Your thoughts on Ulysses

[S.MacConmidhe]

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[Victoria2133]

I'm surprised this hasn't gotten any responses yet.

I will say that I first read Ulysses for a class that dedicated ten weeks to the novel. At first I wondered how you could fill ten weeks with one novel. Obviously, I was baffled by the end of the course at how much we didn't have time to discuss. I appreciated the novel for a work of genius, connected with Bloom and felt great sympathy for Molly, but I didn't actually love the novel. Until I attended the James Joyce summer school in Dublin two weeks ago. I left with a newly-cultivated love affair for the novel. I'm in the process of reading it again very slowly. Three pages a day at the most. I want to do some more study of Molly and Bloom and the way their guilt over having lost a son manifests throughout the novel. Any thoughts?

[Nemo Neem]

It's my all-time favorite book. I have to say that James Joyce is a literary genius. The book is so surreal, so decayed, and yet humorous at the same time...and also very perverted. A great piece of literature!

[ed_shaw]

I read not so much for the narrative, but, rather, for the brilliance.
I don't have much patience with Joyce's ramblings. I have learned to screen the
stream of consciousness, and do screen it in favor of the diamond miner's eagerness for the gems. Reader does not have to look very far in this book for memorable pieces of writing.

[blazeofglory]

I am reading this book not for fun or entertainment, and it has little of them at least on my level. I understand little but I am really wooed to read it for I do not know what engages me in this very tough book, may be the art of the book and nothing else in point of fact

[ed_shaw]

For example, on page 131 in the Modern Library edition,
consider this paragraph for humor.

What was their civilisation?...........
....It is meet to be here. Let us construct a watercloset."

James Joyce can be very funny.

[blazeofglory]

For example, on page 131 in the Modern Library edition,
consider this paragraph for humor.

What was their civilisation?...........
....It is meet to be here. Let us construct a watercloset."

James Joyce can be very funny.

Of course the funniest part of him despite his rigors is what charms all of us and we are really hooked to his difficult writings in point of fact. He is not just pedantic, at times he becomes so unhurried and relaxed with humor and hilarity

[Nemo Neem]

...each contemplating the other in both mirrors of the reciprocal flesh of theirhisnothis fellowfaces.

Now that's funny!

[Nobodaddy]

I dug into Ulysses a couple weeks ago after having read alot ABOUT it and about Joyce as well and also after reading "Portrait" and "Stephen Hero" to prepare me.

I've thankfully had some guides with me to help navigate through difficult chapters but so far it's been a great reading experience. I'm up to "Sirens" now and I think the book is absolutely incredible.


"Lestrygonians" was so fun to read, up to that point of the book it's the longest chapter but I breezed through it so fast because it's written so well and so stimulating to read. He not only paints vivid pictures but does so with the most beautiful words. I also loved "Scylla and Charybdis" and the episode I've just finished, "Wandering Rocks"

It's incredible how ahead of his time Joyce was, and The Wandering Rocks is a great example. It's just one chapter of his mighty book and, according to his letters, it's sort of an interlude but what a virtuoso piece of writing brilliance!! He weaves the vignettes together like a film and basically constructs Dublin, both physically and socially, out of words. All while that little crumpled throwaway that Bloom tossed away earlier floats along the Liffey which weaves the pieces together like a thread.

I saw an excellent movie not too long ago called "Paris, je t'aime" and immediately recognized that they took that entire theme from Joyce's Wandering Rocks.



From a macro-cosmic perspective it's fascinating and brilliant, but from the microcosmic it's perhaps even better. The sentences are rich, especially the thoughts and words of Stephen. I just absolutely love it and, from what I've read, it's going to get even better now as I drift into the realm of the Sirens, Cyclops, and Nausicaa.

[ed_shaw]

I think Joyce must have had quite an influence on movie writers and directors.
A fine example on page 381 of the Modern Library edition, 374 of the original:
He's lost in thought, the reader not knowing exactly where he is, Bloom, that is,
deep in thought. Suddenly, external reality comes into the picture, as he
looks down at something on the ground. The sequence goes like this:

".....Must nail that ad of Keyes's. Work Hynes and Crawford.
Petticoats for Molly. She has something to put them in. What's that?
Might be money.
Mr. Bloom stooped and turned over a piece of paper on the strand.
He brought it near his eyes and peered...... "

The reader had not known Bloom was walking along the seashore, thinking
and talking to himself. There is a hint of where Bloom is. Then the details.
Very similar to what became the techniques of the modern cinema, 1920's
and 1930's.
This is part of the fun of reading Ulysses. It is so unique.

[mansoor7]

you have pointed out to something very interesting and thought provoking in the great novel ulysses.

[ed_shaw]

With your permission, mansoor7, astute of you to take note of that. I say that with impugnity because, at 65 years, and after several aborted attempts dating back to
my college days, the book finally took hold; you could say I wouldn't give up.
Any rate, I'm making notes in the margin as a aid to referring back, and would be
happy to share an annotation or two with you, if you'd wish.
Now, I am just past that break point on page 429 (421) where about 200 pages
of what looks like scripted material emerges. What do you make of that section,
if you don't mind my asking? (The exchange with Mrs. Breen was great.)

[Carmilla]

I didn't like the book at all! What a waste of time it was! I don't know why I kept on reading it, I guess it was because I wanted to know how it would end. Mr. Joyce knew a lot of things, there's no doubt about that, but this was a book I could definitely put down.

[mcgrunt]

Took me years but I finally got it read. It was worth the wait and the effort. I kept trying which included reading Richard Ellmann's biography James Joyce.

[mcgrunt]

I would also add that Anthony Burgess' REJOYCE was a huge help.

[kev67]

I am not really enjoying or understanding that much, but it is the biggest beast out there that I have not read, possibly excepting War and Peace. When I have finished it I will mount its head on the wall. Then I may read another book that explains what it means and why it's so good.

[kev67]

I am over a third the way through. It's more verse than prose. My copy is 930 pages long, but I think you could just read ten pages of each 100, and you would not miss much. You would get 90% of the experience for 10% of the effort. At least that is my impression up to now. It might be different when it gets to Molly Bloom's bit. I think that basically it's just too hard. It reminds me of Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas. Maybe Dylan Thomas was inspired by Ullysses. However, Under Milk Wood is easier to understand, enjoyable, and nowhere near as long. Maybe if I had another twenty IQ points I would think a lot more of Ullysses.

[Jackson Richardson]

I realised that I got all the references to Gilbert and Sullivan. And then thought how many other references to contemporary popular Dublin culture am I missing?

[Danik 2016]

It seems a post of mine got lost.

But, never mind. I think the particularity of the readers of "Ulisses" and "Finnegans Wake" is that each of them is unique in the sense that not two of them have the same references. In this sense, each reader of Joyce is reading a different book.

[kev67]

The book is making more sense now. The writing changes in style quite a bit. I enjoyed the pub scenes. The drinkers were talking nationalist politics, but reported in a satirical way by the narrator.

[kev67]

I was understanding it, but now I'm not understanding it again. James Joyce seems to have changed the standard word order of grammatical English for some reason. Maybe he has borrowed the word order from another language, perhaps ancient Greek or Irish. I expect that is thrilling to somebody.

[kev67]

I have been googling why Ulysses is good, and I found this (https://www.avclub.com/ulysses-turns-100-this-month-and-you-should-totally-re-1823524706) section:

Ulysses, in other words, is a justification of the effort it takes to read Ulysses. Hence the overwhelming cult around it. Go wandering into its labyrinth and you come out changed by the effort. But—and this is my point—you will find your way out, and you’ll be changed, in some measure, by the experience, too.


I reckon I will probably finish it unless something unfortunate happens to me first. But will I be a changed person? If so, which part of me will change and will it be for the better? Human beings are very complex, and in order to assess change, one needs to record a before and after state. Perhaps I should make an appointment with a psychologist so I can do some personality tests.

[Danik 2016]

I think the effort of reading Ulisses is in itself unusual, because it is an difficult book and one of the great universal books it took much knowledge to write, like Cervante's, D. Quixote and Dante´s Divine Comedy. It has also been an cult object at universities, partly by people who haven´t read it.

So, go ahead!

[kev67]

I have finished it and I do feel different. I feel smug. Just don't test me on it.

[Danik 2016]

Lol!No one is going to test you unless you use it for a thesis! You now belong to the club of the selected few who have readJoyce´s Ulysses.Congrats!

[kev67]

Yes, there are only two types of people in the world:those who have read James Joyce's Ullyses and other people. I would hate to be one of those other people.

[Danik 2016]

Now You are exaggerating, Kev. Don´t forget we are majority :D.

If you are getting nostalgic of Joyce, there is Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, which focus on Stephen Dedalus, if you haven´t read it already. This one I have read a long time ago.

[Danik 2016]

Now don´t overdue it, Kev. Don´t forget we are majority :D.

If you are getting nostalgic of Joyce, there is Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, which focus on Stephen Dedalus, if you haven´t read it already. This one I have read a long time ago.