Joyce also turned his hand to theatre and, inspired by the work of Henrik Ibsen, produced Exiles in 1914. Exiles features many of the themes that pop up repeatedly in Joyce’s work but, unlike A Portrait of the Artists as a Young Man and Ulysses (between which Exiles was produced), never managed to attain the […]
Reader’s Guide
Chamber Music
Although not renowned for his poetry, Joyce’s work in this area is accomplished. Chamber Music is a collection of thirty-six poems, all accessible to the Joycean novice. Chamber Music is essentially a collection of love poems written in different styles, composed and revised between 1901 and 1906. Elkin Mathews of London published the first edition […]
Finnegans Wake
Finnegans Wake, Joyce’s final work, was created over a period of sixteen years with composition starting in 1923. It was finally completed and published in May 1939. Like all of Joyce’s works Finnegans Wake was dogged by publication controversy. The obscurity of the text meant that many lost faith in his last artistic venture, finding […]
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
In this novel, Joyce sets forth the childhood, adolescence and early manhood of Stephen Dedalus, a character who represents his own alter ego in both A Portrait and Ulysses. He travels through Stephen’s mind and soul allowing us to experience his mental and spiritual development whilst witnessing the physical changes he goes through as he […]
Dubliners
Dubliners is a collection of vignettes of Dublin life at the end of the 19th Century written, by Joyce’s own admission, in a manner that captures some of the unhappiest moments of life. Some of the dominant themes include lost innocence, missed opportunities and an inability to escape one’s circumstances. Joyce’s intention in writing Dubliners, […]
