Dogsbody

Forms: dogsbody

Related terms/ideas: Dog/s, body/ies, dogskull, dogsniff, bitchbody

Explication:

In Ulysses, the term “dogsbody” only occurs five times. The first time it is used condescendingly by Buck to describe Stephen, and the second use occurs almost immediately after, as Stephen internalizes the term and refers to himself as a dogsbody. The other two instances occur in Episode three as Stephen watches a dog sniff the carcass of another dog. Interestingly in this instance, the term is actually used to describe the body of the dead dog, and follows the terms “dogskull” and “dogsniff”. Thus in the second two instances, it used like many of Joyce’s other combined words and literally means the body of a dog.

In the first two instances of its use between Buck and Stephen, Buck uses this term to call attention to Stephen’s need of appropriate clothing and secondhand clothes, which seems to be an incorrect use of the word. A few passages later, Stephen looks in a mirror and seems slightly repulsed at his face, thinking “Who chose this face for me? This dogsbody to rid of vermin” (episode 3). He seems to internalize Buck’s insult, but again does not use the term in its dictionary definition. In Ulysses, this second definition of “dogsbody” seems to be an insulting term for someone who appears to be of a lower class, a status which is marked by secondhand clothing and an association with pests.

The term again resurfaces for a final time in the Circe episode, as an imaginary Buck Mulligan tells Stephen “The mockery of it! Kinch dogsbody killed her bitchbody. She kicked the bucket” (episode 15). Again, this term becomes associated with Buck, Stephen, death, and corpses. From its five uses in the novel, the word emerges with two somewhat distinct definitions; the first falls into Joyce’s familiar custom of putting two words together that literally mean those two words. An example of this first described instance comes from Episode 3, as Stephen watches a dog sniff another dead dog’s body. However, the second definition is slightly more complicated. It is a term that Buck calls Stephen to insult him, one that becomes associated with his body, physical appearance, and lack of appropriate clothing. That said, once Buck calls Stephen a dogsbody, Stephen seems to internalize it as a source of shame, which further becomes visible as he associates the term with his mother’s death in Circe.

The bodies of actual dogs are also important to the novel as well. Many dogs appear throughout the novel, but there are two that are specifically interesting. In “Cyclops”, the dog Garryowen appears to belong to the citizen, but we later find out he is owned by Giltrap (who is Gerty MacDowell’s grandfather). Garryowen seems to mainly exist in the novel as a tool of intimidation–as he mostly sits and growls–but there is an odd moment in which the citizen “starts hauling and mauling and talking to [Gerryown] in Irish and the old towser growling, letting on to answer, like a duet in the opera” (episode 12). In Circe, Bloom is followed by a dog that he imagines is continuously changing its body, as it becomes a retriever, a wolfdog, and mastiff. He feeds the dog the organs that he has been carrying, but it continues to follow him throughout the episode, and the occasional bark or dog noise is mentioned in the narration.

 Definitions and examples:

Noun:

1. naut. slang: Peas boiled in a cloth, pease pudding (sea biscuits softened in water, with sugar added)

   –On the ship, the sailors were regularly served dogsbody.

2. a junior officer or midshipman

   –Lyle had just joined the navy, so he was known as a dogsbody on the ship.

3. colloq. a person who is given menial tasks

   –Having just joined the crew, Matthew was forced to do the terrible jobs of a dogsbody.

Verb

4. to act or work as a dogsbody; to carry out menial tasks.

–New cops on the force must do their time dogsbodying and patrol traffic.

Related topics:

dirty clothing, corpses, bodies, Kinch/Stephen Dedalus, Buck Mulligan