Reddit mentions of FINNEGANS WAKE

> What suggestions do you have for Finnegan's Wake?

This is why reddit is so great. I live for this question, and no one would ever ask me this irl.

My main suggestion is to get a copy with 628 pages so it will match up with Annotations to Finnegans Wake and other scholarly books -- and also you want a copy with all of Joyce's corrections incorporated.

For paperbacks, I am a fan of the [1976 Penguin edition] (http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0013SOYIC/ref=tmm_pap_used_olp_sr?ie=UTF8&condition=used&qid=&sr=) with the green stripe across the cover -- just make sure it's not the one that says "Centennial edition" (1982) on it; that one is a pretty crappy copy. The 1976 is a nice copy, but the type is pretty small.

The Oxford 2012 has a 10 page outline which will probably be pretty cool to have. It lines up page per page with the classic edition (628 pages) so that Annotations to FW will work. It incorporates all the author's corrections. Same issue as the Penguin 1976 -- the type isn't very big, or so I've been told. At this point, the Oxford is getting so expensive that you might as well get a nice hardcover.

Or if you want something a little fancier, here's a post I made about finding a nice hardcover edition: https://www.reddit.com/r/jamesjoyce/comments/2aqkc7/guide_to_finding_a_nice_hardcover_edition_of/

Here's another thread about recommended editions: https://www.reddit.com/r/jamesjoyce/comments/2ya85b/finnegans_wake_edition/

Why it matters...

The differences between the texts are indeed substantial, if you want to read what Joyce wrote rather than a bunch of typos. The original 1939 edition, as you might imagine, was full of typos and errors. Joyce spent 2 years correcting these errors.

This would merely be scholarly trivia... except they have started selling the 1939 typo-riddled edition again. The [1999 Penguin edition] (http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51e-laTWynL._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg) is a reprint of the 1939 edition that is full of typos.

If you want to see how extensive the typos are and whether they will affect your enjoyment, here is a PDF of the 15 pages of typos that were laboriously corrected by Joyce and finally incorporated into the book in 1958: www.rosenlake.net/fw/Corrections-Misprints-Finnegans-Wake-1945.pdf

You can tell right away if you have a corrected edition by looking at page 4 (the second page of text) -- if lower in the first paragraph it says "But was iz? Iseut? Ere were sewers?" with question marks -- then it's a corrected edition. The uncorrected edition has exclamation marks.

Here is a good site listing various editions: http://www.rosenlake.net/fw/FWeditions.html