James Joyce's Finnegans Wake

https://www.onelittlegoat.org/finneganswake
Welcome to James Joyce’s divine and delirious comedy, Finnegans Wake. This episode, number 24, is a special one because joining us from Berkeley, California will be scholar Nina Beguš, who is using Finnegans Wake to shape an unusual AI named “FinneGAN.” Nina is interviewed by Adam Seelig, director of the Finnegans Wake film series produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit https://www.onelittlegoat.org/podcast.
“James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake” is produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company, an official charity in Canada and the USA. To support our work, please visit us online to make a charitable donation and join our mailing list.
To get in touch, email us at onelittlegoattc@gmail.com — we’d love to hear from you. This podcast is made possible by Friends of One Little Goat Theatre Company and the Emigrant Support Programme of the Government of Ireland. Thank you for your support!
Music for this episode was arranged and performed on the piano by Adam Seelig, with Tyler Emond on bass and Jinu Isac on drums, recorded at Ghost Town Studio in Toronto.
A big thank you once again to special guest Nina Beguš.
Thank you as ever to the team at the Irish Consulate in Toronto. And thank you to Production Consultants Cathy Murphy and Andrew Moodie. Thank you for listening!
Mentioned: Nina Beguš, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Digital Humanities, Stanford vs Cal (Berkeley), Frederick Wiseman, “At Berkeley” (film), FinneGAN, “imagitation,” latent spaces, GANs (Generative Adversarial Networks), large language models (LLMs), “What Finnegans Wake Teaches Us about AI,” “Latent Spacecraft Brains GANs Finnegans,” humanistic interpretability, eight-word experiment, whale communication, nonce words, child language acquisition and invention, children and language in Joyce (Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses “Oxen of the Sun”, Finnegans Wake), Mother Goose, Humpty Dumpty, “the writing of the night,” dream language, pre-verbal language, Metahaven, Ricardo Petrini, Gašper Beguš, University of California Berkeley, Whisper speech recognition, deep fakes (of cats), “We inhabit a locked hole but can we use it?”, William Wordsworth’s “poetic spirit” in children, Shaw’s Pygmalion, Irene Pepperberg’s Alex the parrot, Richard Harte, Pip Dwyer, Sweny’s Pharmacy Dublin, interdisciplinary science and arts.
Resources: Transcript for this episode, including the text of Finnegans Wake.
Cited: “What Finnegans Wake Teaches Us about AI,” Paul Massari, Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences,2026-02-26.
“Latent Spacecraft Brains GANs Finnegans,” Nina Beguš, Gašper Beguš, Metahaven, Ricardo Petrini; Antikythera,https://latentspacecraft.antikythera.org/, 2026-03-02.

https://www.onelittlegoat.org/finneganswake
Welcome to James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. In this episode we’ll hear Irish-Canadian actor Richard Harte reading pages 104 to 108 to begin Chapter 5 of Joyce’s last novel, with an introduction by director Adam Seelig.
Richard’s reading (p.104:1-108:36) was recorded with a live audience at the Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto, on 21 October 2024.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit https://www.onelittlegoat.org/podcast.
“James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake” is produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company, an official charity in Canada and the USA. To support our work, please visit us online to make a charitable donation and join our mailing list.
To get in touch, email us at onelittlegoattc@gmail.com — we’d love to hear from you.
This podcast is made possible by Friends of One Little Goat Theatre Company and the Emigrant Support Programme of the Government of Ireland. Thank you for your support!
Thank you to the artists for this episode: Richard Harte (Reader); William Bembridge (Sound); Sandi Becker (Stage Manager); Adam Seelig (Director, Music Arrangement, Piano), Tyler Emond (Bass, Recording at Ghost Town Studio Toronto), Jinu Isac (drums).
Thanks to John Shoesmith, Special Collections Librarian, to David Fernández, Head of Rare Books and Special Collections, and to their colleagues at the Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto, as well as to our wonderful live audience. Thank you to everyone at the Irish Consulate in Toronto. And thank you to Production Consultants Cathy Murphy, Andrew Moodie.
Thank you for listening!
Mentioned:John Cage, Time & Space Limited, Hudson NY, Bloomsday Film Festival, ALP, Anna Livia Plurabelle, The Letter, letter/litter, who wrote the letter?, Quran and Bible, names of the letter, ALP’s defense of HCE, cyclical falling and rising, “The Suspended Sentence,” “Of the Two Ways of Opening the Mouth,” two women on Dublin Coat of Arms, enter the professor of paleography, letter/litter/literature, patience, Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto, Marshall McLuhan, Gutenberg printing press, literature’s shift from ear/aural/communal to eye/visual/individual, Gerard Manley Hopkins, “read it with the ears,” dream language, people gathering to hear text read, synopsis.
Resources: ⁠⁠Transcript for this episode⁠⁠, including the text of Finnegans Wake.Finnegans Wake (1939) by James Joyce: there are many freecopies of FW to read online or download, e.g. ⁠⁠finwake.com⁠⁠
⁠⁠James Joyce Digital Archive, “Chicken Guide”⁠⁠ to Finnegans Wake provides a ‘plain English’ paraphrase of each chapter by Danis Rose.
Richard Ellmann’s biography of James Joyce. Oxford University Press, 1982.
Edmund Epstein, A Guide through Finnegans Wake. University Press of Florida, 2009.
Adaline Glasheen, Third Census of Finnegans Wake: An Index of the Characters and Their Roles, University of California Press, 1977.
John Gordon’s annotations on his ⁠⁠Finnegans Wake blog⁠⁠.
Roland McHugh, Annotations to Finnegans Wake (4th edition). Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016.
Raphael Slepon, ⁠⁠fweet.org⁠⁠
William York Tindall, A Reader’s Guide to Finnegans Wake. Syracuse University Press, 1996.

https://www.onelittlegoat.org/finneganswake
Welcome to James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. In this episodewe’ll hear Irish-Canadian actor Richard Harte reading pages 100 to 103 to conclude Chapter 4 of Joyce’s last novel, with an introduction by director Adam Seelig.
Richard’s reading (p. 100:5-103:11) was recorded with a live audience at Type Books on Queen Street West in Toronto on 22 January 2024.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit https://www.onelittlegoat.org/podcast.
“James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake” is produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company, an official charity in Canada and the USA. To support our work, please visit us online to make acharitable donation and join our mailing list.
To get in touch, email us at onelittlegoattc@gmail.com— we’d love to hear from you.
This podcast is made possible by Friends of One Little Goat Theatre Company and the Emigrant Support Programme of the Government of Ireland. Thank you for your support!
Thank you to the artists for this episode: Richard Harte (Reader); William Bembridge (Sound); Sandi Becker (Stage Manager); Adam Seelig (Director, Music Arrangement, Piano), Brandon Bak (Drums, Recording at Sound Department Toronto).
Thanks to Claire Foster and the staff and owners of Type Books, as well as to our wonderful live audience. Thank you to everyone at the Irish Consulate in Toronto. And thank you to Production Consultants Cathy Murphy, Andrew Moodie and Shai Rotbard-Seelig. Thank you to Darina Gallagher and the James Joyce Centre in Dublin for your partnership.
Thank you for listening!
Mentioned: King James Bible, Psalm 137, “by the rivers of Babylon,” babble, Babel, transition from HCE to ALP, male to female, land to water, tides, River Liffey, Island Bridge, Phoenix Park, Eve and Adam, serpent, Garden of Eden, original sin, papal and sexual imagery, ALP’s 111 children, ALP’s defence of HCE, formula for longevity of ALP and HCE’s relationship, synopsis.
Resources: ⁠Transcript for this episode⁠, including the text of Finnegans Wake.Finnegans Wake (1939) by James Joyce: there are many freecopies of FW to read online or download, e.g. ⁠finwake.com⁠
⁠James Joyce Digital Archive, “Chicken Guide”⁠ to Finnegans Wake provides a ‘plain English’ paraphrase of each chapter by Danis Rose.
Richard Ellmann’s biography of James Joyce. Oxford University Press, 1982.
Edmund Epstein, A Guide through Finnegans Wake. University Press of Florida, 2009.
Adaline Glasheen, Third Census of Finnegans Wake: An Index of the Characters and Their Roles, University of California Press, 1977.
John Gordon’s annotations on his ⁠Finnegans Wake blog⁠.
Roland McHugh, Annotations to Finnegans Wake (4th edition). Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016.
Raphael Slepon, ⁠fweet.org⁠
William York Tindall, A Reader’s Guide to Finnegans Wake. Syracuse University Press, 1996.
Cited: Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, “Madonna and Child with Saint Anne,” 1606, Galleria Borghese, Italy.
“Up on Cripple Creek” by The Band, The Band (eponymous), Capitol Records, 1969.

https://www.onelittlegoat.org/finneganswake
Welcome to James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. In this episodewe’ll hear Irish-Canadian actor Richard Harte reading pages 96 to 100 from Chapter 4 of Joyce’s last novel, with an introduction by director Adam Seelig.
Richard’s reading (p. 96:25-100:4) was recorded with a live audience at Type Books on Queen Street West in Toronto on 22 January 2024.
For a transcript of this episode, please visit https://www.onelittlegoat.org/podcast.
“James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake” is produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company, an official charity in Canada and the USA. To support our work, please visit us online to make acharitable donation and join our mailing list.
To get in touch, email us at onelittlegoattc@gmail.com— we’d love to hear from you.
This podcast is made possible by Friends of One Little Goat Theatre Company and the Emigrant Support Programme of the Government of Ireland. Thank you for your support!
Thank you to the artists for this episode: Richard Harte (Reader); William Bembridge (Sound); Sandi Becker (Stage Manager); Adam Seelig (Director, Music Arrangement, Piano), Brandon Bak (Drums, Recording at Sound Department Toronto).
Thanks to Claire Foster and the staff and owners of Type Books, as well as to our wonderful live audience. Thank you to everyone at the Irish Consulate in Toronto. And thank you to Production Consultants Cathy Murphy, Andrew Moodie and Shai Rotbard-Seelig. Thank you to Darina Gallagher and the James Joyce Centre in Dublin for your partnership.
Thank you for listening!
Mentioned: Robbie Burns “Auld Lang Syne,” Earwicker as fox, Parnell, the hunt, gun dogs, public officials judging HCE, absurd news of HCE’s whereabouts and near fatal experiences, media and technology spreading news and rumours, synopsis.
Resources: Transcript for this episode, including the text of Finnegans Wake.
Finnegans Wake (1939) by James Joyce: there are many freecopies of FW to read online or download, e.g. finwake.com
James Joyce Digital Archive, “Chicken Guide” to Finnegans Wake provides a ‘plain English’ paraphrase of each chapter by Danis Rose.
Richard Ellmann’s biography of James Joyce. Oxford University Press, 1982.
Edmund Epstein, A Guide through Finnegans Wake. University Press of Florida, 2009.
Adaline Glasheen, Third Census of Finnegans Wake: An Index of the Characters and Their Roles, University of California Press, 1977.
John Gordon’s annotations on his Finnegans Wake blog.
Roland McHugh, Annotations to Finnegans Wake (4th edition). Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016.
Raphael Slepon, fweet.org
William York Tindall, A Reader’s Guide to Finnegans Wake. Syracuse University Press, 1996.
Cited: “Technology” by Makaya McCraven, with Theon Cross and Ben LaMar Gay, Off the Record (Techno Logic), Nonesuch Records, 2025.

https://www.onelittlegoat.org/finneganswake
Welcome to James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. This episode isa special one because joining us from his home in Ireland’s capital will betranslator Kenji Hayakawa, who is currently translating Finnegans Wakeinto Japanese. Kenji will share his insights into Joyce’s last novel, and we’llhear him read excerpts from his translation alongside actor Richard Harte’sreadings in the original English.
For atranscript of this episode, please visit https://www.onelittlegoat.org/podcast.
“JamesJoyce’s Finnegans Wake” is produced by One Little Goat Theatre Company, anofficial charity in Canada and the USA. To support our work, please visit us online to make acharitable donation and join our mailing list.
To get intouch, email us at onelittlegoattc@gmail.com— we’d love to hear from you.
This podcast ismade possible by Friends of One Little Goat Theatre Company and the EmigrantSupport Programme of the Government of Ireland. Thank you for your support! Thankyou to everyone at the Irish Consulate in Toronto. Thank you to DarinaGallagher and the James Joyce Centre in Dublin for your partnership. Thank youfor listening!
 
Mentioned:translator Kenji Hayakawa, existing Japanese translations of Finnegans Wake,why translate FW into Japanese, Kenji’s translation and annotations (with YutaImazeki) on https://finneganswake.net/,Japan Knowledgedatabase, Fweet, standardized Japanese in 20thcentury, 18 categories of Japanese dialects, drawing on nonstandard Japanesedialect terms to translate FW, suppression of Irish language under British rule,translating into “Japaneses” plural much as Joyce wrote FW in multiplelanguages (dream language), translating puns and sound, thunderword #3 inEnglish and Japanese, thunderword as a trans-lingual magical incantation, ‘horserace’excerpt from Ch02 in English and Japanese, starting with Ch02 rather than Ch01,Vancouver FW reading group led by Kevin Spenst, community aspect of reading andtranslating FW, “Ballad of Persse O’Reilly” excerpt in English and Japanese, politicaldimensions of “Ballad,” No Kings protest against American President DonaldTrump, opening line of FW in English and Japanese, “riverrun” as “Kawaran” meaning“unchanging” in Japanese, “Kaway” meaning “river” in Japanese, ‘culturaltranslation’ of Irish culture, Japanese script vs latin-letter scripts (English,German, etc.), JamesJoyce Digital Archive.
 
Resources:Transcript for thisepisode, including the text of Finnegans Wake.
Finnegans Wakes:Tales of Translation, Patrick O'Neill. University of Toronto, 2022.
TheMaking of Monolingual Japan: Language Ideology and Japanese Modernity, PatrickHeinrich. Bristol, UK, Multilingual Matters, 2012.
Kenji Hayakawa’s Japanese translation of FW Ch02online.
Note: Kenji Hayakawa will be speaking at the James Joyce Centre in Dublin on2026-01-15.