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The writing is very straight-forward, with the occasional subtle nuance which escalates this compendium into the realm which we now classify as literature. Honestly, I fell right in to his technique (which is how it's presented here) and discovered that this practice makes for very palatable reading. To save time it's best to just note that Joyce encountered discord in getting this work published because various influential factions found it to be "blasphemous." This outdated assessment represents the Irish Catholic View of the age which had somehow carried over from the Victorian Period. These people were subjugated by archaic laws, dissolute politicians, greedy employers, by one another, but most of all by the hop and grain.
In the end, this work of top British (Irish) literature eventually saw publication in 1914.Joyce embraced certain caveats which he wanted included via the publishing process -- he used dashes to set out dialogue instead of quotation marks as he considered the latter to manifest unnecessary baggage. First, a little about the Modern Library edition.Astute scholars have toiled quite diligently here to preserve the fifteen stories which make up this work in the precise way that James Joyce himself wanted them presented. At times James is as morbidly dreary as Dostoyevsky in Crime and Punishment (Wordsworth Classics) and at others he panders a level of acerbity which William Faulkner conveyed in As I Lay Dying (Norton Critical Edition). The Irish poor somehow managed to live a slightly more civilized existence than the aforementioned groups but they were still enslaved to their overwhelming social burdens -- Joyce brought these actualities to life. He also wanted many corrections made to the original text and as many as possible were included in this 1993 edition.As to the stories, I savor Joyce to the highest degree because I can relate to his paradigm -- my own writing is quite like his.
These are all culturally folksy tales of Dublin salt-of-the-earth residents.Each story chiefly focuses upon members of a repressed society, the urban working Irish at the outset of the 20th Century. He lifted the mundane, indeed the melancholy, to the plateau of the melodramatic without being in the least exploitive of their collective plight. Today one might characterize these tales as very slightly irreverent, if that. Alcohol was as vast a problem for the Irish as it has historically been for both Russians and Native American Indians. I am James Joyce just as Dan Quayle was JFK.
Anyway, here we have fifteen fictional accounts over the course of 286 pages (the product description is incorrect). The ultimate consequence for all three cultures has been essentially equivalent. His writing style, especially his vague story conclusions, best lend themselves to suit the analytic ponderer.If you would like to begin your reading of Joyce in chewable bites rather than tearing into Ulysses (Penguin Modern Classics) or Finnegans Wake (Penguin Modern Classics) then this book is precisely what you're seeking.Highly recommended.
I especially appreciate the editor's notes in this edition, which clarify a range of topics, including Dublin topography, vocabulary and slang that has gone out of usage, obsolete social and political matters. Indeed, each story is linked to the next by recurrent vocabulary and imagery--for instance, conceptual images of light and dark, vision & blindness, paralysis, and death--among others--to be understood both literally and figuratively.
I can only tell you the reasons why I adore this book. Since Amazon seems to have lumped reviews of sundry editions under one category, I have specified the exact edition on which I am commenting instead of a proper title for my review.It would be presumptuous of me to comment upon Joyce's prose, which in "Dubliners"--in my reader's opinion--seems flawless.
The stories seem intended to be read in order from beginning to end. Joyce views his residents of Dublin--of various ages and social classes--through a melancholy lens, albeit tinged with grace and humor.
Of all the stories, my favorite is "Araby," which recaptures the expectations, frustrations, and delusions of adolescence. All these images have been interwoven so carefully that unless one is looking for them, they will be noticed only subliminally; they nevertheless contribute to the feeling of satisfaction after Joyce brings them together in his final heartbreaking paragraph, which will linger in one's thoughts long after one has closed the book.
This Penguin Edition is therefore excellent for students as well as for the serious reader.
"I lingered before her stall, though I knew my stay was useless, to make my interest in her wares seem the more real. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Dubliners--By James JoyceJoyce's earlier works are his most accessible and personal. The narrator encounters a series of physical and spiritual experiences, including losing his virginity and wrestling with his faith, on the journey to manhood. In stories like "Araby," the narrator has a sudden revelation or insight (Joyce called it "epiphany") that brings out a significant truth.The boy who narrates "Araby" dreams of going to a street fair where he hopes to meet a girl, but his uncle is late getting home to give him the money.He arrives as the fair is closing, and lingers while the carny's finish their work. Gazing up in the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger."Joyce's language is sparse and economical, but still evocative of a time and mood. He is attracted toward the priesthood because of its ceremony, but afraid of the commitment it requires:"A flame began to flutter on Stephens's cheek as he heard in this (priest's) proud address an echo of his own proud musings.
I allowed the two pennies to fall against the sixpence in my pocket. His semi-autobiographical "Portrait of the Artist" traces the personal and spiritual growth of the protagonist, Stephen Dedalus. Then I turned away slowly and walked down the middle of the bazaar. How often had he seen himself as a priest wielding calmly and humbly the awful power of which angels and saints stood in reverence. He had seen himself, a young and silent-mannered priest, entering a confessional swiftly, ascending to the altar steps, incensing, genuflecting, and accomplishing the vague acts of the priesthood which pleased him by reason of their semblance to reality and of their distance from it." "A Portrait of the Artist" ranks among the finest autobiographical essays like "The Education of Henry Adams." "Dubliners" is more a series of vignettes than a collection of conventional short stories. I heard a voice call from one end of the gallery that the light was out.
Meaney may be remembered from Star Trek: The Next Generation, among others.Dearbhla Molloy recalls Eveline; her rare name may be found at My Dream of You (Rumpole Crime). Keep Joyce alive. Oddly at this moment we find it upon the Amazon only in cassette tape and no longer in Audio CD disk. Ciaran Hinds whispers with a proper, formal and intimate effect so appropriate to the lonesome and private figure in A Painful Case. Professor McCourt wrote, best in the audiobook read by himself, Teacher Man: A Memoir. 1954. Director: Luis Bunuel.
Nevertheless, the Naxos abridged recording of Ulysses (Abridged) (Modern Fiction) is unaccountably offensive and less than useless; the Naxos recording of Dubliners (Part I) is not worthy of one listening, and this is not to mention other great artists such as The Great Poets W B Yeats, which is an obscenity of senseless production decisions, as well as King Lear (Naxos AudioBooks) which wastes our greatest Shakespearean voice on a briefer First Folio reading among minor lights.Caedmon, however, we may always acquire with full confidence, and so, here, as well, with Mr. Unfortunately our fine amazon often combines reviews of products of similar title (and occasionally and most disconcertingly of items with no apparent interelation at all) and so the discerning shopper finds with difficulty reviews specific to a particular product under investigation.And so is the case with this excellent recording by Caedmon of the immortal short stories (and one small novellette) collected by Mr. As mentioned above, the notorious Norton reads Counterparts.We are graced to hear the great Sorcha Cusak read Clay, a tale requiring great sensitivity and wisdom. He is not the Citizens for Decent Literature Keating, nor the banking scandal Keating, but the Irishman. He may be however briefly viewed in The Inspector Lynley Mysteries Series 1, 2, & 3; hear we may easily listen to him repeatedly. This subtle reading is a true tour de force. He is also known for Angela's Ashes: A Memoir and for his several Irish brothers seen in The McCourts of New York.Patrick McCabe reads An Encounter; Colin Meaney recounts the days and night of Araby. Could he be the same found in Luis Bunuel's odd reading of Robinson Crusoe (Full Length.
Mr. Joyce's great short stories (and one small novellette). She may be known to joyceans from Joyce to the World; she has also read This Year it Will Be Different and Other Stories: Unabridged(A Christmas Treasury). The greatest perhaps is TP McKenna, formerly of Inspector Morse - Complete Collection, long of the Dublin theatre, who performs a most nitricate ballet with the several voices speaking in the most complex orchestration of Ivy Day in the Committee Room. Hinds may be seen as well as heard in The Mayor of Casterbridge and Amazing Grace [DVD].
Dan O'Herlihy does the disturbing scenes of After the Race. Read him among several other places at Monk Swimming, A: A Memoir and at Malachy McCourt's History of Ireland (paperback); see him in Beyond the Pale, etc.Donal Donnelly may best be known for the definitive and unabridged reading of Ulysses, an essential possession in every home. Here he graces this present collection with his sensitive rendering of The Boarding House. Joyce under the communal title Dubliners.I despair now of another producer named Naxos, and cannot recommend their products, and find repulsion at the mere name of their Jim Norton, although he also appears here for Caedmon reading the most disturbing and unlistenable story of this strong collection, Counterparts, as his carpet chewing skills are required. McKenna here individualizes each voice, and peoples that dark room entirely and convincingly, as if called upon to sing all four parts, and more, at once, in an oratorial.Fionnula Flanagan strongly presents A Mother in a new reading which must be heard and considered.
I always prefered this tale as read so gently and carefully by Setlock in a version no longer available, as with all of these stories. Charles Keating reads Grace as needed. Dignum et justum est. Stephen Rhea, he of the The Crying Game (Collector's Edition) and of several audiobook readings, gives us truly the Dead.Do all you can to find this in Audiobook CD; the cassette format is also convenient and readily available upon this amazon.
Seek it for it is worth it.For upon this disk we find carefully selected and assigned by Caedmon the greatest and most lyrical of Irish voices (save Norton) to read for our understanding these, our greatest of short stories, and one brief novellette.First in rotation Frank McCourt reads The Sisters. Joyce's abbreviation of the Divine Comedy, in Dublin. Dan O'Herlihy, Jaime Fernandez, Felipe de Alba).Malachy McCourt, brother to Frank and once the great King in a memorable series of ancient televised butter commercials, reads for us Two Gallants, a serendipitous selection. Brendan Coyle reads a Little Cloud.
This tale was Mr. Awaken your heart and soul.
They're not, although by contemporary standards the tales are indeed innovative and excellent. I'd read the book first in the mid-80s, then the early 90s, and just a while back. In attempting a slice of Dublin life of the day Joyce sometimes falls prey to the fallacy that to be `real' he has to show characters doing dull things, or simply describe things too matter-of-factly, rather than letting the epiphanies speak for themselves, by brushing away the `ordinary' excess. The key to that term, however, is that the epiphanies are meant to occur within the reader, not to Joyce's characters.It is legend that Dubliners originally consisted of twelve tales, and that Joyce later added Two Gallants, A Little Cloud, and The Dead, after the original dozen were done by 1905.
But, he said it, at his best, better than most. I don't think that sort of knowledge really matters since the three tales are rather uneven in relationship to each other, so give no idea of Joyce's growth nor stagnation, and certainly not a hint of his later fracturing of narrative, which was already being hailed as Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man was already being serialized in The Egoist magazine when the book finally hint print, almost a decade later in 1914. Thus, his greatest work was unfairly overlooked by the critics of the day.They were generally dismissed as trifles, save for The Dead, although, when the critical tide turned, it turned far too much in the other direction, with virtually every one of the stories being hailed as a masterpiece. I've long proclaimed that Dubliners is Joyce's greatest literary achievement. James Joyce was a great writer, but tales like After The Race, Clay, Ivy Day in the Committee Room, A Mother, and Grace- fully a third of the book, are simply not good stories, for reasons mentioned earlier. It also makes tales like Ivy Day in the Committee Room, laden with political references as arcane as a John Dryden poem, and little real character development, simply not good.
Dramatically, the stories are rather predictable- what separates them from lesser writers' tales is how the expected is unleashed and described.In short, while the argument that Joyce was a great writer, but not great novelist, sticks, the idea that he was without anything to say is demonstrably false. It's just that he did not have a whole lot to say, nor did he have anything particularly new to say.
Not acknowledging that does no good, and only casts the reader and critic in the role of the sciolist professor I encountered.It is only by acknowledging failures that the structures that go under a great work of art- its scaffolding- can be considered and applied by others. While I stand by my initial assessment that it's Joyce's best work, with age, and my own forays into fiction, I see that it is not as good as I once thought, although it still has moments of greatness.The book is fifteen short stories that were mostly written in the years 1904-1905, and were dubbed by Joyce as being `epiphanies'- moments of sudden insight.
It is the fact that Joyce attempts more than contemporary short fictionists, and that this collection is not a mere collection, but a narrative movement, or symphony, with a purpose, that makes the book glow all the more brightly in contrast to the dreck that populates today's fiction. The stories vary greatly in approach, but their tone is too similar, that is- consistently dour, which augured the summation of Joyce as the favorite writer that nobody reads.Also, there is a tendency, in the lesser stories, for Joyce to get stuck in minutiae of the day that means little now, as well as superfluous dialogue designed to add color, yet only adds fat.
Another problem is that in order to show the inertia and decline of Irish culture into paralysis, around the turn of the Twentieth Century, Joyce's stories are essentially without much real conflict- thus their lean into `epiphany'. What most astonishes me, though, as I grow and age, is how little it takes for a person's reputation as an artist, to be founded on.
To not do so is to keep up the curtain that denies that greatness is achievable now, the same sort of lie that Gabriel Conroy's world finally lost in the snow.
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