Joyce's abandoned early draft of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, published posthumously in 1944. It recurs across the series in two registers: as Bob's source for the digestive system as the universal common element (which he builds into his series of "stomachs"), and as Cameron's evidence for how McLuhan read Joyce toward "the medium is the message." New to it — start with dialogue 08 for the "apprehensive faculty" passage.
Across the dialogues
Systematized into Bob's ascending series of "stomachs," from the chemical body to the Android Meme
Bob turns the book's digestive figure into a system — an ascending series of stomachs, from the chemical body up to the Android Meme.
"I've systematized"
Its "apprehensive faculty must be scrutinized in action" read by Cameron as the hinge from the 1930s to "the medium is the message"
Cameron makes the book's line the hinge of McLuhan's whole development — to examine the apprehensive faculty in action is to look at its medium, which McLuhan called it impossible to exaggerate the importance of.
"the apprehensive faculty must be scrutinized in action."
Placed in McLuhan's 1950 turn — the rereading of Joyce, through Lewis and Pound, that produced the great early Joyce essays
Connections
Joyce's abandoned early draft of A Portrait of the Artist, published posthumously in 1944 — the source of the "apprehensive faculty" passage.
McLuhan's gloss on the "apprehensive faculty must be scrutinized in action" line is, for Cameron, a bridge from the 1930s to "the medium is the message."
From the book's digestive-system-as-universal-element, Bob systematizes his ascending series of "stomachs" up to the Android Meme.