1999 JAMES JOYCE BY IRISH AUTHOR EDNA O'BRIEN FIRST EDITION ULYSSES AUTHOR GIFT [Hardcover] EDNA O'BRIEN

Penguin Lives

by Edna O'Brien

This rare and vintage book is a perfect addition to any bibliophile's collection

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, Ireland, Irish Literature, Literary Criticism, Biography Memoir, Literature

333 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1999

About the author

Edna O’Brien was an award-winning Irish author of novels, plays, and short stories. She has been hailed as one of the greatest chroniclers of the female experience in the twentieth century. She was the 2011 recipient of the Frank O’Connor Prize, awarded for her short story collection Saints and Sinners. She also received, among other honors, the Irish PEN Award for Literature, the Ulysses Medal from University College Dublin, and a lifetime achievement award from the Irish Literary Academy. Her 1960 debut novel, The Country Girls, was banned in her native Ireland for its groundbreaking depictions of female sexuality. Notable works also include August Is a Wicked Month (1965), A Pagan Place (1970), Lantern Slides (1990), and The Light of Evening (2006). O’Brien lived in London until her death.

Reviews

[George Ilsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

An evocative, lyrical, biography of James Joyce written by a novelist. Candid and complicated, this book is both a biography and something else—a work of creative non-fiction in the shape of a biography, incorporating words and opinions of others as well as revelatory fragments from Joyce himself. (How is that more than a biography? . . . I'm still thinking about why.)

In a word, I loved this book! All literary biographies should be this good.

Update: In July 2024 Edna O'Brien departed this realm for parts unknown. She was 93. When I heard the news I remembered how much I loved this remembrance of James Joyce, and vowed to read more of O'Brien's work. Here on hand, mouldering in a teetering pile, is A Pagan Place so perhaps I'll start with that.

[Justin Evans · Rating 3 out of 5]

An odd experience this: in college, I apparently loved Joyce. I read his works, I read Ellmann's biography, I thought Joyce was right about more or less everything.

Here I am, less than 15 years later, reading O'Brien's short life in anticipation of re-reading Joyce's work (other than the Wake), and I've come to almost exactly the opposite conclusion: that Joyce is wrong about more or less everything: an awful human being who hid behind tiresome romantic cliches about Truth and Beauty, a man whose prodigious linguistic talents were wasted on puerile and boring topics and ideas, writing as he did at great length about his own non-existent victimization and the objects he'd fondled at one time or other--and then justifying it all with some half-arsed discussion of the inner spiritual essence of whatever.

And this book makes those feeling worse, simply because O'Brien allows those cliches and puerilities to stand as marks of Genius and Independence. She believes that "writers have to be such monsters in order to create," which is so plainly false that it's hard to know what she's talking about.

On the upside, it's a short read, and fairly easy; O'Brien slips in the odd Joyceism, but they're ignorable. The real problem, as with anyone who self-consciously follows Joyce, is that she writes sentences, not paragraphs. That's all well and good if you want to quote a hagiographical sentiment down the pub, but not great if you want to read, understand, or, heaven forfend, criticize what you're reading.

More concretely, there's almost nothing in her about PAYM, and I have no idea why.

[Frank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hardly a standard biography and not quite literary criticism either, though there are elements of both here certainly: it would perhaps be too glib to call this a portrait of the artist. O’Brien assumes her readers have a familiarity with both the outline of Joyce’s life and his major works, she dives right into the story, parodying Joyce’s style:

Once upon a time there was a man coming down a road in Dublin and he gave himself the name of Dedalus the sorcerer, constructor of labyrinths and maker of wings for Icarus who flew so close to the sun that her fell, as the apostolic Dubliner James Joyce would fall deep into a world or words—from the “epiphanies” of youth to the epistomadologies of later years.

Baby Tuckoo indeed. I liked this, it was refreshing. I could not recommend it to anyone who hasn’t already read Richard Ellmann’s 1959 biography, which Anthony Burgess called “the greatest literary biography of the century”. One should also be familiar enough with Joyce’s output that the allusions and references make sense. In which case, this will prove a lovingly eccentric reflexion on the author’s life and work.

[Jason Furman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I listened to the audiobook of this short biography of James Joyce. I did not know much about Joyce's life before but this presented a relatively comprehensive portrait from birth to death, with a lot of detail about both the writing and publication of Ulysses and a summary/literary criticism of it with less space devoted to Joyce's other books. A lot of the focus is on Joyce's relationships to women, including Nora Barnacle (the women he spent his life with) and a series of mostly nameless prostitutes. Although Edna O'Brien asserts that all of this is complex and multifaceted overall Joyce comes across as mostly a self-obsessed jerk--albeit one who produced towering masterworks.

The biography itself is beautifully written with some almost poetic turns of phrase. The audiobook is narrated well with an Irish voice.

[Bookthesp1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

O'brien writes like an angel ( okay an angel who swallowed a big plate of oirish blarney)
And this is truly brilliant. Lyrical, informative and rich prose that makes you smile as you read- fab.

[Kyra Boisseree]

This is one of the worst books I have ever read in my entire life, and I have never before hated anyone as deeply and as personally as I hate James Joyce. This books gets absolutely no stars--it was that bad. The only other book I have ever given no stars to was a book of political theory that was by a literal Nazi. Congratulations.

1. The only useful thing this book confirmed for me is that James Joyce is an antisemite. But I knew that already. This was just proof.

2. This author's romanticism about writers, ESPECIALLY abusive writers, is deeply disturbing. It also says something about her own ego.

3. This a biography and yet she cited nothing.

4. James Joyce is the literal scum of the earth and his body of work was not worth the hurt he inflicted on other people.

5. If I ever go to Switzerland, it will be with the sole purpose of destroying his grave. Some dynamite should do.

[Boris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Може би едно ниво над стила в уикипедия. Писана за хора, които ги мързи да четат Джойс. Не разбирам защо трябва да се режат дръвчета за такива книги.

[Οδυσσέας Μουζίλης · Rating 5 out of 5]

Play it again, Jim :p

https://pepperlines.blogspot.com/2021...

[Eva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jag tycker om den här serien med 'Porträtt' av författare om författare. Tycker mycket om Edna O'Briens stil. Hon är väl påläst, de 17 viktigaste bibliografierna listas i slutet. Men hon har läst mer än så, och lyckas koka ner alla dessa textmassor till en hanterbar, nätt liten bok på 184 sidor, som tar oss med på en resa genom James Joyce tragiska liv. Texten är sina långa meningar till trots, lättläst, som fiktion/essä när den är som bäst, som stiger fram som trovärdig. Och känns fullständig, för att O'Brien lyckats teckna en mångfacetterad författare - 'komplex och paradoxal'. Och hur det skar sig mellan honom och världen.

Det enda jag inte förstår, är hur O'Brien kan protestera mot åsikten att James Joyce föraktade kvinnor, med förklaringen "I själva verket var han långt mer skonsam mot kvinnor än män" och förklarar att hans skäl till det var hans beroende av tre kvinnor - hustrun Nora för inspiration, Sylvia Beach som kämpade för att Odysseus skulle kunna tryckas och filantropen Harriet Weaver som höll honom med pengar. Inte var han mindre föraktfull för det. Han svek dem alla.

Han läste Nietzsche, som så många andra kring år 1900, och ville vara 'författargeniet', som kunde ägna hela livet åt att leka med orden. Utan den leken var livet tomt och ödsligt.

[Justin Wiggins · Rating 5 out of 5]

This biography on James Joyce by Irish writer Edna O' Brien was incredible. The biography honestly portrays Joyce's faults, flaws, literary successes, his complex relationship with Ireland, his family, enduring literary legacy, and how much of a broken and sad man he was in his last days. My favorite part of the book is the chapter about Joyce's friend Sylvia Beach, who started the iconic bookshop Shakespeare & Company in Paris, France. That amazing lady helped Joyce get Ulysses published, which is his most most well known work. I really enjoyed Dubliners, and I am making my way slowly through Ulysses.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book made me want to go back and re-read Ulysses, the revised version. And the Dubliners. And Portrait of Artist as a Young Man, which I've read twice.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

If there is any truth to the popular philosophy that a fine line exists between genius and madness, it’s very possible that Irish writer James Joyce (1892-1941) lived on that fine line. And another Irish writer, Edna O’Brien, does a handy job of how he did that in her compact biography, James Joyce. Not surprisingly, her biography is a tribute to Joyce and his work.

Joyce’s life seemed to be one of constant turmoil, or at least of an unsettled restlessness. Much of this was caused by an ongoing and chronic shortage of money. Other than writer, the only other discernible occupations Joyce had were teacher and reviewer. Of course, money shortage was the trigger for a host of other problems, not least of which were food and accommodation. Layered on top of these problems was Joyce’s lifelong poor health, from conjunctivitis and glaucoma, to abscesses and blood accumulation.

Under these circumstances, it’s hard to calculate when Joyce had the time to write, let alone the mental disposition necessary for such creative activity. Nevertheless, write he did. He was also a linguist in the sense that he had a flair for languages from a young age (reportedly speaking five), and believed language in its traditional, rule-bound form, was a sort of writer’s Playdoh to be refashioned at will. Joyce was a passionate experimenter, meticulously taking apart words, grafting together unrelated parts, then repurposing these mutants to sculpt his unusual narratives.

Though Joyce shamelessly begged and borrowed money from friends and family, whenever he had it, he spent frivolously and irresponsibly. Yet notably significant people felt compelled to help him. In 1913, Ezra Pound succeeded in having the autobiographical A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man serialized in The London Magazine, The Egoist. Harriet Shaw Weaver, editor of The Egoist, was instrumental in publishing the U.S. version of A Portrait. She also became Joyce’s secret benefactrix by setting aside funds from which he could draw, thereby securing Joyce’s financial independence. And when no English or American company would publish Ulysses for fear of obscenity, Sylvia Beach, founder of the bookstore, Shakespeare & Company, published it in Paris in 1922.

Once he left Ireland in his early twenties, Joyce was never to live there again, instead spending his life in continental Europe—Paris, Zurich, and Trieste. He sat through two world wars in neutral Zurich, and died there in 1941 at the young age of 59.

One Irish writer (Edna O’Brien) has written a short, compelling biography of another (James Joyce). And while this reviewer has read a number of books by O’Brien, I’m not sure he is ready to be persuaded to enjoyably consume the experimental and innovative writing techniques of Joyce.

[diario_de_um_leitor_pjv · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sempre que um escritor enceta a tarefa de escrever sobre outro escritor - seja em modelo ficional ou biográfico, ou mais arriscado uma mistura de ambos - o leitor faz uma aproximação cuidada e, ligeiramente, desconfiada.

Este "James Joyce" de Edna O’Brien é um belíssimo exemplo de uma curta, mas incisiva, biografia de um dos maiores escritores do século XX. Obviamente, a autora é fã do biografiado. Isso é flagrante no texto.

A autora parte da inúmera (e monumental) investigação sobre a vida de Joyce e, em pequenos incisivos capítulos conta inúmeros momentos do quotidiano do escritor, da sua relação com Nora, da sua família, e dos inúmeros territórios onde viveu o longo exílio da sua Dublin amada. Trieste, Roma, Zurique e Paris são assim uma presença no livro sendo espelho do carácter de exílio - e das dificuldades inerentes - que foi grande parte Joyce.

Ao longo do livro O’Brien explora igualmente a obra de Joyce, dando particularmente destaque ao Ulisses, a que dedica interessantes páginas. Os detalhes analíticos destes capítulos são particularmente interessantes para mim que me irei lançar a partir de amanhã na tentativa de ler o Ulisses.

[İlke · Rating 5 out of 5]

Edna O'Brien'den James Joyce'un sanki bir roman kahramanı gibi anlatıldığı sıradışı bir biyografi✨Joyce'un doğumundan, aile dinamiklerinden itibaren 'çocuksu bir hassasiyetten incitici bir kayıtsızlığa, doyumsuz bir dindarlıktan kuşku ve isyankarlığa nasıl geçtiğini' anlatıyor, kitaplarından alıntıları metnin akışı içinde vererek bir roman dokusu yaratıyor. Ülkesinden ayrılışını, parasızlık ve zor şartlardaki hayatını, kitaplarını yazım süreçlerini, kardeşiyle ve eşiyle mektuplaşmalarını okurken tüm kitaplarında kendisini anlattığını bir kez daha ayrıntılı bir şekilde gördüm. Kendi içindeki bitmeyen sürgün ve kızının hastalığı için endişelenerek geçen son yıllarından sonra ölümüyle, evet Joyce'u biraz fazla içselleştirmiş olabilirim ama, yine de gözümde bir damla yaş ile bitireceğim aklıma gelmezdi😥Tabii ki İrlandalı O'Brien de tarafsız bir bakışla yazmamış, yazarın Joyce'u çok sevdiği her satıra yansımış. Joyce'un ruhuna sığdıramadığı sayısız benliğinin ve binparça hayatının eserlerine nasıl yansıdığını görmek isterseniz, ya da edebiyatla ve 'bir başkalık' arayışıyla geçen bir ömrü okumak isterseniz mutlaka tavsiye ederim💫

[Randall Green · Rating 3 out of 5]

Millions of words and thousands of pages have been written about James Joyce, and O'Brien's Penguin biography becomes a compendium of those other pages and observations. She asks the question we all ask of minds we find inscrutable: "Do writers have to be such monsters in order to create? I believe that they do. It is a paradox that while wrestling with language to capture the human condition they become more callous, and cut off from the very human traits which they so glisteningly depict. There can be no outer responsibility, no interruptions, only the ongoing inner drone, rhythmic, insistent, struggling to make a living moment of both beauty and austerity." Joyce fulfilled the description in many ways, both succeeding and failing to explain the world "with all the sorrow and muddle which pertains to life and death." The fact that he is still read and analyzed eighty-plus years after his departure is really all the testament needed as explanation for his importance and greatness, though monster he may have been.

[Селина Йонкова · Rating 4 out of 5]

едно е безспорно в тази биография, една о’ браян истински харесва творчеството и макар да проявява разбиране, не се прехласва и не оправдава човека, джеймс джойс, този арогантен, скъсал с църквата и йезуитите, но не отделил се от тях, жертвал зрението си на олтара на думите, изгнаник, пресътворил родния дъблин така, че да може да бъде пресъздаден детайлно, ирландец създал работа за поне 300 години на изследващите творчеството му.
иронична, занимателна, любопитна и добре написана книга, за потъналия в необятния свят на думите писател, за когото символите и въображението са определящи и по- важни от реалността.

[John Purcell · Rating 5 out of 5]

There's great warmth and understanding in this portrait of Joyce. Edna O'Brien doesn't shirk from showing us the man, she almost revels in it, but she also digs out the artist, that complex entity which is us but not us. And as a writer of genius herself, in portraying Joyce in passages like this - 'A writer, and especially a great writer, feels both more and less about human grief, being at once celebrant, witness and victim.' -she reveals much about Edna O'Brien as well.

[Neşet · Rating 3 out of 5]

edna o'brien ingiliz tabloid gazeteleri gibi iyi çalışmış. james joyce dahiymiş belli ve çevresi bu adamla nasıl baş edeceğini bilememiş gibi anladım. bazı insanlar da çekilmez oluyor gerçekten. kızı lucia'nın öyküsü en ilginç bölümlerden biri kitapta. zevkle okudum.

[nuuriper · Rating 5 out of 5]

Do writers have to be such monsters in order to create?

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

O'Brien's style, while clearly her own, echoing her short stories and novels, takes on the diction and rhythm of her subject as the biography moves through his career from "Stephen Hero" to "Finnegan's Wake". While her bookl stands on its own as a work of art, O'Brien is neither particularly exact regarding dates nor is she interested pining down when and why the Joyce family moved, for example, for the 11th time while Joyce was still living with them in Dublin--it is enough for her to point out the dreadful stigma of poverty in Ireland, a place where rural people would shut their doors so that their neighbors couldn't see them starve to death during the Famine. It was particularly wounding for a family that had a certain place in the world, one they fell from as John Joyce, the head of the family, drank away his paycheck (and then his pension) while continuing to make his wife pregnant every year.

Her readings of both "Ulysses" and "Finnegan's Wake" are among the best short appreciations of this works you will find. Her analysis (and excitement over) his wordplay in both of the later novels is a joy to read. Nora, Joyce's wife, is shown as a character as interesting as Joyce, a woman who loathed Ireland even more than her husband with a healthy appreciation of her sexuality. The chapter on their sex life is taken in part from letters from Joyce to Nora when he was in Dublin on a harebrained effort to become a movie magnate and she was stuck in Trieste. These letters are models of verbal concupiscence and are brilliant in themselves.

This is not a typical biography. Like that of Anthony Burgess it is a reflection by a novelist on perhaps the greatest (or at least most influential) novelist of the 20th century.

[Caspar "moved to storygraph" Bryant · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anyway this may be the year where I reJoyce so I'm starting here and hoping things will improve. It's a short biography that makes no claims to surpass the greats. Good. It works nicely enough as a primer though certainly I have my issues with Edna's approach.

First that I found rather odd was her surprisingly backwards approach to Nora. Dear strange Nora Barnacle is having a bit of a renaissance these days and has a couple biographies of her out and about that re-evaluate the fusty perspective that labels her, muse that inspires Molly, 'unworthy' of JJ. So it's disappointing to see Edna go along with the 'unworthy' view. She wavers between surrender, describing Joyce's attachment to Nora as inexplicable, or otherwise reducing it to a purely sexual partnership that persisted in order to 'meet his needs'. dear o dear
She also boldly, and rather un-self-consciously asserts that a genius is necessarily antisocial or indeed harmful to those around them. Such a tedious thing to say I was surprised it made it through editing - irrelevant, hardly insightful, and that's if we believe it at all.

ANYWAY those aside it's not bad! As a view of JJ's life, it works, though we ought to consider it an overview. I think the execution is a little off from what it could have been but it's no waste of time. I'm hoping to get to Ellman's definitive (and rather large) biography at some point this year. Wish luck

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

So this book is clearly written by a writer (and one with a phenomenal vocabulary at that), which, obviously, is great because you get to see a writer thinking about one of her heroes. This also becomes a problem, mostly because I don't agree with O'Brien that a genius is required to be an asshole because of his lack of presence in the real world (among the mere mortals such as Stanislaus, his brother). This is a great fantasy, and perhaps a strange way to put someone on a pedestal, but I have two words for that argument: JOHN CAGE. She picks some good stories though and I feel like I learned a lot about Joyce that can be applied to his work. Highly recommended.

[Márcio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Edna O'Brien possibilita uma visão geral da vida de James Joyce nessa sua breve biografia do escritor Irlandês.

Confesso que conhecia pouco de sua biografia, mas não estranhei de todo a sua atribulada vida, muito em razão de seus próprios excessos. Alguns podem dizer que é coisa de gênio, outros dirão que se trata de excessos que todos os seres humanos possuem. No entanto, entre as biografias que já li, seja de autore(a)s, artistas, atore(a)s etc., é difícil encontrar vidas que não tenham seus "pecados", pequenos e grandes.

[Joan · Rating 4 out of 5]

O'Brien channels Joyce's ecstatic language and produces a vivid portrait of the man and his city in this fabulous SHORT biography. I am now a huge fan of the Penguin Lives series.

[Мnemosyne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Липсва отправна точка, която да събира разказа за живота на Джойс по по-запомнящ се и увлекателен начин, но иначе приятно четиво. :)

[Sanjuro · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully written biography of the greatest (but not necessarily best) writer of the 20th century; O'Brien of course is a stellar writer in her own right, an oft-discussed Nobel candidate, but she does not anywhere impose her own status onto her subject or this book. She makes no attempt to make this about her reading of Joyce, though her opinions, deftly disguised, are sprinkled throughout. It's a book about Joyce, through and through. O'Brien mixes wonderfully crafted sentences with brevity to make for an enjoyable and readable account.

The book suffers from two problems. First, there is some attempt to cast Joyce as "charismatic but difficult," but the "difficult" part takes center stage to the detriment of the charisma that so clearly won him a number of admirers. O'Brien paints him largely as an oppressive and abusive force, despite the fact that she too clearly admires him, a fact she does not hide; so, in the reading, the reader is forced to ask - why does she admire him so? I know why, because I've read of Joyce elsewhere, but the portrait here is largely negative, while O'Brien still tries to assure the reader that Joyce is a genius worthy of our praise.
Second, despite the fact that O'Brien is clear about the many shortcomings of Joyce's personality and personal life, she extols his work as though it were flawless, with no critical engagement whatever, aside from notes of all of the wrongheaded simpletons who were critical of Joyce upon publication of his work. In other words, she mentions the criticism from others, only to note how wrong they were. Some more focused reflections on Joyce's thematic shortcomings might have been helpful.

I'm a huge fan of Joyce's work. "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" and "Ulysses" are two of my favorite books. This is a stellar, concise, and detailed look at his troubled life, although I wonder if pieces of a more nuanced portrait are missing.

[Glen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Writers writing about writers' writings can be insightful or insufferable, depending on the talents of subject and object. Fortunately this short volume is of the former variety, and never the latter. O'Brien is a prodigious talent in her own right who readily acknowledges her indebtedness to Joyce's literary example. That debt acknowledged, she does not paper over the many faults in Joyce's character (what would be the point, since they are extensively documented elsewhere?) but also does not fall prey to the temptation to see in the works themselves only the masked projection of those same faults. No amount of lionizing of Ulysses or of Finnegans Wake can excuse or redeem the man Joyce from his self-centeredness, his alcoholism, his moments of outright nastiness toward those closest to him who held his best interests closest to heart, but so what? Sometimes morally bankrupt people produce great art, and sometimes morally upright people are void of artistic vision or talent. What O'Brien understands, being an artist with vision and talent of her own, is that the protection and cultivation of vision and talent can seem monstrous to those on the outside looking in while still being (perhaps?) necessary for the production of the art. In the end, for better or for worse, Joyce did enjoy the love and devotion of many right up to the end of his rather tormented and tormenting life, and I am grateful that I can enjoy and appreciate the works he produced without having to decide whether his loved ones were fools or saints. O'Brien provides a short, lively, ultimately sympathetic but not hagiographic biography that may assist in illuminating some passages in Joyce's works and in driving the reader back to those works, and that is service enough for one volume.

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I looked forward to this one, being a fan of Joyce and hoping to learn more about his time in Paris in the 1920s.

But I had to take time out for knee surgery and just finally finished reading it.

It did not disappoint.

I very much liked Edna O’Brien’s approach to explaining this very complicated man.
To describe him as unique would be a disservice. He was that and so very much more.

It is said that he had an amazing tenor voice and loved to entertain guests. I was hoping to find some recordings online but was unable to.
He was also known as quite the dresser, always sporting a hat and cane to finish off his ensemble.

Like Beethoven whose ears failed, Joyce’s eyes failed him, though that didn’t cost either of them their genius.

Of course he will always be most remembered for Ulysses. Seven years and 20,000 hours of toil for a book that was deemed impossible to publish. Had it not been for the determination of Sylvia Beach, it may never have happened. Possibly the most loved and hated book ever written.

I liken him to his contemporary, and acquaintance in Paris, Pablo Picasso. Their earlier works were more simplistic yet quite beautiful. Their latter work became much more complicated and not easily understood by the masses.

‘…….No one knew Joyce, only himself, no one could. His imagination was meteoric, his mind ceaseless in the accruing of knowledge, words crackling in his head, images crowding in on him “like the shades at the entrance to the underworld.” What he wanted to do was to wrest the secret from life and that could only be done through language because, as he said, the history of people is the history of language……’

[Panos Papazoglou · Rating 4 out of 5]

Κάπου, κάπως πετυχαίνει κανείς τα βιβλία της, αλλά δεν είχα κάτι άλλο συγκεκριμένο υπόψιν από την κα. Ο’Μπράιεν και τη γραφή της, εκτός από τη βιογραφία του Joyce και νομίζω και άλλη μια του Βύρωνα(;), αλλά η μυθιστορηματική της οπτική στο παραπάνω βιβλίο είναι εξαιρετική. Ιρλανδή και η ίδια, φυσικά και έχει γνώση της τοπογραφίας και της ιρλανδικής συλλογικής μνήμης γύρω από τον εξόριστο ήρωα του Δουβλίνου, αλλά δεν αρκεί μόνο το βίωμα, θέλει και τρόπο! Και τα καταφέρνει μια χαρά να αποδώσει στον μέγιστο βαθμό τα βασικά σημεία της βιογραφίας του Τζόυς, αλλά και της περίπλοκης ιδιοσυγκρασίας που πηγάζει από τη μεγαλοφυή φύση ενός υπέρτατου καλλιτέχνη.
Με χιούμορ, ανάλαφρα, αλλά και με εμβάθυνση στους χαρακτήρες, σκιαγραφείται ένα πορτρέτο που ακροβατεί μεταξύ πραγματικότητας και μυθιστορηματικής μαγείας, αλλά εν τέλει, αν κάποιος έχει διαβάσει τα βιβλία του και τις αναρίθμητες βιογραφικές αναφορές και κυκλοφορίες γύρω από αυτόν, αντιλαμβάνεται την καταπληκτική δουλειά της O’Brien. Και αυτό γιατί είναι δύσκολο να μην παρασυρθεί ο αναγνώστης στο ρυθμό και τις λυρικές περιγραφές της. Δε φλυαρεί αναλύοντας λεπτομέρειες, ούτε εμβαθύνει σε πληροφορίες επί πληροφοριών. Δίνει έμφαση στις σημαντικές στιγμές που διατρέχουν τη ζωή του Τζόυς σε μικρά κεφάλαια και μέσα σε 200 σελίδες ο αναγνώστης αντιλαμβάνεται τον Τζόυς που παρουσιάζεται στα ίδια του τα βιβλία. Και αυτό από μόνο του αποτελεί μια επιτυχή προσέγγιση που κάνει το κείμενο ευκολοανάγνωστο αφενός, αλλά και αξιόλογο ως αυτούσιο λογοτεχνικό κείμενο αφετέρου.
Δεν έχει την ακαδημαϊκή πολυλογία του Έλλμαν και της (εξαιρετικής και πολύτιμης) βιογραφικής σπουδής του, αλλά μέσα από τις 200 μόνο σελίδες του καταφέρνει να κάνει αντιληπτή την προσωπικότητα και το εκτόπισμα του μεγάλου Ιρλανδού. Μαζί με το «Ζωή και Έργο» της Μαντώς Αραβαντινού, τις βιογραφικές και δοκιμιακές αναλύσεις του Άρη Μαραγκόπουλου, αυτό το μικρό, εξαντλημένο βιβλιαράκι είναι ένας εξαιρετικός οδηγός που αρκεί για να κατανοήσει κανείς τον υπότιτλο. Την απόκρημνη όψη μιας μεγαλοφυΐας.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

James Joyce by Edna O’Brien is part of the series, Penguin Lives. I am so impressed with the quality of this book, that I will look into others in the series which includes: Joan of Arc, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Buddha, Dante, Martin Luther King Jr, Herman Melville, Charles Darwin, Virginia Woolf, Rosa Parks, Simone Weil, Marcel Proust and others. The books are short - ~200 pages and cover the highlights of the subject’s lifetime.

Edna O’Brien is an excellent choice to author this biography. She is a well respected Irish author and helps to communicate the Irish POV of Joyce’s life and body of work.

First, in reading about people who lived in historical time periods, it is difficult to not overlay modern values and opinions to those in the past. In Joyce’s (1882-1941) era in Ireland and Continental Europe, I found it difficult to not dwell on being angry over the norms where male-dominated societies treated women poorly as a matter of practice, the first born son was the only heir and families favored and gave in to their indulgences. However, Joyce himself seemed to be particularly difficult and behaved with entitlement and self indulgence with his family, and others in his inner circle that went beyond the norms of the time.

O’Brien presents Joyce with all of his flaws as well as his creative genius as a writer. She also points out why the Irish people were deeply hurt by Joyce’s portrayal of life in Ireland and of the Irish who lived in poverty. The Irish psyche was deeply shamed by his exposing the filth of poverty that the Irish did not like to talk about. Rather than portray Ireland at its best, they felt he exposed the worst.

It is worth noting that Joyce left Ireland in his 20’s, wrote all of his works about Ireland while living in Continental Europe and never returned to live in his home country. He lived and wrote in Italy, France and Switzerland.

Overall, this book is a good introduction to James Joyce and a good jumping off point to study more about his life and works.