User's Manual

This is the user's manual for the Fweet Search Engine page. It endeavours to methodically describe and exemplify each feature appearing on the page, in the order of their appearance, in an attempt to induce a soporific effect upon the hapless reader. It partly assumes that you have already been through the introductory tutorial. The examples given below each feature are sometimes theoretical and not necessarily taken as is from the Fweet elucidation collection. Wherever a string is shown within quotation marks, the quotation marks themselves are just delimiters and do not form part of the string exemplified. If you take exception to some feature and would like to see it modified, improved or deteriorated, please send a comment.

Search String

This is the text-box in which one types the text to search for. The text is used exactly as typed, with the exception that leading spaces (i.e. all spaces before the first character), trailing spaces (i.e. all spaces after the last character) and consecutive spaces (i.e. all spaces but one between words) are discarded. Except for the special keywords described below, there are no characters with special meaning. The search string is further affected by the search options listed below.

• unlike regular web search engines, the entire text is searched exactly as typed; characters such as quotation marks, minus signs, asterisks, parentheses, question marks, &c. have no special meaning whatsoever (unless you are using the advanced Regular Expression option, in which case the meanings of characters are those of Perl-style regular expressions)
• searching for the "the cat" will not find "the black cat" or "cat the" or "the, cat" or "the giraffe" (this is not because it is technically difficult to do so; it is because I believe this makes the search engine more useful)

Actions

This row of buttons allows you to perform common operations related to the searching process, as described in the bullets below.

• the "Submit Query" button launches a search on the given search string (unnecessary if employing one of the shorthands with the Submit radio-button selected)
• the "Clear String" button only clears the text of the "Search String" text-box, without affecting any other option
• the "Reset All" button resets all the components of the page to their default values, including clearing the text of the "Search String" text-box; the options' default values are either those previously saved through the "Save Default" button, or the site's own original default, if no such default-state cookie is present
• the "Save Default" button saves the current state of all the options (i.e. search, display, less-used, scope and advanced options) in a default-state cookie within your browser (this obviously requires cookie support); this state will then be restored every time you reload the Search Engine page or click on the "Reset All" button, even when you return to the site at a later time, thus allowing you to have your own default set of options, rather than being chained to the site's own default; using this button updates, of course, the "Saved Default" text displayed below the options
• the "Delete Saved Default" button deletes any default-state cookie previously saved using the "Save Default" button, thereby restoring the site's own original default; using this button updates, of course, the "Saved Default" text displayed below the options

Keywords

Special keywords – individually described below – may be used within the search string to perform more complex searches. All keywords must be written entirely in uppercase letters and be preceded and followed by at least one space to be properly identified by the search engine. All keywords are binary operators — i.e. they take two operands, one preceding the keyword, one following it. With the exception of the NEAR keyword, one may have more than one keyword within the same search string, in which case they are always processed from left to right. Note that keyword operands are in no way restricted to being single words.

• elucidations found by the "hamlet OR pericles AND I was" search will all contain either "hamlet" or "pericles", and will all contain "I was"; namely, the engine first performs "hamlet OR pericles" and then performs "AND I was"
• elucidations found by the "I was AND hamlet OR pericles" search will contain either both "I was" and "hamlet", or "pericles" (regardless of "I was"); namely, the engine first performs "I was AND hamlet" and then performs "OR pericles"

AND

AND is one of the keywords supported by the search engine. It takes the form: "<1st-operand> AND <2nd-operand>", where each operand is any string that may be searched for. The effects of AND are somewhat different when searching in Fweet elucidations and when searching in Finnegans Wake text. When searching in Fweet elucidations, it will find any elucidation that contains both operands within the same elucidation, regardless of order (i.e. <1st-operand> after <2nd-operand> or vice versa), and will highlight both operands, if highlighting is turned on. When searching in Finnegans Wake text, it will find any text that contains both operands within the same one to four lines (as determined by the Text Search Distance option) of Finnegans Wake, regardless of order (i.e. <1st-operand> after <2nd-operand> or vice versa), and will highlight both operands and all the text between them, if highlighting is turned on.

• using the default options of the search engine, search for "hamlet AND to be" to see the effects of AND when searching within the Fweet elucidations
• using the default options of the search engine, except "Search in Fweet Elucidations" is turned off and "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" is turned on, search for "castle AND senco" to see the effects of AND when searching within the Finnegans Wake text

NEAR

NEAR is one of the keywords supported by the search engine, and currently the most powerful one. It takes the form: "<1st-operand> NEAR <2nd-operand>", where each operand is any string that may be searched for and may well include other keywords. Unlike other keywords, the NEAR keyword may appear only once in the search string, effectively splitting the string into two sub-strings. When a search string contains the NEAR keyword, the search engine searches for the <1st-operand> as if it was a complete independent search string (including the processing of any keywords it may contain) and keeps the results in an internal table, then does the same for the <2nd-operand>. It then scans the two tables and displays only those elucidations in one table that are within the same one to four lines (as determined by the NEAR Merge Distance option) of an elucidation in the other table (and vice versa). This technique is applied regardless of the searched scope and can thus be used to find terms that are "near" each other even if they are in different scopes (e.g. one in the text of an elucidation, the other in the text of Finnegans Wake).

• using the default options of the search engine, except "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" is turned on, search for "castle NEAR peninsular" to see the effects of NEAR when searching in both scopes at the same time
• using the default options of the search engine, except "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" is turned on and "NEAR Merge Distance" is 1 line, select the "Overwrite" radio button, select the "Chapter I.8" shorthand, type " NEAR tell NEXT me" in the search string text-box, and submit the query to find the occurrences of the phrase "tell me" in chapter I.8 only
• because of the way NEAR searches are performed (as explained above), it is useless to have the same term on both sides of the NEAR keyword (e.g. "kill NEAR kill"), as this is effectively the same as simply searching for that term (e.g. "kill"), only much slower

NEXT

NEXT is one of the keywords supported by the search engine. It takes the form: "<1st-operand> NEXT <2nd-operand>", where each operand is any string that may be searched for. The effects of NEXT are exactly the same as those of THEN, except that only non-alphanumeric characters (e.g. spaces, punctuation marks), if any, are allowed between the <1st-operand> and the <2nd-operand> for the match to qualify. This keyword is often useful for finding words that may or may not be hyphenated (e.g. 'bee-hive', 'bee hive' and 'beehive' all match 'bee NEXT hive').

• using the default options of the search engine, search for "ep NEXT and" to see the effects of NEXT when searching within the Fweet elucidations
• using the default options of the search engine, except "Search in Fweet Elucidations" is turned off and "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" is turned on, search for "nuk NEXT of" to see the effects of NEXT when searching within the Finnegans Wake text

OR

OR is one of the keywords supported by the search engine. It takes the form: "<1st-operand> OR <2nd-operand>", where each operand is any string that may be searched for. It will find any elucidation or line of text that contains either operand (or both), and will highlight both operands, if highlighting is turned on.

• using the default options of the search engine, search for "hamlet OR macbeth" to see the effects of OR when searching within the Fweet elucidations
• using the default options of the search engine, except "Search in Fweet Elucidations" is turned off and "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" is turned on, search for "hamlet OR macbeth" to see the effects of OR when searching within the Finnegans Wake text

THEN

THEN is one of the keywords supported by the search engine. It takes the form: "<1st-operand> THEN <2nd-operand>", where each operand is any string that may be searched for. The effects of THEN are exactly the same as those of AND, except that the <1st-operand> must come before the <2nd-operand> for the match to qualify.

• using the default options of the search engine, search for "hamlet THEN to be" and for "to be THEN hamlet" to see the effects of THEN (compare these to searching for "hamlet AND to be" and for "to be AND hamlet")

Ignore Case

When this check-box is checked, the search engine ignores the case of letters in both the search string and the searched scope (elucidations or Finnegans Wake text), treating lowercase and uppercase letters as identical.

• when this check-box is checked, a "cAt" search string will match "cAt", "cat", "CAT", "Cat", &c.; when this option is unchecked, it will only match "cAt"

Ignore Accent

When this check-box is checked, the search engine ignores the presence of diacritics, accents and ligatures in the searched scope (elucidations or Finnegans Wake text), treating accented and unaccented letters as identical. Fweet currently supports a relatively restricted range of diacritics, accents and ligatures; see the "Diacritics" brevity of shorthands for a complete list.

• when this check-box is checked, a "caet" search string will match "caet", "cået", "çæt", "çäét", &c.; when this check-box is unchecked, it will only match "caet"

Whole Words

When this check-box is checked, the search engine only compares whole words against the search string to find matches. Technically speaking, it requires that the characters immediately preceding and following the search string (or, if using special keywords, each keyword operand) in the searched scope (elucidations or Finnegans Wake text) not be alphanumeric (i.e. 'a' to 'z' or '0' to '9').

• when this check-box is checked, a "the cat" search string will match " the cat ", " the cat!", "(the cat)", but not " the catch" or "lithe cat"; when this check-box is unchecked, it will match all the above and many more

Regular Expression

When this check-box is checked, the search engine treats the search string (or, if using special keywords, each keyword operand) as a Perl-style regular expression. It is well beyond the scope of this site to teach the use of regular expressions (a kind of computer language shorthand for searching text strings), so if you do not know what these are, you can blissfully ignore this option. Note that some shorthands turn on this option; as long as you use shorthands for searching, continue ignoring this option, but if you switch from using shorthands to manually entering search strings, you may want to turn off this option, if it is on, or simply just click the "Reset All" button (although the vast majority of searches will not be affected by leaving this option on).

Natural

When this check-box is checked, elucidations are displayed exactly as they appear in the Fweet collection, with no special processing – au naturel, so to speak. Since the Fweet elucidations are full of rather cryptic shorthands, this can be inconvenient (hence, the Beautified option). This option is mainly useful, if at all, for those interested in the inner workings of the collection, perhaps preparatory to submitting elucidations of their own. Both this and the "Beautified" option may be checked at the same time, resulting in two lines per elucidation, one natural, one beautified, but this is even less useful. When this check-box is unchecked, the "Beautified" check-box is automatically checked, if it is not already so.

• when this check-box is checked, a "_Pro_" search string will display Provençal language elucidations as "_Pro_" (rather than the clearer "Provençal")
• the output of this option is somewhat different based on the value of the Ignore Accent option; when the latter is checked, "natural" elucidations contain no diacritics, when unchecked, they do contain them

Beautified

When this check-box is checked, elucidations are displayed with clearer longhand terms instead of the native cryptic shorthands (as displayed by the Natural option). Beautified terms can always be identified by their exclusive use of the italic font style. Both this and the "Natural" option may be checked at the same time, resulting in two lines per elucidation, one natural, one beautified. When this check-box is unchecked, the "Natural" check-box is automatically checked, if it is not already so.

• when this check-box is checked, a "_Pro_" search string will display Provençal language elucidations as "Provençal" (rather than the more obscure "_Pro_")

Highlight Matches

When this check-box is checked, terms matching the search string are highlighted (in red and underlined) for easier identification. Despite its seeming simplicity, this feature involves some rather complex programming when it comes to highlighting beautified elucidations and multi-line Finnegans Wake text; if you come across any unsuitable highlighting (whether morally or otherwise), please send a comment.

• when this check-box is checked, a "_Pro_" search string will highlight either the term "Provençal" (for beautified elucidations) or the term "_Pro_" (for natural elucidations)

Show FW Text

When this check-box is checked, a line of Finnegans Wake text is shown above the elucidations belonging to that line. The text is displayed over a darker background to allow for differentiation between cryptic Finnegans Wake text and cryptic Fweet elucidations. The text shown is based on the webified version of Finnegans Wake produced many years ago by Tim Szeliga and Donald Theall of Trent University, albeit with numerous modifications, primarily intended to adjust the text to Fweet's line numbering scheme and to correct more than three hundred misprints in the "Finnegans Web" text. If you find an error in the displayed Finnegans Wake text, vis-à-vis the printed text, please send me a comment. When this check-box is unchecked, the "Hide Elucidations" check-box is automatically unchecked as well, if it is not already so, otherwise there would be nothing to display.

Show Context

When this check-box is checked, a synopsis entry is shown above the elucidations falling within that entry's page-line range. The synopsis entry is displayed over a darker background to allow for differentiation between the synopsis (which is not strictly a result of the search) and the elucidations (which are). The purpose of this feature, originally suggested by Levin Magruder, albeit in a different format, is to remind a user faced with a given elucidation what narrative context, as reflected by the current synopsis entry, it is part of.

• This option is temporarily disabled when searching specifically for synopsis entries, to avoid every entry appearing twice

Hide Elucidations

When this check-box is checked, all those lovely elucidations I have been collecting for years are not displayed. This is useful, I expect, primarily for those times when you want to read some portion of Finnegans Wake undisturbed. When this check-box is checked, the "Show FW Text" check-box is automatically checked as well, if it is not already so, otherwise there would be nothing to display.

• Do be aware that Fweet's FW text, though proofread, might still have some typos in it. It's likely better than most FW e-texts on the web, and than many printed FW editions too, but if you have access to a Faber and Faber 1975 or Viking 1959 edition (or a later reprint), I would recommend using that instead (which is what I do)

Hide Summary

When this check-box is checked, the search summary paragraph usually present at the top of the search results page is not displayed. This option, suggested by Gary Yuen, is primarily intended for those using Fweet on mobile phones and similar screensize-challenged devices.

Sort Alphabetically

When this check-box is checked, the results are sorted alphabetically by elucidation text, rather than by the default page-and-line order.

• this option is not extremely useful and is mostly envisioned for searches where all the results share the same domain and format (e.g. notebook entries)
• if this and the Sort Alphabetically from Search String option are both checked, the latter takes precedence

Sort Alphabetically from Search String

When this check-box is checked, the results are sorted alphabetically by elucidation text, rather than by the default page-and-line order, ignoring however any text preceding the search string within the elucidation.

• this option is not extremely useful and is mostly envisioned for searches where all the results share the same domain and format (e.g. notebook entries) and where one wishes to sort explicitly according to the search string (e.g. notebook shorthand) and the text immediately following it (e.g notebook page and entry numbers)
• if this and the Sort Alphabetically option are both checked, this takes precedence

Get Following

When this check-box is checked, for each elucidation found by the search engine as a match for the search string, the following elucidation within the collection, regardless of whether it has the same page-dot-line location or not, is also retrieved and displayed.

• this option is not extremely useful and is mostly envisioned for searches of notebook entries, since often the elucidation following the notebook entry contains source identification for the entry itself
• if this and the Sort Alphabetically (or Sort Alphabetically from Search String) option are both checked, the alphabetical sorting is done before getting the following elucidations, thereby guaranteeing that each following elucidation remains alongside its predecessor

Search in Fweet Elucidations

When this check-box is checked, the search string is searched within the text of the Fweet elucidations. All elucidations matching the search criteria are then displayed. Both this and the Search in Finnegans Wake Text option may be checked at the same time, resulting in the search being conducted simultaneously on both scopes. When this check-box is unchecked, the "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" check-box is automatically checked, if it is not already so.

• when this check-box is checked, a "parnell" search string will display more than a 100 elucidations containing the string "Parnell" or "parnell" (assuming "Ignore Case" is checked)

Search in Finnegans Wake Text

When this check-box is checked, the search string is searched within the text of Finnegans Wake. All the lines of Finnegans Wake text matching the search criteria are internally marked; then, all elucidations for each of these lines are displayed. When you perform a search using this option, the text of Finnegans Wake is displayed alongside the elucidations, even if you forgot to check the Show FW Text check-box. Both this and the Search in Fweet Elucidations option may be checked at the same time, resulting in the search being conducted simultaneously on both scopes. When this check-box is unchecked, the "Search in Fweet Elucidations" check-box is automatically checked, if it is not already so.

• when this check-box is checked, a "parnell" search string will display all the elucidations for the only 4 lines of Finnegans Wake containing the string "Parnell" or "parnell" (assuming "Ignore Case" is checked)
• the search engine is capable of locating a search string even if it is split over more than one line of Finnegans Wake (up to four lines, as determined by the Text Search Distance option); for example, searching for "encor" will return, among others, lines 003.04-.05, containing the word "passencore"

Also Search Related Shorthands

When this check-box is checked, the search string (or, if using special keywords, each keyword operand), in addition to being searched within the elucidations, is searched through all the content shorthands and any that match it are then also searched within the text of the Fweet elucidations. All elucidations matching the search string or any of the located shorthands are then displayed. This option is only relevant if the Search in Fweet Elucidations option is also checked.

• when this check-box is checked, a "Dublin" search string will also search for books and newspapers containing the word "Dublin" in their title, a "Jespersen" search string will also search for books by Jespersen, a "Shakespeare" search string will also search for all of Shakespeare's works, an "Italian" search string will also search for references to the Italian language, &c.

Text Search Distance

This selection-list determines the number of lines of text of Finnegans Wake that are searched, allowing for the match to extend over more than one line. This option only affects searches within the "Finnegans Wake Text" scope and not within the "Fweet Elucidations" scope.

• the default of "4 lines" is generally recommended, the other options being there primarily for cases where this default results in too many matches
• the option of "1 line" is generally discouraged, as it would miss even single (hyphenated) words that span over two lines

NEAR Merge Distance

This selection-list determines the number of lines between elucidations belonging to the two sub-searches of a search involving the NEAR keyword in order for such elucidations to qualify as being near enough to form part of the final set of results. This option only affects the merging of sub-searches associated with the NEAR keyword; it does not affect either of the two sub-searches themselves.

Font Size

This selection-list determines the relative font size of the text on the search results page (and no other page). This option, suggested by Gary Yuen, is primarily intended for those using Fweet on mobile phones and similar screensize-challenged devices.

Sans Serif

When this check-box is checked, the font type used for all the text on the search results page (and no other page) will be sans serif, rather than the default serif. This option, like several others, was suggested by Gary Yuen.

Shorthands

A shorthand is an abbreviated form used within the Fweet collection. A collection of shorthands sharing a similar subject (e.g. Languages) is referred to as a brevity of shorthands, or just a brevity. If there are other shorthands you would like to see formed, please send a comment. The effect of selecting any of the shorthands, be they text-box-based or selection-list-based, is governed by the following radio buttons: Submit, Overwrite and Append.

• the description of a shorthand, as it appears on the search engine page, sometimes contains additional information that clarifies its use within the collection (e.g. see "Editorials" or "Motifs" shorthands); moreover, some useful information may be present only in the shorthand's description and nowhere else, so please take your time perusing the available shorthands
• all shorthands (except some "Diacritics", "Sigla" and "Symbols"), including all the location shorthands, are useful only for searching within the Fweet elucidations, not within the text of Finnegans Wake — accordingly, to avoid confusion, if you use any location shorthand (i.e. line, page, chapter, or range) with the "Search in Finnegans Wake Text" option enabled, the option will be silently disabled and the "Show FW Text" option enabled instead, under the assumption that this is what you were actually trying to achieve
• most shorthands, in their natural form, are flanked by either underscores (e.g. _G_ for German) or angle brackets (e.g. <OTGen> for Genesis)

Submit

This radio button governs the effect of selecting any of the shorthands on the page. If this radio button is marked (i.e. on), the selected shorthand overwrites the contents of the "Search String" text-box, some of the "Search Options" check-boxes are changed to match the optimal configuration for this shorthand, and the shorthand is automatically submitted to the search engine for execution. Please refer to the Overwrite and the Append options for other possible effects.

• if this radio-button is marked, typing "416" in the "Page" shorthand text-box and moving out of the box (e.g. by pressing "Tab" (not "Enter") or by clicking on the page's brown background (not on the "Submit Query" action button)) will automatically return all the elucidations for page 416 of Finnegans Wake

Overwrite

This radio button governs the effect of selecting any of the shorthands on the page. If this radio button is marked (i.e. on), the selected shorthand overwrites the contents of the "Search String" text-box, some of the "Search Options" check-boxes are changed to match the optimal configuration for this shorthand, but the shorthand is not automatically submitted to the search engine for execution. After selecting a shorthand with this button marked, the mark automatically shifts to the "Append" option (as the main reason for using "Overwrite" is to follow it by an "Append"). Please refer to the Submit and the Append options for other possible effects.

• see under Append for useful examples for this option

Append

This radio button governs the effect of selecting any of the shorthands on the page. If this radio button is marked (i.e. on), the selected shorthand is appended to the current contents of the "Search String" text-box, some of the "Search Options" check-boxes are changed to match the optimal configuration for this shorthand, but the shorthand is not automatically submitted to the search engine for execution. Please refer to the Submit and the Overwrite options for other possible effects.

• to look for a combination of adjacent shorthands in the Fweet collection (e.g. French Slang), select the "Overwrite" radio button, select the first shorthand (e.g. "French" under "Languages"), note that the "Append" radio button is automatically selected for you (courtesy of Fweet), select the second shorthand (e.g. "Slang" under "Registers"), and finally click on the "Submit Query" button
• to look for elucidations related to either Hamlet or Macbeth, select the "Overwrite" radio button, select the "Hamlet" shorthand under "Shakespeare", type a space, type "OR", type another space, select the "Macbeth" shorthand under "Shakespeare", and finally click on the "Submit Query" button

Line

This pair of text-boxes allows you to search for elucidations for a single line of Finnegans Wake. To do so, type a 1-to-3-digit page number in the left-hand box, type a 1-to-2-digit line number in the right-hand box, and step out of the boxes (e.g. by pressing "Tab" (not "Enter") or by clicking on the page's brown background (not on the "Submit Query" action button)). When you use these text-boxes, one special link (marked "Random Line") appears near the top of the results page, to allow you to jump along a path of random lines of Finnegans Wake, should you wish to do so. When you search for lines in chapter II.2, the given line number is automatically matched against the main page text, the bottom footnotes, the left marginalia, and the right marginalia.

• typing "0" in both boxes results in Fweet selecting a random line to display (rather than searching in vain for the non-existent line 000.00)
• to read more about Fweet's unconventional conventions for line numbering, please refer to the Line Numbering page

Page

This text-box allows you to search for elucidations for a single page of Finnegans Wake. To do so, type a 1-to-3-digit page number in the box and step out of the box (e.g. by pressing "Tab" (not "Enter") or by clicking on the page's brown background (not on the "Submit Query" action button)). When you use this text-box, three special links (marked "Previous Page", "Next Page" and "Random Page") appear near the top (and bottom) of the results page, to simplify the browsing of adjacent (and random) pages of Finnegans Wake.

• typing "0" results in Fweet selecting a random page to display (rather than searching in vain for the non-existent page 000)

Chapter

This selection-list allows you to search for elucidations for an entire chapter of Finnegans Wake (or a portion of a chapter, for longer chapters). It is intended primarily as a service for people wanting to print an entire chapter's-worth of elucidations for later use in an Internet-free environment (e.g. a classroom).

• please do not abuse these shorthands to appropriate the entire Fweet collection – help the site grow by using it and contributing to it

Range

This quadruplet of text-boxes allows you to search for elucidations for a range of pages and lines of Finnegans Wake (i.e. from a given page-dot-line to a later page-dot-line). To do so, type 1-to-3-digit page numbers in the first (from) and third (to) boxes, type 1-to-2-digit line numbers in the second (from) and fourth (to) boxes, and step out of the boxes (e.g. by pressing "Tab" (not "Enter") or by clicking on the page's brown background (not on the "Submit Query" action button)). When you search for a range including lines of chapter II.2, the given line numbers are automatically matched against the main page text, the bottom footnotes, the left marginalia, and the right marginalia (please let me know if this is inconvenient).

Bible

This brevity contains shorthands for books of the Bible: Old Testament (in a Jewish conventional order), New Testament (in a Christian conventional order) &c. All the books of both testaments are listed, including some for which no elucidations are present. It also contains collective shorthands for all the books of the Old Testament and for all the books of the New Testament. Unless otherwise noted, quotes are from the King James Version.

Books

This brevity contains shorthands for books, magazines and articles (in alphabetical order of the author's name) Joyce is known to have used as sources for Finnegans Wake (although not necessarily the exact edition listed). This list is very far from being complete, both in that there are still books mentioned within the elucidations that are not on the list and in that there are sources as yet not appearing anywhere in the collection. Unless otherwise noted, references to the books within the elucidations are by page number.

• books preceded by an asterisk have an electronic edition available for download on the sources page
• if the elucidation immediately preceding the book entry in the Fweet collection is a notebook entry (click on the line number in the page-dot-line location reference to check for this), the book entry was probably identified as part of the notebook study (and was probably obtained from the relevant volume of the Deane–Ferrer–Lernout Brepols edition of the Buffalo notebooks or from the later addendum articles published in the GJS)

Classics

This brevity contains shorthands for classical works (in the widest sense of the term and in alphabetical order of the author's name) quoted or referred to within Finnegans Wake. This list is obviously extremely far from being complete and will be added to with time. However, do note that classical works written by a person who is listed under the "People" brevity will be listed there, rather than here (e.g. Swift's works).

Clusters

This brevity contains shorthands – as usual, still an incomplete list – for large or small clusters of related terms found in a relatively large proportion over a relatively small span of the text of Finnegans Wake – a few lines, a paragraph, a couple of pages (or in extreme cases, a chapter or two).

Diacritics

This brevity contains shorthands for accented letters and ligatures. It is useful, if at all, primarily with the Append option to construct search strings containing accented letters. When using shorthands from this brevity, the Ignore Accent option should be turned off, otherwise no elucidations will be found; this is automatically done by the search engine interface as soon as such a shorthand is selected.

• for most diacritics, selecting an uppercase shorthand will return only uppercase instances of that diacritic (by automatically turning off the Ignore Case option)
• for most diacritics, selecting a lowercase shorthand will return either only lowercase instances of that diacritic (if the Ignore Case option is off) or both lowercase and uppercase instances (if on)
• trying to use accented letters typed directly from your keyboard, selected from your operating system's symbol tables, or copy-pasted from some other place (including Fweet itself), instead of using this brevity, will not work

Editorials

This brevity contains shorthands for various unrelated editorial entities that may be of some interest:

• cross-references (in [single brackets]): page-dot-line (or dot-line, if on the same page) references to other locations within Fweet, Finnegans Wake or both; whether you search for them or not, all cross-references (in "Beautified" mode) are hypertext links that may be clicked upon to jump to the referenced location
• speaker (in [[double brackets]]): presumed speaker for a given unit (often paragraph) of Finnegans Wake
• synopsis (in {{double braces}}): a bungling attempt to provide a short descriptive summary for a given unit (often paragraph) of Finnegans Wake (referenced by book, chapter, section (+optional subsection), and subunit, the first three being conventional divisions of Finnegans Wake, the last an arbitrary one); could well be improved by a more knowledgeable reader than myself (especially true for II.4 and III.3)
• variants (in {single braces}), of which there are two subtypes:
  • variations among three major editions of Finnegans Wake, being Faber and Faber 1975 [FnF], Viking 1959 [Vkg] and Penguin 1992 [Png], as well as Joyce's list of Corrections of Misprints in Finnegans Wake [JCM] — the purpose of these is primarily to highlight where the Penguin edition is lacking owing to its being an uncorrected edition (i.e. not incorporating Joyce's post-publication corrections)
  • variations between the published text of Finnegans Wake and Joyce's earlier drafts, where the latter are ideally identified by James Joyce Archive volume and page [JJA], but some are still bearing marks of an older system and are identified by their British Museum manuscript [BMs] or Transition issue [Tr#] location — the purpose of these is primarily to highlight where the published text of Finnegans Wake may perhaps be faulty due to pre-publication transmission errors uncaught by Joyce (note: no attempt is made to list all of these, of which there are many thousands, only a select few that I consider 'more interesting')

Folk Culture

This brevity contains shorthands for several loosely-related categories, such as children's games, proverbs and songs.

Joyce

This brevity contains shorthands for James Joyce's works referred to within the elucidations.

Languages

This brevity, which is rather complete, perhaps too complete, contains shorthands for the many languages appearing in Finnegans Wake.

• note that more that one instance of the same or similar language may appear within the brevity (e.g. Latin and Low Latin, Greek and Modern Greek, French and Old French, &c.)

Minor Characters

This brevity contains shorthands – as usual, still a very incomplete list – for minor characters of Finnegans Wake that are either mentioned repeatedly throughout the book (e.g. Magrath) or appear primarily in one chapter or tale but are referred to elsewhere (e.g. the prankquean). In the latter case, the shorthands usually do not include the numerous occurrences of the characters within their primary chapter or tale.

Motifs

This brevity contains shorthands – as usual, still an incomplete list – for recurring motifs found throughout the text of Finnegans Wake. However, do note that if a motif is directly attributed to a specific person, and that person is listed under the "People" brevity, then that motif will be listed there, rather than here (e.g. Oscar Wilde on fox hunting).

• if a motif requires explication, this will usually be done only once, rather than on every occurrence of the motif; to find and read the explication, simply click on any occurrence of the motif on the results page, thereby displaying all the occurrences of the motif, including the one bearing the explication (this principle, while common especially for motifs, may apply to other shorthands as well, e.g. some of those listed under "People")

Newspapers

This brevity contains shorthands for newspapers and periodicals (in alphabetical order) Joyce is known to have used as sources for Finnegans Wake. Like the "Books" brevity, this one is also very far from being complete.

• if the elucidation immediately preceding the newspaper entry in the Fweet collection is a notebook entry (click on the line number in the page-dot-line location reference to check for this), the newspaper entry was probably identified as part of the notebook study (and was probably obtained from the relevant volume of the Deane–Ferrer–Lernout Brepols edition of the Buffalo notebooks or from the later addendum articles published in the GJS)

Notebooks

This brevity contains shorthands for entries from Joyce's FW notebooks (in tentative chronological order), initially based on the highly-recommended Deane–Ferrer–Lernout Brepols edition of the Buffalo notebooks, supplemented by information from articles published in the GJS and entries from the JJDA, among others. This brevity also offers shorthands to select notebook entries by crayon colour (indicated by a parenthesised single letter after the notebook entry location reference, where (b) stands for blue, (g) for green, (k) for black, (o) for orange, (p) for purple, (r) for red, (w) for brown, (y) for yellow, and ( ) for uncrayoned).

• the format of the notebook references is quite standard where, using "VI.B.6.041f (r)" as an example, "VI.B.6" is B notebook number 6, "041" is page 41, "f" is more-or-less the sixth entry on the page, and "(r)" refers to the entry being cancelled (crossed through) with a red crayon
• there are three major families of notebooks: VI.A (a single large notebook often called Scribbledehobble), VI.B (Joyce's primary notebooks, of which there are around 50), and VI.C (Madame Raphael's — no relation — transcriptions of Joyce's uncrossed entries from the VI.B notebooks, in a much neater hand, but with the occasional transcriptional error, very understandable given Joyce's illegible handwriting)
• there are two numbering systems for the B notebooks: (a) the traditional "VI.B" numbering, in retrospect rather arbitrarily set by Peter Spielberg when cataloguing the notebooks for the University of Buffalo (Peter Spielberg: James Joyce's Manuscripts and Letters at the University of Buffalo, A Catalogue, 1962), (b) the newer "N" numbering developed by Danis Rose, which attempts to number the notebooks in chronological order (Danis Rose: The Textual Diaries of James Joyce, 1995) — additionally, many notebooks also have a non-numeric name, derived from the first entry of the notebook
• the elucidation immediately following the notebook entry in the Fweet collection often contains relevant information related to the entry, primarily its source, if known (click on the line number in the page-dot-line location reference to check for this (or use the Get Following search option))

People

This brevity contains shorthands – as usual, still a very incomplete list – for people, both real and legendary, referred to repeatedly throughout the text of Finnegans Wake, as well as for sayings attributed to them, names or expressions associated with them, and literary works written by them, if any.

Places

This brevity contains shorthands – as usual, still a very incomplete list – for geographical features and locations, both in and outside Dublin and Ireland, referred to repeatedly throughout the text of Finnegans Wake.

Registers

This brevity contains shorthands for linguistic varieties and registers (in the widest sense of the term), such as Slang, Dialect, Dublin or World War I. These shorthands often appear in combination with each other or with "Languages" and "Folk Culture" shorthands (e.g. Anglo-Irish phrase, Triestine Italian Dialect, Dublin Slang).

Shakespeare

This brevity contains shorthands for references to the works of Shakespeare. All the plays are listed, in alphabetical order, including some for which no elucidations are present.

Sigla

This brevity contains shorthands for Joyce's major sigla. Sigla are pictorial ideograms that were used by Joyce to represent the central characters and themes of Finnegans Wake and are similarly used within the Fweet collection. The use of sigla within the elucidations is currently partial and inconsistent at best.

• an elucidation remarking on an allusion to a central character will not read "HCE" or "ALP" or "Shem" or "Shaun" or "Issy", but will instead read "E" or "A" or "C" or "V" or "I"; the terms "HCE" and "ALP" are reserved for referring to the appearance of these letter combinations within Finnegans Wake

Symbols

This brevity contains shorthands for miscellaneous symbols appearing in the elucidations and/or in the text of Finnegans Wake, none of them extremely useful.

• trying to use symbols typed directly from your keyboard, selected from your operating system's symbol tables, or copy-pasted from some other place (including Fweet itself), instead of using this brevity, will not work
• a couple of symbols (the mathematical symbols for 'therefore' and 'because') are not supported by earlier versions of Internet Explorer and Safari for Windows

Utilities

As the search engine page is the central page of the site, it is also burdened with controls allowing access to utilities remotely related to the searching process (mostly just fancy links to other pages) .

• the "Bibliography" page lists the books, articles and personal contributions of authors, editors and contributors, whose work has allowed the formation of the collection and enabled the creation of the search engine
• the "Catalogue" page lists all changes inflicted upon this website since its on-line inception
• the "Readings" page archives audio recordings of portions of Finnegans Wake
• the "Sources" page lists electronic editions of some of the books used by Joyce as source books (i.e. those under the "Books" brevity)
• the "Tips" page lists the "Tips of the Month" that have appeared on the Fweet email newsletter
• the Recommended Citation utility is just a recommended example for those brave souls wishing to cite this website (but be forewarned that, given the fluidity of the electronic medium, no guarantee is made that what you quote will remain unchanged or remain at all); the "Last updated" date is the actual date of the last update of the site, the "Last viewed" data is the current date, and both form an integral part of the citation

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