Dubliners

Written by James Joyce

Narrated by Emma Hignett

Seven of the short stories in the collection called Dubliners read by Emma Hignett. Includes The Sisters, An Encounter, Dubliners Araby, Eveline, After The Race, Two Gallants, and A Little Cloud

• Language: English
• Publisher: Saland Publishing
• Release date: Jan 12, 2011
• ISBN: 9781908338969

James Joyce

James Joyce (1882–1941) was an Irish poet, novelist, and short story writer, considered to be one of the most influential authors of the 20th century. His most famous works include Dubliners (1914), A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), Ulysses (1922), and Finnegans Wake (1939).

Reviews for Dubliners

[jackmessenger-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I reread this every few years and am always amazed. It culminates with The Dead, one of the most evocative stories I know. John Huston?s film of The Dead is similarly masterful.

[jamesmscott-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

"The Dead" is worth the price of admission here. It is the longest and, by far in my view, the best story in Joyce's famous collection of glimpses of life in turn of 19th century Dublin.

[maxernst11 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Verzameling korte verhalen, nogal wisselend van niveau, geen meesterwerken maar wel gedegen vakmanschap. Gemeenschappelijk katholieke verwijzingen, band met Dublin. Telkens een schokkende gebeurtenis voor de betrokken persoon. Apart: langere essay The Dead, subliem-wervelend.

[meredk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Such wonderful writing! The book gets better the further you go, because the stories create a vivid picture of a city and time. Although these are short stories, in one sense this is a novel. Makes me think of "Winesburg, Ohio" (which I just realized I need to add to my list of books read).

[mykl8s · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Not so pleasant to read, maybe, but engrossing. And, of course, "The Dead" Joyce's very famous story about life.

[eavans-914612 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm sat here with a missed flight to Dublin in the Toronto airport and I really enjoyed the stories but I actually just want to be in the Irish National Gallery looking at Caravaggio's Taking of Christ instead of this place with weird French and a weirdly amazing duty free store. I guess the last story "The Dead" made me cry.

Please pity like this.

[castlelass · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Compilation of fifteen short stories set in early 1900s Dublin. The stories are vignettes of life. As with most short story collections, I liked some more than others, but they are all high quality. My favorites are A Painful Case, A Mother, and The Dead. The tone is quiet and melancholy. The writing is superb. I listened to the audio book, read masterfully by Jim Norton. The audio includes snippets of music recordings of the era, which added to the atmosphere.

[tjsjohanna_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two things that struck me about these short stories. One, the writing is so vivid. Mr. Joyce focuses a tight lens on the details - and everything comes alive. Two, these stories are less stories in the sense of narrative than stories in the sense of catching a glimpse of a life - like looking through a window at a moment or two in an on-going story. The trick in this is that the window catches just that moment that tells the whole story.

[sriddell_8 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The stories are all very well-written. But I found the overall whole to be depressing.

[kristelh_15 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Reason Read: Books from European Capitals, Dublin, ROOTThis is a work of short stories, published in 1914. They are stories of ordinary people living in Dublin. I've read several other James Joyce including Ulysses and finally got this one read which has been on my shelf since 2016. Many of his characters from this book appear in Ulysses. Glad I've read it and it would have been nice to read it alongside Ulysses though I doubt that I take that on again. But...maybe

[pgchuis · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I read (most of) these short stories for my OU course. This particular edition has an absurd number of 'helpful' footnotes, which I gradually learnt to ignore unless I was really struggling with the meaning. I came to this collection with the idea that Joyce was difficult to read, but these were not that difficult really, other than one about an election, which I gave up on.I can see that they are good, but I didn't particularly enjoy them and the mood was so depressing throughout.

[geoffsc-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I have finally got round to reading this classic.
I loved his concise descriptive language.
His characters were alive and believable.
But I don't think I'm ready to tackle Ulysses yet!

[varielle_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I once got robbed in Dublin. It doesn't seem that much has changed. This is the first Joyce that I successfully slogged through. Bleak. Despairing. Half the characters are drunk and beating their families and the other half are wallowing in misery. Not recommended unless you are suicidally depressed and are looking for something to push you over the edge.

[larryking1-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Sure, this collection was written by none other than James Joyce, but let's be perfectly honest: this book encapsulates what Thoreu was talking about when he stated the obvious: "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." After finishing this collection of failed lives, broken dreams, religious superstition, alcoholic excess, harsh memories, heartbreak, double-dealing, etc, I am going to need lots of ice cream to cleanse my palate of from the taste of a 'why even bother' mentality. And to think that my Irish grandmother was living in these very streets as this book was written! No wonder she left! Despair at its most relentless; as one character notes, "I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger." And he was one of the lucky ones!

[currerbell-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A reread of Dubliners, which I haven't read in half a century. A first read of the Norton Critical Edition with its supplementary materials. Dubliners could get 5***** on its own, but the supplementary materials in this NCE are absolutely superb, even better than the usually excellent NCE material. Especially good were Howard Ehrlich's " 'Araby' in Context: The 'Splendid Bazaar,' Irish Orientalism, and James Clarence Mangan" and Victor Cheng's "Empire and Patriarchy in 'The Dead'."

[nmele_4 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I hadn't read Joyce's collection of short stories in years when I opened this paperback and began. I had forgotten how swiftly he renders his characters and how details he describes help define the characters and the movement in his stories. This collection stands the test of time and ha for a century.

[brakketh-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lovely collection of stories about Dublin.

[vinjii-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Dubliners was my attempt to get into Joyce's work. I'd like to read Ulysses one day, but so far I haven't quite dared to tackle it. This is a collection of short stories that I hoped would gently introduce me to Joyce's writing. The stories are easy to understand and I enjoyed the prose. I'm definitely keeping his other work on my tbr list and would recommend Dubliners to anyone who wants a taste of James Joyce.

[thesmellofbooks · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I finished the last story in this collection last night--Christmas Eve, coincidental with the story taking place on Christmas night. I have enjoyed every one of the tales in this book, the light brushstrokes with which each character and scene is painted, the reliance on simple human circumstances rather than action-heavy, moralistic plotlines. They rise from the page, leaving me with the sorts of emotions--wistfulness, annoyance, regret, joy--that I know well from real life. Beautiful.

[randymetcalfe · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Quite apart from the perfection of “The Dead,” death permeates the stories, vignettes, character sketches and emotional revues of Dubliners. A death is announced in the first sentence of the first story, “Sisters.” Whether in the foreground or mentioned in passing, deaths are just part of life for those who live in Dublin. When death gets title billing in that final story, it is hardly surprisingly to find Joyce reaching some kind of summative view on the matter with the snow now general across all of Ireland.This time reading Dubliners, I was struck by the “The Sisters,” “An Encounter,” and, as ever, “Araby.” But also “The Boarding House,” and “A Mother.” Yet standing apart from all of them is “The Dead.” It is so much more complete, so much more complex, so much more human and humane, and sadder. It truly is the culmination.Highly recommended, every time you read it.

[dele2451 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Melancholy stories of working class Irish men and their beleaguered women. Incredibly beautiful sentences about somewhat sad lives.

[turambar-3 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

There is so very much which can be said about the power of Joyce's early style and the fact that it's equally present in the very shortest story of the collection, "Evaline," and the longest, most novelistic story, "The Dead." But many people have already said whatever I could say. Instead I will merely offer up the following; Dubliners taught me what a short story has the potential to be.

[dono421846 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Like so many others, I read this collection in hopes of gathering momentum to attack Ulysses. I do think I acquired a better sense of his style, which is full portraiture of ordinary events. Little happens that qualifies as dramatic, yet the reader is still pulled along through the narratives. It is difficult to imagine why Joyce had such challenges getting this book published. But I suppose any group can blush at such an unromantic and truthful account of its members. Onward, I suppose, to Portrait.

[reread-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Thoroughly enjoyed reading these short stories - the first I have read of Joyce. I've the centennial edition and the pages are cut in a serrated style which. is. AMAZING.What I didn't like, however, was the "Index" at the back of the book explaining Irish colloquialisms, which I obviously didn't mind, but it also felt the need to refer to every street name and bible/religious tones - something I tired of checking halfway through the book. Man, did that drag.

[cecrow · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Reading this collection was the first step of my master plan to tackle Mount Ulysses. Dubliners is said to be Joyce's most accessible work in addition to his earliest, so it seemed like the logical place to start. The reading is easy, but I was no further than the end of the first story, "The Sisters", when I turned to Sparknotes.com to ensure I wasn't missing something. Joyce purposely outlines and hints but doesn't fill in the whole puzzle; nothing much seems to happen, and in a sense that's the point. There's only what's on the surface, the theme rather than the events: how death makes us feel paralyzed by its strangeness, its simultaneous presence and lack thereof. In the subsequent stories he portrays other things besides death that unbalance us, leaving us faltering and disconnected: loss of innocence, exposure to illness or madness, first love, rebellion, intoxication, dull routine. Through these episodes we may gain insight that promises to guide us towards living our lives more fully, but insight alone is not enough. Positive change requires action but these characters are doomed to paralysis: they sentence themselves to understanding the truth of their chosen lot while doing nothing about it. Some stories hit painfully close to home, triggering my own regrets about opportunities I've passed on or the risks I didn't take.This collection has more unity than just its theme: there is also the locale of the title with which the theme is closely associated. These tales are meant to describe the plight of Dubliners and the Irish in general as a downtrodden lot. Some of the stories such as "Two Gallants" speak to this more directly than others through symbolism and mood. I still find them universally applicable. There's also a subtle aging in how the stories are ordered, the first being that of a child, up to the last about man who has been married for several years. Every age must contend with the same choice placed before them, to live or merely to exist. It isn't impossible to make the right choice, only improbable because our greatest obstacle is ourselves.

[jujunna · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'm currently re-reading this book (the Norton edition) for perhaps the 8th time (or maybe more), in preparation for teaching it this fall semester. The wonderful thing about these short, pithy stories is that you CAN re-read them many times and get something more from them with every re-reading.

At first glance, they're pretty depressing, realistic portraits of life in turn-of-the-century Dublin. But a closer reading reveals rich underpinnings of symbol, allusion, even allegorical contexts. And the reader who persists, getting through all the stories to the last one, "The Dead," will be rewarded with a final vision of Irish hospitality and celebration, closing with a sense of equanimity (though not everyone reads the final passage this hopefully).

Joyce never fails to disappoint.

[jvioland_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Joyce was a fantastic writer. That is until he perpetrated the greatest fraud in the history of literature by producing "Ulysses" and resting on his laurels. He followed with an even more outrageous work "Finnegan's Wake" which I believe tweaked the noses of the literati, making it so incomprehensible that it "must be good". Bull. His "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" and "Dubliners" proved his gift. "Ulysses" and "Finnegan's Wake" show his sense of outrageous humor concerning his worshipers.

[sloopjonb · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The rating is for 'The Dead', the only story I have so far read, which was an incredible piece of writing. If only Joyce had carried on this vein, and not vanished up his own fundament, the show-off.

[gbill_7 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

15 short stories which paint a picture of life in “dear, dirty Dublin” in the first decade of the 20th century. It’s a little uneven, with some of the stories too short or less interesting, yet is certainly worth reading. My favorites were “A Little Cloud”, in which a man comes to grips with his failed literary dreams and the idea that his baby son was now getting all of the attention from his wife, and the last story, “The Dead”, which has an awkward and insecure man pondering life and death, and just how little he knows about his wife’s past. That gives you a taste for the moments of self-realization, or ‘epiphanies’, the characters in these unflinchingly honest stories feel.

[thatotter-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Really liked The Dead. Some of the others had their moments, but I didn't like that most of them were more like vignettes than actual short stories.