My Brother's Keeper: James Joyce's Early Years

by Stanislaus Joyce, T.S. Eliot, Richard Ellmann

Stanislaus Joyce was more than his brother's he was at various times his brother's co-dependent, touchstone, conscience, and biggest fan. The two shared the same genius, the same childhood influences, and had the same literary instinct, but in Stanislaus it was channeled into sober academic pursuit, while in James it evolved into gaiety, wild whimsy, and at times sodden despair. Covering the first twenty-two years of James Joyce's life in Dublin and Trieste, My Brother's Keeper is a window onto the drama that was his youth. Thanks to Stanislaus's superb memory and sure hand, here we find the Dublin of the streets, neighbors, churches, and unforgettable eccentrics. Here we see the model for Ulysses' Simon James' father, a dour and violent figure when in his cups. Here are the Joyces in their own home, and the minor characters that pepper A Portrait of the Eileen, Leopold Bloom's comely daughter; Mrs. Riordan, the surly teacher; Mr. Casey, the political agitator. And finally, here is Trieste, a place of exile for Stanislaus but a retreat for James. Stanislaus Joyce has fashioned both an invaluable primary source for his brother's opaque masterpieces and a loving memoir of his brother's early life.

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

292 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1957

Reviews

[Bob R Bogle · Rating 4 out of 5]

My Brother's Keeper helps to frame the environment in which big brother James Joyce lived his early life, but the subject of the study himself (let us adhere to the tradition of calling Stanislaus' book an unfinished biography) appears always a ghostly presence, lingering at some distance removed and aloof. Siblings may know the most about what is sufficient in our lives while suspecting little about what is most necessary. The most brightly-illuminated shimmerings about the life of his storied brother are always found between the lines of Stanislaus Joyce's chronicle whose author is, we feel, as often as not blind to the same.

Despite its distance from its subject, or possibly because of that distance, My Brother's Keeper may be the easiest James Joyce biography to read. Sometimes Stanislaus' sentences seem to spiral around and bring us nowhere in particular. Not infrequently, his sequencing of events is annoyingly arrhythmic, sidling now forward, now backward in time. He does, however, provide immediate local color that is of interest to those of us preoccupied with the life and works of brother Jim.

Growing up in the house of his alcoholic father, John Joyce, was doubtlessly a harrowing experience that became indelibly inscribed upon Stanislaus' heart, its scars to be borne throughout his life. Much of the father's unforgivable behavior is reported in the book. The most affecting scene does not involve James Joyce directly, but takes place after the funeral of the mother, May Joyce, in the family home. In a canonical Freudian scene Stanislaus excoriates his father in a long diatribe for a lifetime's crimes against the dead mother. In recounting the tale Stanislaus, presumably writing as an old man in his 60s or 70s (the 1939 publication of Finnegans Wake has already occurred), tells us: "He listened in silence, and when I had done, and without resentment [he said]: 'You don't understand, boy.'" And yet Stanislaus relates the scene with his own resentment still untempered and unresolved, apparently unaware that he's confirming his father's pitiful assessment.

If it does nothing else, this biography must lead us to ponder the inherited wisdom of James Joyce's later cruel treatment of kid brother Stanislaus in Trieste. We might do well to remind ourselves that James did deliver Stanislaus from what could well have been a ruinous life in Dublin. The relationship of these two brothers must have been, like any relationship always is, far more nuanced than any speculation and writing that has entered into the public record. It's unclear whether Stanislaus was the untalented individual he imagined himself to be. He'd grown up in the shadow of a heroic-brother whom he worshiped: the only model Stanislaus had and to whom he must compare himself was James Joyce. Daunting, that. Fairly or no, Stanislaus was intimidated, standing in that shadow cast by a giant. In the end though, it's possible it was James, more than Stanislaus, who played the role of brother's keeper.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

"James Joyce seemed like the most arrogant man who ever lived, had both his eyes wide open and great faculty of speech, but what he say, I knew not what," writes Bob Dylan in Chronicles. A few years later (on his 2009 album Together Through Life) the Bard of Hibbing would sing, "I'm listening to Billy Joe Shaver/And I'm reading James Joyce." Dylanologists have combed through Dylan's many songs and have noted an encyclopedic knowledge, filled with references to everything from the Bible and the Bard of Stratford on Avon to references to Neil Young, Billy Joe Shaver, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Joyce, Moby Dick, Pound and Eliot, Victor Hugo and just about everything else under the sun. It is apparent in Chronicles that he was a voracious reader and that he also devoured other forms of culture (film and music especially) with great avidity (not unlike Joyce). Oftentimes, and in accordance with artistic tradition, he borrowed or stole from materials, taking the work of others and making it his own. And, yet, though we know so much about Dylan we still know so very little about the real Bob Dylan (whatever "real" means). He is a great artist and songwriter. We can name his influences (among them Rimbaud, the Beats, Woody Guthrie). But he was a man of many masks, his interests varied and fleeting.

I thought of Dylan often as I read My Brother's Keeper: James Joyce's Early Years, by Joyce's younger brother, Professor Stanislaus Joyce. The book tells us quite a bit about Joyce's influences (as do books like Anthony Burgess's ReJoyce) -- William Blake, Henrik Ibsen, Sterne, Yeats. It also tells us about his relationship to Yeats (and it could be said that if Joyce is the Cad to Yeats, that Dylan is the Cad to Guthrie; this being a central theme in Finnegans Wake). The book also tells us something other Joyce scholars note, that Joyce (as is the case with Dylan as well) had passing interest in many things, with a very obvious encyclopedic knowledge, and was a borrower (or thief if one prefers) of others ideas. I cannot find the quote in the book, but somewhere there is a quote in which Joyce says that his skill is in taking the work of others and making it into something entirely his own (borrowing from Ibsen, many obscure sources and even his brother's journal). This is true of many artists; there is little that is truly "original." Great artists like Dylan and Joyce have created great works of art by piecing together scraps from the cultural dump heap, taking highbrow, lowbrow and everything in between, fusing them and making them their own.

This book was of greatest interest where it shed some light on the work of the artist, giving the reader glimpses of how certain ideas from his personal life were incorporated into works like Portrait of the Artist, Dubliners, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake, all of which can be seen as highly autobiographical. But in between these passages of interest was a great deal of information that I found trifling. I wish also the work discussed more of Joyce's later life, but that is outside of the scope of this work. It does shine some light on the life and work of James Joyce, but at the end the work may leave the reader with more questions than answers. (3.5 Stars).

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating look into the life, history, and influences of James Joyce through the eyes and recollections of his brother, Stanislaus. This is a welcome book to read, both for its familiarity with the subject and diversity of details, and for how approachable it is in a literary sense.

[Rebeka · Rating 5 out of 5]

He held style, good or bad, to be the most intimate revelation of character, and slovenly writing invariably provoked his angry contempt.

Stanislaus Joyce's My Brother's Keeper is simply one of the best memoirs written.

Stanislaus is the younger brother by three years to the modernist legend James Joyce, author of Ulysses, The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Dubliners. I was a Joyce fangirl as a teenager, and I think I would've gained immensely in my understanding of all three of his works if this book had been available back then.

In his memoir, Stanislaus details their home life, the events of that time in Dublin, his brother's climb to success and mentions other information that colors your understanding of his work. All through Stanislaus disparagingly calls himself epithets such as ''his brother's jackal'' and ''whetstone''. There's an argument with his brother where he begs James to give up drinking and write again, and James shoots back by telling Stanislaus to write the poems himself, if he is so inclined. Stanislaus replies "I have no talent".

I believe that if Stanislaus didn't grow up in the shadow his big brother cast, he would've been a decent writer. This memoir is actually an unfinished manuscript - he died before he could write about their time living in Trieste, so it's mostly about their life in Dublin, up to early adulthood. I assume it means that it's largely a draft and only lightly edited for clarity and grammar, however, it does not read that way at all. Stanislaus is funny, witty and open. He is philosophical, he quotes freely and from memory. He has a natural sense of pacing and he has a great style.

A lot of that self-hatred stems from their father. John Joyce was an abusive husband and father in many ways. He was an alcoholic, he was violent and he was also manipulative and verbally cruel. Stanislaus holds no love at all toward his father, though he explains that their relationship was a bit different than James relationship with him. Some of it has to do with their personalities - James was more of a ''roll with the punches'' kind of guy and Stanislaus was the type to nurse a slight for years. Some of it also has to do with the difference of their surroundings - James got a full education, living in a boarding school, while Stanislaus had to stay at home and witness the mayhem there. In any case, Stanislaus doesn't omit these factors too.

Here Stanislaus is trying to reconcile forgiveness with honesty in the memory of their family life.

I had neither such courage nor such love of my father. On the contrary, my antipathy to him seemed to have been born with me. There are some wise people who derive great benefit to their health and peace of mind by sleeping with feet and head in line with earth's rotation. Conversely, I believe most firmly that when the heart feeds on hatred and contempt, the human being is facing the wrong way. But how is one to blink facts and remain one's honesty?

Here you can see some of that verbal cruelty his father loved to dish out.

For my part, I hung on the borders of these friendships, dubiously accepted by the students as my brother's rather taciturn henchman. My father, Thersites-like, called me my brother's jackal, and when his tongue tired of that, he would explain to me scientifically that I gave no light of my own, but that I shone with borrowed light like the moon.

Here he quotes James, and the connection of their home life to James' writing.

He had no doubt that most artists, even the greatest, belied the life they knew, and offered the world a make-believe. Literature, he said, was a parody of life. He declared bitterly that he believed in only two things, a woman's love for her child and a man's love of lies - of lies of all possible kinds - and he was determined that his spiritual experience should not be a make-believe.

Further on James decision to write differently.

The life which he found in novels was not the life that passed before his steel-blue eyes and unblinking gaze at home and in the streets of Dublin, the emotions which he found in poetry were not those he found in his own heart, but sumptuous exaggerations to which the poets rose by dint of leading haughty and elaborate lives.

Overall, this is an excellently written and well-sourced memoir. This should be a must read for anyone into James Joyce and the factors that lead up to the development of modernism. Stanislaus details the many aspects of their life and includes letters from other writers to James. He doesn't delve deep into Irish history, however he gives an excellent account of the influences at work in Dublin at the time of their youth. Most memoirs have to choose between two paths. Either have it ghostwritten, and lose the authenticity of the author's voice, or have the author write it, and suffer from style and grammar issues, as well as clumsy, unfocused trivia that isn't relevant to the topic at hand. My Brother's Keeper avoids both and chooses a third - by luck of history, have the observer be a writer in his own right.

[Vincent Hernot · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the type of biography that is in fact an autobiography - in fact, or as well. Brilliant examples of that kind are Michael Frayn, or even MArtin Amis (in a twisted three-way autobio-bio-autobio). Or perhaps all biographies are part autobiographies - a claim I guess Richard Holmes would probably support.
This one is ostensibly about James Joyce, but beyond the anecdotal for the lay-man (and the very best of anecdotal: James Joyce had chosen a stage name, intending to act in theatre: Gordon Brown...) , and the precious gems probably long known for specialists, little of importance will be learned about the writer (I can only recommend Joyce's Letters, though, for a pretty unflinching, realistic portrait of the artist). But perhaps this book is not what it's supposed to be: the ironic title (Stanislaus was very anti-religious, and even more anti-church) might make it seem as if he's defending someone, but that someone could very well be himself.
Thus when he recontextualises the origin of some remarks, stories or otherwise literary creations by his brother, it is often to point to himself as the real source of those. When he describes at length his brother's bouts of heavy drinking, he's careful not to morally condemn him while painting himself in a whiter-than-white image. And while always praising his brother's genius, he's not always shy to suggest he may have had a hand in the artistic development of James.
While that may sound negative, there is much to enjoy in here: the heavily ironic tone, the lashing out at the Church always well-phrased, the condemnation of Ireland and the Irish (which comes across as more virulent than even his brother's: who influenced whom?), the descriptions of Dublin then, and of poverty, and his musings on Art.
And yes, also: the portrait of James Joyce, tall and slim and silent, and singing, and acing, drinking, playing tricks, being stupid, being young, being drunk, being in love: nothing exceptional, nothing new, but as usual with these things, it's still all new and a bit exceptional.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Das durchaus kritische Vorwort von T.S. Eliot hat seine Berechtigung: Was gehen den Leser die privaten Details aus dem Leben eines Autors an? Diese Frage ist berechtigt und muss immer wieder neu beantwortet werden.
Da Joyce kleinste Details aus seinem Leben in Dublin in sein Werk eingebracht hat, ist die Biografie seiner Jugendjahre durch Bruder Stanislaus natürlich gerechtfertigt und kann unter anderem als Ansammlung von Mikrokommentaren und Fußnoten zum Werk des Meisters gelesen werden. MEINES BRUDERS HÜTER ist auch ein wunderbares Buch über Irland und steckt voller kleiner Anekdoten, wie sie schöner und typischer für das irische Wesen kaum sein könnten.
Professor Stanislaus Joyce war nicht nur der kleine Bruder von James, sondern ein eigenständiger scharfer Denker und Beobachter, der seine Abneigung gegen die katholische Kirche sogar noch deutlicher zum Ausdruck brachte als James Joyce.
MEINES BRUDERS HÜTER ist auch eine Dokumentation der schwierigen Beziehung der Brüder zueinander, ein Gegenstück sozusagen zu Shaun und Shem in FINNEGANS WAKE.
Ironie des Schicksals: Stanislaus Joyce starb am Bloomsday des Jahres 1955!
Die Übersetzung wurde von Arno Schmidt angefertigt und ist wunderbar lesbar.

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stanislaus Joyce is as fascinating a personality as his famous older brother. He is the one who is there so often when James crashes and burns, putting out the fire with another loan and all the help he can give. Stanislaus is loyal and diligent, doggedly persevering -- unassuming but ready and willing to stand up for what he believes is right. James in contrast comes across as the flighty, irresponsible brother although he is as committed to his art as Stanislaus is committed to his duties. James himself was intrigued by the contrast of seemingly flighty creative genius and dogged, totally trustworthy, solid dependability and commitment to duty, and refers to it in many different ways in his books. Those interested in James Joyce can vicariously join the two young brothers, shabby and poor sons of an improvident father, as they walk the streets of Dublin conversing with each other all the while. A poignant and always fascinating depiction of two notable human beings.

[ñick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stanislaus Joyce notes that his father compared him to a moon shining with the borrowed light of his solar brother, James. It’s hard to avoid feeling a little twinge of pity while reading this dual künstlerroman and realizing that John Joyce was right. My Brother’s Keeper strings a series of interesting little anecdotes and correspondences together with bland philosophizing and the occasional, pungent homophobic/misogynist skid mark (see Prof. Joyce’s baffling digressions treating the relationships between sexual abstention and homosexuality for heaping helpings of both of these flavors of bigotry). The moon still shines, though, even if its light is borrowed, and the real merit of A Portrait of the Artists as Young Men is found in Prof. Joyce’s ability to be wounded and self-effacing without lapsing into “it should have been me!” complaining when he locates the germ of one of his brother’s stories in conversation or correspondence.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sadly Stanislaus Joyce didn't finish this, so it ends rather abruptly though it covers most of the years when he and James were close and often living together (they kept up a correspondence to the end, but Stannie didn't approve of the later chapters of "Ulysses" and certainly not of "Finnegans Wake"). It has been thoroughly mined for various biographies and critical works so there wasn't much in this that was new to me, the real interest was Stanislaus's own character - tougher than James, a confirmed and occasionally combative atheist and socialist, much less forgiving of their wastrel father and the effect he had on their family. He's also very perceptive about his far more talented brother (and he seems to have come to the conclusion fairly early on that while he was certainly not stupid, his brother had the creative literary talent).

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every study of James Joyce includes quotations and references to this work, but it really works better when read as a whole.
Unfinished at the time of his death, Richard Ellman has done a nice job of editing tha manuscript. But, it is a bit unorganized over all.
Stanislaus' insights into his older brother's works and aesthetics are of interest, and useful.
His tales of family life make it worth a read as well.
My oh my, he did bitterly hate his father!
Anyone with any interest in James Joyce should read this.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stanislaus's style has "the touch of the artist" in it as his brother might well say. At times though, it hits kinks and very convoluted phrases that need hard ironing. Overall, the book unfolds with the two brothers' early life together and reveals more nitches of his brother's character, areas of his personality I have not read about before. For example, Joyce, even for all his hatred of the Roman Catholic Church, was not expressly atheistic. Rather, he was deeply moved and inspired by the artistic elements of spirituality, ritual, and christian theology. The author's own personality showed forth immensely. At times, I became more interested in it than in his brother's because, generally, not much is known about Stanislaus. I previously had the opinion that Stani was rather boring and conventional. I was shocked to find Stanislaus, not Joyce, the agnostic and, at least in personal opinions, more anti-religion.

[M. · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was interesting to know more about James Joyce's life in an informal light, and to have a quick look at how personal experience shaped and influenced his work, as well as how he reworked phrases from his brother and family into his fiction. But, apart from that it was a bit frustrating that Stanislaus Joyce could not stop badmouthing the Jesuits and the Church in general. It became boring and repetitive, and I don't care that he was always convinced that despite having been more devout, at the end James always agreed with him in that matter and others.

It was somewhat enjoyable because it makes us know James Joyce also was fully human as any of us, a dimension one tends to lose when it comes to authors as big as those, but it's not like this biography is the last word on Joyce, neither it is the reason why I'm drawn to read more of his books.

[Padraic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my - the high cost of finding oneself in the same nest as a genius. James made much of fleeing the nets, but poor Stan seemed forever caught up in the webbing, albeit happily. Amazing how often genius is supported by willing handmaidens.

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting personal account of Joyce's early years. The first section about childhood is the most illuminating, and fills in a lot on the author's character. Stanislaus is a competent writer himself, and shows a good sense of humour in places.

[Layton]

Stanislaus Joyce comes across as a self serving ass who wrote a book about his brother in order to secure his place in history, in his brothers shadow. I discourage you greatly from wasting your time and energy on this useless babble.

[David Elliott · Rating 5 out of 5]

A revelatory account of the lived values of James Joyce, as experienced and witnessed by his bother Stanislaus. Other than Ellmann's works, and differently, this is the single most powerful and eloquent account of the "man behind the screen." A brief, incisive, balanced vision.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Acquired Apr 30, 1992
Cheap Thrills, Montreal, Quebec

[Ralph · Rating 5 out of 5]

Useful but opinionated. Has an undying hatred of his and James’ father which is strange in a supposedly mature person.