Why Joyce is a journey too far
HAD you been hovering outside 12 rue de l’Odéon in Paris, home of the famous Shakespeare and Company bookshop, exactly 100 years ago today, you would have been able to watch Sylvia Beach, its proprietor, take delivery of her first venture into publishing: 1,020 newly printed copies of James Joyce’s novel, Ulysses.
The book borrows its structure,, uses interior monologue, pays little heed to narrative or plot and is widely considered one of (if not ) greatest novels of the 20th century. Apparently, after Joyce finished it, he was so exhausted that he barely put pen to paper, not even to write a shopping list, for a year. I can well believe it. The first time I began to read it—not, I add, voluntarily, it was a set book at school—I took a jolly long nap about three pages in.
