"In his preface to A Finnegans Wake Gazetteer, Louis Mink says that the time for naïve enjoyment of Finnegans Wake is past. He says that now we are obliged to continue the scholarly unravelling of its mysteries. And an editorial in a magazine published at the Centre Pompidou says that the most urgent and important art work to be done now is to come to an analytical understanding of the art of the twentieth century. I don't agree. I think that we can still at unexpected moments be surprised by the beauty of the moon though now we can travel to it. And I think that the artists of the twentieth century who resist our understanding are the ones to whom we shall continue to be grateful. Besides Joyce there is Duchamp. And Satie whose work, though seemingly simple, is no less difficult to understand than that of Webern. Somewhere in the Wake Joyce says 'Confusium hold'em!' I hope that Roaratorio will act to introduce people to the pleasures of Finnegans Wake when it is still on the side of poetry and chaos rather than something analyzed and known to be safe and law-abiding." -John Cage
