And to help him through his work each day,

To send him on his way

alternates: on his way, on with his work


He'd a drop of the craythur' every morn.

whiskey (from 'creature'?)

sometimes "drop of the craythur" gets its own quotes, like an idiom (is that apostrophe just a typo?)

Joyce's versions:
004.29 "ugged the little craythur"
315.02 "he daddle a drop of the cradler"
410.10 "thinking of the crater"
487.20 "is that the way with you, you craythur?"


Chorus:

Whack, hurrah! blood and 'ounds, ye sowl ye!

Lots of equally nonsensical variants:
Whack fol the darn
Whack fol' the dah
And whack Fol-De-Dah
Whack, hurrah!/ hurroo!
Whack fol la dar-o

"Whack row de dow" was the original singer's favorite

Joyce's versions:
042.01 "the trio of whackfolthediddlers"
382.24 "with his fol the dee oll the doo"

variant: "Blood and 'ounds, ye sowl ye!
cf U003: "For this, O dearly beloved, is the genuine Christine: body and soul and blood and ouns"

alternate: Dance to yer partner

(like squaredance calling?)

Joyce's versions:
004.29 "tuck up your partinher"
531.25-.26 "Hairhorehounds, shake up pfortner"
607.15-.16 "tear a round and tease their partners"


Welt the flure, yer trotters shake;

Round/Around/Welt the floor/flure

"welt the flure" was the original author's favorite phrase for dancing

"shake your trotters" = dance

trotters = pigfeet or sheepfeet
(trotter)


Isn't it the truth I've tould ye,

Isn't/Wasn't
Told/tould/tell
you/ya/ye
This 'un is the truth, I told ya

Joyce's versions:
015.24-.25 "(isn't it the truath I'm tallin ye?)"


Lots of fun at Finigan's wake!

Joyce's versions:
105.21 "Lapps for Finns This Funnycoon's Week"
176.16 "Hops of Fun at Miliken's Make"
321.17 "And old lotts have funn at Flammagen's ball"
351.02 "and all the fun I had in that fanagan's week"
375.15-.17 "So yelp your guilt and kitz the buck. You'll have loss of fame from Wimmegame's fake"
379.34 "Tem for Tam at Timmotty Hall!"
496.36-497.01 "Qui quae quot at Quinnigan's Quake!"
512.23 "logs of fun"
531.25-.26 "Hairhorehounds, shake up pfortner. Fuddling fun for Fullacan's sake!"
607.15-.16 "tear a round and tease their partners lovesoftfun at Finnegan's Wake" (spelled right for once, almost at the end)



One morning Tim was rather full,

got/felt/was feelin'

Joyce's versions:
006.07-.09 "wan warning Phill filt tippling full. His howd feeled heavy, his hoddit did shake"


His head felt heavy, which made him shake;

Joyce's versions:
006.08 "His howd feeled heavy, his hoddit did shake"

139.09 "stutters fore he falls"
shake = stutter


He fell from the ladder and broke his skull,

Joyce's version:
006.09-.10 "He stottered from the latter."


So they carried him home his corpse to wake.

They rolled him up in a nice clean sheet,

or Laid him out on

or neat clean
Or purty


And laid him out upon the bed,

upon/all on

Joyce's versions:
006.26-.27 "They laid him brawdawn alanglast bed. With a bockalips of finisky fore his feet. And a barrowload of guenesis hoer his head."


With fourteen candles round his feet,

The earliest versions had candles, the later ones alcohol, but there's no hint Joyce ever heard the candles-variant (though Joyce's first published story opens with a mention of the Irish Catholic candles-tradition)


And a couple of dozen around his head!



Whack, hurrah, etc.



His friends assembled at his wake,

Here including at least: Missus Finigan, Miss Biddy O'Brien, Judy Magee, Peggy O'Connor, Mickey Mulvaney (mostly women!)

or Mrs Finnegan, Widow Malone, Biddy O'Brian, Paddy McGee, Maggie O'Connor (any generic Irish-sounding name will apparently do)


Missus Finigan called out for the lunch;

(wife... or maybe mother?)


First they laid in tay and cake,

they/she

brought in
or 'gave them'

tea

460.32 "do be careful teacakes"

ALP's letter mentions a present of cakes [fweet-13]


Then pipes and tobaccy, and whiskey-punch.

tobacco

056.25-.27 "there at the Angel were herberged for him poteen and tea and praties and baccy and wine width woman wordth warbling"


Miss Biddy O'Brien began to cry:

in FW, Biddy is usually a hen, Biddy Doran [fweet-9]

or: Then Widow Malone began to cry [a 2nd widow?]

or bawl


"Sich a purty corpse did you ever see?

Arrah! Tim avourneen, an' why did ye die?"--

or Arrah/ Yerrah/ Ay, Tim avourneen...(= darling) ♬
emphasis on 2nd syllable: uhVOREneen

Joyce's versions:
006.13 "Macool, Macool, orra whyi deed ye diie?"


"Och, none o' yer gab!" says Judy Magee.

or Arrah, hold...

Paddy [fweet]

Will ye hold your gob?


Whack, hurrah, etc.


Then Peggy O'Connor took up the job:

or Maggie
In Joyce's version, Isolde and her dark mirror-twin are called the Maggies [McHugh]

or 'the mean' or 'the moan'



"Arrah, Biddy," says she, "ye're wrong, I'm sure."

(wrong that the corpse is pretty???)


But Judy then gave her a belt on the gob,

Biddy gave her a belt in the gob

453.02-.05 "let ye create no scenes in my poor primmafore's wake. I don't want yous to be billowfighting your biddy moriarty duels, gobble gabble, over me till you spit stout"
 

And left her sprawling on the flure.


Each side in the war did soon engage,

Then the war did soon engage
or Then civil war did all engage
Or Oh then a mighty war did rage


'Twas woman to woman and man to man;

Joyce's version:
511.23 "'Twas womans' too woman with mans' throw man."


Shillalah-law was all the rage,

shillelagh law

or 'did all engage'

Joyce's versions:
176.20-.21 "the grand germogall allstar bout was harrily the rage"
511.15 "she laylylaw was all their rage"


And a bloody ruction now began.

a ruckus (ruction)

080.16 "when ructions ended"


Whack, hurrah, etc.


Mickey Mulvaney raised his head,

or Mickey Maloney

Joyce's version:
331.12 "Tommy Melooney"

or ducked


When a gallon of whiskey flew at him;

or noggin or naggin:

or Jameson


It missed him, and, hopping on the bed,

Or 'He ducked'

or falling or 'landing'


The liquor scattered over Tim!

or splattered

139.08 "blows whiskery around his summit" ?


Bedad, he revives! see how he raises!

or Tim revives
Or 'Bedad/ By God/ Och! he revives'
Or 'The corpse revives'

See how he rises

The 1845 inspiration says "when the whiskey bottle was uncorked he couldn't stand it any longer So he riz right up in bed"

for Joyce, this was an awakening at a wake, symbolising the cycle of life-death-rebirth


And Timothy, jumping from the bed,

the name 'Timothy' is almost absent from FW [fweet]

258.35 "Pray-your-Prayers Timothy"
274.11 "as repreaches Timothy"
599.03 "Much obliged. Time-o'-Thay!"

Rising from the bed
or 'jumping up from the bed'

139.10 "goes mad entirely when he's waked"


Cries, while he lathered around like blazes,

or Says or Crying

Whittle or Whirling, or Throwing, or Twiddle, or Fling

or water

blazes (fweet)


"Bad luck till yer sowls! d'ye think I'm dead?"

Thanam o'n dhoul, do ye think I'm dead?
'Thanam o'n dhoul, do you think I'm dead'
Tell 'em up there, they think I'm dead!
Thundering Jaysus... Thundering blazes...
Glory be to God...

or "Don't you know it's a dreadful sin!?"

Joyce's versions:
024.15 "Anam muck an dhoul! Did ye drink me doornail?"
074.08 "Animadiabolum, mene credidisti mortuum?"
258.08-.09 "To Mezouzalem with the Dephilim, didits dinkun's dud?"
297.21-.22 "(your sow to the duble)"
317.03-.04 "when I'm soured to the tipple you can sink me lead"
321.29 "Your sows tin the topple, dodgers, trink me dregs!"
499.17-.18 "your saouls to the dhaoul, do ye. Finnk. Fime. Fudd?"


Whack, hurrah, etc.