5 (U62.199)

Poor papa! 

Fifth cast. I got 62 and 199.

Poor papa! How he used to talk of Kate Bateman in that. Outside the Adelphi in London waited all the afternoon to get in. Year before I was born that was: sixtyfive. And Ristori in Vienna. What is this the right name is? By  Mosenthal it is. Rachel, is it? No.

 

The repeated rhythm of was-was, is-is, it is - is it.

Mr. Bloom recalled his father, seeing a poster for a performance of Leah, the Forsaken on a street. Deborah by Salomon Hermann von Mosenthal (1821-1877), a dramatist of German-Jewish descent, has been translated into several languages. Leah is the English version, adopted by Augustin Daly. The main character of the play is a Jewish girl.

 

Mr. Bloom thought “Poor papa!”, for his father had committed suicide by taking poison.

 

Mr. Bloom's father, Rudolph, was of Jewish descent and lived in Hungary until at least 1852 (U594.1876),  then itinerated through Vienna, Milan, Florence, London, and settled in Dublin. (U558.535) (U595.1908)

 

Rudolph may have seen Lear at the Adelphi while living in London. It was a hit role for the American actress Kate Bateman. And when he was in Vienna, he may have seen the original version of Deborah, played by the Italian actress Adelaide Ristori.

 

Mr. Bloom said that the year before his birth was 1865, so we know here that he was born in 1866.

 

Mr. Bloom made the mistake, trying to remember the original title of Leah. It is Deborah, not Rachel. Of the sisters who became the wives of Jacob, in the book of Genesis, the older is Leah and the younger is Rachel, so he must have mistakenly thought it was Rachel.

 

I happened to find this passage in the beginning of chapter 9 of Joyce's Finnegans Wake, page 221.

 

"KATE (Miss Rachel Lea Varian, she tells forkings for baschfel-lors, under the purdah of card palmer teaput tosspot Madam d'Elta,causing the pawses), ..."　

 

In Joyce's mind, Rachel and Leah seemed to be connected.

One more thing. In Search of Lost Time by Proust, there appears a Jewish actress called Rachel, a former prostitute. She is an important character who appears from the beginning to the end of this long story.

Kate Bateman

 

"Kate Bateman" by Mathew Brady Studio, active 1844 - 1894 is marked with CC0 1.0