James JoyceLife and Work (1882-1941)

Modernism Challenged traditional attitudes about

God, humanity, and society. Scientific and industrial advances

caused social upheaval: Discontinuity Fragmentation Alienation Despair

Brief Bio Declining middle-class family, more than 12

children Reduced to poverty by his father’s drinking Received a classical education at Jesuit school At University College, he rejected his religion

and national heritage / alienated writer Believed typical citizens of Dublin lived lives

of mediocrity, sentimentality, and self-deception

Settled in Paris (1920-death) among artists

Technique Stream of consciousness: reveals

character’s thoughts as they experience them Ulysses was censored in the US until 1933

because of these uninhibited thoughts Moment of Epiphany: “sudden

spiritual manifestation, whether in the vulgarity of speech or gesture or in a memorable phase of the mind itself.”

His Writing Even though he lived in Paris, his writing was

always about Dublin, the “center of paralysis” Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1915):

Protagonist who rejects custom and tradition If the artists was to see clearly and report freshly

what he saw, it was necessary to stand outside the commonplace responses to experience derived from family, church, or country.

Ulysses (1922)- his masterpiece – one day in the life of Irish-Jew, Leopold Bloom, who represents a microcosm of all human experience

Most Challenging Work Finnegan’s Wake (1939): His most

challenging work Experimental – plays with language within

a fluid dream world – character’s experiences evolve into expanding meanings produced through complex allusions and elaborate puns in multiple languages

Deep, lasting influence on literature

Dubliners Joyce’s quarrel with his native city, and his homage

to it Most accessible of Joyce’s work 15 stories about characters who struggle with

oppressive morality, plodding routines, somber shadows, self-conscious decency, restless desires, and frail gestures toward freedom

Made up of quiet moments that turn out to be important

Called it “a chapter of the moral history of my country”

Causes of paralysis: Catholicism, family life, economy, vulnerability to political forces