Korean Job Discussion Forums

MollyBloom · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Location: James Joyce's pants

I am always interested in discussing Joyce because people have so many opinions on his work.

I, personally, love him. I had a wonderful teacher introduce Ulysses in high school, and then some professors got me into his other works in college, and then in grad school I had a mentor who was a Joyce scholar who really opened up a lot of doors into his writing.

I am going to write about Joyce for my MA thesis, and I have two ideas that I really need to work on narrowing down to one. If anyone wants me to open up that can of worms, let me know. Maybe you folks can help me out with my ideas... Smile

I do get frustrated with the fact that Ulysses and Finnegans Wake are not for everyone. To understand a lot of Ulysses you need to know a lot about Irish politics, Dante, Aquinas, Aristotle, and Vico, not to mention the songs and slang that was popular at that time. The first time I read Ulysses I only got about 1/5th of the book, but after studying it for YEARS I really only started to know what was going on. Finnegans Wake is his only work I have not yet attempted to tackle yet, and to be honest with you, I think that won't happen for a while. Ulysses is just a work that really needs to be studied to be enjoyed, and I wish Joyce had made it more accessible to everyone. Even children can learn and enjoy Shakespeare; damn you Joyce!

I just really see A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Stephen Hero to be good bildungromans. Ulysses I see as a wonderful reference to many other works, and a huge influence on writers in general. It's great to read TS Eliot's works and see the impact Joyce made on his writing.

I also don't really have an opinion on the idea that anyone who likes Joyce is a "snob"; I mean, I can't understand astrophysics... Why would someone feel uncomfortable and need to judge if someone likes Joyce ?

Is it just one of those cultural ideas that the elitists created, or was it the people wanting to be elite that created that stigma? I guess I just don't understand why reading and enjoying Joyce has to have that attachment to it. I learn something new every time I read it, and there are people who study Joyce for their whole lives and never solve his enigmas.

Also to be fair, I don't think as many people read his works now as they did when he wrote them. His writing was "contemporary" and people were getting a basic education in Greek, Latin, Aquinas, etc., so it would be easier to grasp his main ideas.

PGF · Joined: 27 Nov 2006

You should know by now that the world of lit lovers is severely splintered.

Personally, I find Joyce boring. When asked about joyce, I, of course, say it's marvelous, interesting and a blah, blah, blah...

But, I prefer post-modern lit.

MollyBloom · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Location: James Joyce's pants

PGF · Joined: 27 Nov 2006

MollyBloom · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Location: James Joyce's pants

But you must be specific...other wise you are just generalizing.

PGF · Joined: 27 Nov 2006

nicholas_chiasson · Joined: 14 Jun 2007 Location: Samcheok

Joyce is over rated. His entire literary output is quite quite small. Dubliners is a collection of short storeis. Portrait of the Artist might as well be "Portrait of the egoist". Finnigins Wake is unreadable to those not in the 'know' as you hourself have said, and is really a lingusitic joke and a cocked snook at the establishment of the literati. Ulysses is as worst a bad parody of Homer made famous by its "obscenity" and at best a rather introspective view of a dull man. Based on this output, what can one 'discuss?"
(not that Joyce is not influential or even worthy of a certain study, but to devote one's life to such a small canon seems limiting.)

peppermint · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 2:58 am Post subject:

I'd found that the stream of consciousness aspect of Ulysses made it difficult to follow if I'd put it down for a while. I found a good recording of it on audiobook a while back, and that made all the difference.

happeningthang · Joined: 26 Apr 2003

Never thought this would come up again, but this looks like a good place to ask.

I read a JJ short story in high school called, Clay, I think. Part of the Dubliners.

It's about this dull, lonely working woman who goes to a party and they play some game where the woman is blindfolded and she has to choose from some items. She ends up with a ball of clay, but she doesn't seem to know what that means, even though the kids are giggling at her and they're told to shut up - so everyone else gets it.

What the hell is that all about? I've never got an answer to that one.

tfunk · Joined: 12 Aug 2006 Location: Dublin, Ireland

A painter in my house was raving on about Joyce the other day. Apparently Joyce spent a lot of time as a kid/teen in the botanical gardens (Glasnevin) and used some of the Greek/Latin references of herbs etc in his work.

I love the Dubliners. I can't read Ulysses past a few pages, but like the sounds from it.

The painter chap was telling me a joke from the book, something about a slip of paper from the bookies being called something and everybody else misinterpreting it as something else...they thought he'd won the lottery and wasn't sharing any money with them. He was Jewish, I think, and there was anti-Jewish sentiment at the time that Joyce was highlighting.

Still, Joyce may give the reader a multi-dimensional character accolade but J.K. Rowlings is where the real magic happens.

twg · Joined: 02 Nov 2006 Location: Getting some fresh air...

Great short stories.

Books that cure insomnia

Unposter · Joined: 04 Jun 2006

Old fashioned, Irish-tinged impenitrable language
Obtuse story lines

What's not to love?

Czarjorge · Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 8:14 am Post subject:

Joyce is fairly pretentious, as is everyone who writes with an omnipresent sense of the audience. Bukowski is one of my favorite authors, but one of the criticisms that stick is that he wrote to shock. Joyce, according to himself, guilty of the same thing. When I was younger I went through a Joyce period, but that time has passed. I really appreciate accessible prose now. Check out "Day of the Locust" by Nathanael West.

MollyBloom · Joined: 21 Jul 2006 Location: James Joyce's pants

Ya-ta Boy · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: Established in 1994

I'm a philistine. I want interesting characters in interesting situations. Joyce doesn't deliver--at least in the first hundred pages of 'Ulysses' he didn't. So at that point, I gave up. If you need special knowledge plus guidance in order to read a book, you are no longer dealing with a conventional novel. What's so special about Joyce that I should put out that much effort to read and understand him? Is the payoff worth it? I don't think so. The emperor has no clothes.