Joyce's notes 3

Since the publication of the lost pages of Madame Bovary the centre of sympathy appears to have been esthetically shifted from the lover or fancyman to the husband or cuckold. This displacement is also rendered more stable by the gradual growth of a collective practical realism due to changed economic conditions in the mass of the people who are called to hear and feel a work of art relating to their lives. This change is utilized in Exiles although the union of Richard and Bertha is irregular to the extent that the spiritual revolt of Richard which would be strange and ill-welcomed otherwise can enter into combat with Robert's decrepit prudence with some chance of fighting before the public a drawn battle. Praga in La Crisi and Giacosa in Tristi Amori have understood and profited by this change but have not used it, as is done here, as a technical shield for the protection of a delicate, strange, and highly sensitive conscience.



Robert is convinced of the non-existence, of the unreality of the spiritual facts which exist and are real for Richard, the action of the piece should however convince Robert of the existence and reality of Richard's mystical defence of his wife. If this defence be a reality how can those facts on which it is based be then unreal?



It would be interesting to make some sketches of Bertha if she had united her life for nine years to Robert-- not necessarily in the way of drama but rather impressionist sketches. For instance, Mrs Robert Hand (because he intended to do it decently) ordering carpets in Grafton Street, at Leopardstown races, provided with a seat on the platform at the unveiling of a statue, putting out the lights in the drawing room after a social evening in her husband's house, kneeling outside a confessional in the jesuit church.