Word: punsters
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Compounded of puns, disjointed syllables, half-words, it is closest to English, but Erse, Latin, Greek, Dutch, French, Sanskrit, even Esperanto appear, usually distorted to suggest both an alien and an English notion. The ablest punster in seven languages, Joyce sometimes combines puns and snatches of songs. Example: "ginabawdy meadabawdy!" (from a passage dealing with Earwicker's dream of a night out). Using a favorite device, he suggests that Anna Livia is the River Liffey by slyly punning on the names of other rivers: "he gave her the tigris eye," "rubbing the mouldaw stains," "And the dneepers...
Fellow 8., hardworking, quiet sort without any particular vices--uninteresting; Fellow 9., extremely pleasant and likeable fellow; Fellow 10., jovial, genial, all around person . . . most hospitable; Fellow 11., quick mind revelling in sophism . . . ardent punster...
...idea of what his family's reaction will be. In the course of a prolonged honeymoon, she acquires culture, fashionable boredom, a suspicion that her husband is more stupid than she thought at first. He enjoys being sponged on by his friends, particularly approves of a languid professional punster named Harold Sigrift (Monroe Owsley). Abby badgers Roderick into going to work for his father's firm. When he retires, humiliated by his incompetence, she scandalizes his parents by leaving him and going to work herself, at her old job. Finally Roderick comes to her with a pay check...
...Punster's Whimsy...