Genealogy.

Professor Gordon was by far the best speaker of the evening. In a lovely Scotch voice, he traced the development of the Joyceian style from the letter-writing technique of the 18th century novelists, and pointed out that the stream of consciousness style was akin to the work of Fielding and Smollett. This led to a good deal of debate about this method in the course of the discussion. Most of the speakers agreed that it was finely effective in "Ulysses," but concurred with Professor Gordon when he suggested that in "Finnegan's Wake" it was carried to its ultimate limit, so that one was caught in a vicious spiral going downwards and inwards, till one came to pure Joyce, which of course could only be understood by the author.