[Ulysses etexts]

(probing the question of a maximally flexible, minimally intrusive css design...)

Ulysses is remarkable for embedding transcriptions of various media: letters, ads, imaginary theatrical programs and scripts (contemporary and historical), an accounts book... Might Joyce have preferred to give these appropriate fonts, if the publisher had been willing? Apparently not, although Eolus got one special (weirdly inapt) font.


new:

onepage html


online options:

variorum
well-proofed epub

archive.org
multiple formats, page images, 1922

wikisource.org
unannotated, 1922, linebreaks, pages

wikisource.org
annotateable, 1922, italics, linebreaks, pages


online-literature.com
no italics, 1961, episodes


gutenberg.org
html, italics, radically simplified indenting, 1986? full book

geoffwilkins.net
pdf, italics, 1986? full book

archive.org-gutenberg
txt, CAPS for italics, linebreaks, 1986? full book, Col Choat


indenting styles:

1922 p3 indents everything the same

1986 has different indents for episode-start (w/asterisk), plain paragraph, and speech (no indent, em dash? no spaces)

Philly p1 indents paragraphs deeply (except no indent for episode-start), speeches not at all, but space after dashes

Slote39 p5 has small equal indents for paragraphs and speeches, but no indent for episode-start, and space after dashes

1961 p3 resembles Slote39 but puts the 1st two words on p2, all caps, and no space after dashes

so ideally we should let the stylesheet decide the indent for these three types of paragraph, and whether there's spacing after the dashes (is that even possible?). 1961 also distinguishes episode-starts that aren't also the start of one of the three 'books' but this is nonjoycean.


1.239-241 doesn't indent the stanza, and leads with a dash; ditto 1.300, but not 1.260 or 1.264 which are indented with no dash

1922 p9 indents deeply with no dash, p10 indents two stanzas less deeply (but identically, even though they're very different widths)

1961 has no dashes and widely varying indents

Slote p9-11 has no dashes, and slightly different indents

the dashes are logical to distinguish spoken/sung stanzas from thought, but they look highly unjoycean to me unless accompanied by a hanging indent as 1922 p13-- is it possible to leave those choices (display dash or not, hanging indent or not) to the stylesheet?

stanza-indents should be individually left-aligned and probably approximately centered if this is possible. with a hanging indent as well this could get messy.

in small windows, would it be possible/ make sense to use another level of hanging indent for wrapped lines? (FW2 does this, but FW1 used a weird square-bracket right-aligned overflow)


most editions skip a line before and after stanzas, but 1986 does not.

skipping lines between paragraphs should be a stylesheet decision-- i'm sure the main reason not to has been to save paper.


4.397-414 is Milly's letter (cf Martha's at 5.421ff). 1986 uses three special indents for the open and close.

1922 has one special indent for the open, and another very deep one for the two signatures p64 which are in small caps

both Slote and 1961 also have one special indent for the open, but right justify the two signatures in small caps


5.62-65 has Henry Flower's address on Martha's envelope. 1922 p69 uses three special indents, as does 1961. 1986 seems to treat it as a stanza with a deep hanging indent for the 3rd line.


5.144-147 is Plumtree's ad. 1922 p72, 1961 and Slote all treat it as a stanza. 1986 centers each line separately which looks much better to me. (is there a historical ad this could mimic? it seems a shame to create a special class otherwise)


Eolus needs centered headlines, all caps. 1922 p112 uses a funky 1922-era? font, and skips two lines before and after each headline. 1961 seems to skip 3 before and two after, along with an extrabold style. 1986 skips two lines before and one line after each. Slote skips a line before each, but not after. (nobody mixes large and small caps?) the breakpoints for linewrap should probably be fixed based on 1922, but 1922's were probably arbitrary unless jaj modified some...?


7.717-719 is a right-aligned stanza with 'ellipses' to approximate a left-alignment as well. the number of fullstops before the last line varies from 0-6.


8.15-16 is a stanza for 1922 p144, for 1961 and for Slote, but just two nonitalicised paragraphs for 1986. (if it's an ad like Plumtree's the lines could be centered separately) 8.90-93 is just such an ad for 1986. but for 1922 p146, for 1961 and for Slote it's 3 italicised 'paragraphs'.

9.118-121 is an 'ad' for everyone, eg 1922 p179, but 1961 and Slote use all caps for two of the lines.

9.190-191 is a single wrapped long stanza-line. 1961 and Slote don't indent it at all!

9.500 is typeset to align with the notes in the image (if it's included in the image, is that acceptable? it won't be searchable, and the font may not match...)

9.684ff is a mess, partially imitating the layout of an Elizabethan script, sort of like a stanza with no italics. 1922 p194-195. 1986 relocates the first line, and the weird italic 'Punkt' which everyone else centers with no fullstop. Elizabethan scripts aligned overlapping speakers when a line was split between them, some editions imitate this better than others.

9.893ff anticipates Circe's script layout, with the twist of not-quite-right-justified "(Laughter.)" or "(laughter)" eg 1922 p200,

9.1171-1176 is centered lines with dash in 1986, no dash in 1922 or 1961 or Slote

9.1181-1189 is a special nightmare with unindented small caps (indented and mixed in 1922 and Slote), indented "and"s, and that giant right brace that spans three lines vertically, bisecting the middle line

in 10 it's tempting to tag the intrusions, but joyce conspicuously didn't. sectionbreaks are marked with skipped lines and: a triangle of asterisks in 1922 p215, three asterisks in a row in 1986, one hollow star in 1961, one black star in Slote.


the overture to episode 10 is set off by one blank line except in 1961. everyone but 1986 indents each instrument, and 1986 is also the only one to use hanging indents when wrapping lines.


only 1922 p408ff uses hanging indents for stage directions. Slote skips lines only around name-lines. (1922 looks especially odd for the three-paragraph stage direction at p412-413. cf 10.131ff-- nobody skips lines between these) Slote also centers short stage directions.


1922 doesn't skip a line between question and answer in episode 17, but indents each. 1986 does skip one line, no indents, and skips two between questions. Slote and 1961 indent but don't skip the line.

Bloom's budget 17.1456ff, 1922 p664, has at least four aligned columns, with two headings centered over two each. all use hanging indents (except 1986 that doesn't need any), only 1922 fills lines with ellipses. only 1986 has a superscript 'd' in "recd".