WHAT WE TALK ABOUT WHEN WE TALK ABOUT LOVE

From James Joyce’s sexually obsessive letters to Nora Barnacle, to Oscar Wilde’s evocation of exquisite ecstasy with his wife and his raw passion for Bosie, the Irish have always written lively love letters. For Valentine’s Day, Bridget Hourican chooses s

JAMES JOYCE

Jealousy and sexual obsession animate this letter from James Joyce, above, to his wife Nora Barnacle, above right. He was in Dublin to further publication of Dubliners —leaving Nora and their children in Trieste — when he fell prey to the malice of Vincent Cosgrave, who insinuated that Nora had been two-timing him back in 1904. veering between obscenity and deep spiritual love, this letter shows Joyce at once aroused by the thought of Nora sleeping around — he demands to know all the details — and devastated by her supposed betrayal, which threatened the foundations of his life and work. 7 August 1909, 44 Fontenoy Street, Dublin It is half past six in the morning and I am writing in the cold. I have hardly slept all night.

Is Georgie my son? The first night I slept with you in Zurich was October 11th and he was born July 27th. That is nine months and 16 days. I remember that there was very little blood that night. Were you fucked by anyone before you came to me? You told me that a gentleman named Holohan (a good Catholic, of course, who makes his Easter duty regularly) wanted to fuck you when you were in that hotel, using what they call a ‘French letter’. Did he do so? Or did you allow him only to fondle you and feel you with his hands?

Tell me. When you were in that field near the Dodder (on the nights when I was not there) with that other (a ‘friend’ of mine) were you lying down when you kissed? Did you place your hand on him as you did on me in the dark and did you say to him as you did to me ‘What is it, dear?’ One day I went up and down the streets of Dublin hearing nothing but those words, saying them over and over again to myself and standing still to hear better the voice of my love.

What is to become of my love now? How am I to drive away the face which will come now between our lips? Every second night along the same streets!

I have been a fool. I thought that all the time you gave yourself only to me and you were dividing your body between me and another. In Dublin here the rumour here is circulated that I have taken the leavings of others. Perhaps they laugh when they see me parading ‘my’ son in the streets.

O Nora! Nora! Nora! I am speaking now to the girl I loved, who had red-brown hair and sauntered over to me and took me so easily into her arms and made me a man.

I will leave for Trieste as soon as Stannie sends me the money, and then we can arrange what is best to do.

O, Nora, is there any hope yet of my happiness? Or is my life to be broken? They say here that I am in consumption. If I could forget my books and my children and forget that the girl I loved was false to me and remember her only as I saw her with the eyes of my boyish love I would go out of life content. How old and miserable I feel!

JIM Fortunately Joyce’s misapprehension was fast cleared up. The next day, a friend, John Byrne, told him Cosgrave’s brag was a “blasted lie”, and his brother Stanislaus wrote the same from Trieste, as did Nora in a short letter that has not been preserved but that cut Joyce “to the quick”. The joy of their reunion freed him to express transgressive sexual fantasies; she replied in kind and they embarked on perhaps the most obscene correspondence in literary history.

OSCAR WILDE

Oscar Wilde, right, could have been writing for Hallmark in this letter to his wife of six months, Constance. Ever the aesthete, he evokes twinned souls, music, the gods, and exquisite ecstasy, but the emotion seems generalised. Tuesday [Postmark 16 December 1884] The Balmoral, Edinburgh Dear and Beloved, Here I am, and you at the Antipodes. O execrable facts, that keep our lips from kissing, though our souls are one.

What can I tell you by letter? Alas! Nothing that I would tell you. The messages of the gods to each other travel not by pen and indeed your bodily

presence here would not make you more real: for I feel your fingers in my hair, and your cheek brushing mine. The air is full of the music of your voice, my soul and body no longer mine, but mingled in some exquisite ecstasy with yours. I feel incomplete without you. Ever and ever yours

OSCAR

Seven years later, this letter to Lord Alfred Douglas (‘Bosie’), below left, is quite different. There are no gods, music, or heavenly souls, but Wilde is distraught with love and passion. He writes in an uncharacteristic tumult of dashes and unfinished sentences. If what lovers really want is power over the other, Bosie must have been delighted to receive this. March 1893, Savoy Hotel Dearest of all boys — your letter was delightful — red and yellow wine to me — but I am sad and out of sorts — Bosie — you must not make scenes with me — they kill me — they wreck the loveliness of life — I cannot see you, so Greek and gracious, distorted with passion; I cannot listen to your curved lips saying hideous things to me — don’t do it — you break my heart — I’d sooner be rented all day, than have you bitter, unjust, and horrid — horrid — I must see you soon — you are the divine thing I want — the thing of grace and genius — but I don’t know how to do it — Shall I come to Salisbury — ? There are many difficulties — my bill here is £49 for a week! I have also got a new sitting-room over the Thames — but you, why are you not here, my dear, my wonderful boy — ? I fear I must leave; no money, no credit, and a heart of lead — Ever your own,

OSCAR