Have you read Ulysses?

Harry Angstrom · 16-06-2011 7:15pm #1

Seeing as it's Bloomsday, I thought I'd ask this question.

I read it about 10 years ago but it was pretty heavy going at times. I started reading it in January and didn't finish it until the end of June. I'm glad I read it (it was like running a marathon!) but I don't think I'll ever read it again.

After finishing Ulysses, I gained confidence to start on Finnegan's Wake but I gave up after 10 pages

.

I sometimes think there is too much emphasis placed on both Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake as a lot of people seem to look at these books and form the opinion that Joyce is inaccessible. I'd like to see Portrait Of The Artist and Dubliners given more prominence when Joyce's canon of work is discussed, as well as his play Exiles and his works of poetry.

Callan57 · 16-06-2011 7:25pm

I have a copy but haven't read it yet .... but I will, one of these days

16-06-2011 7:48pm

Yep, enjoyed it too. Preferred Portrait of the Artist though.

Niles · 16-06-2011 8:15pm

Read chapters of it in college, wasn't really impressed to be honest. Guess it's down to individual taste. Slightly preferred Portrait of The Artist as a Young Man but wasn't that wild about either really. Maybe I didn't give them a chance.

Manach · 16-06-2011 8:26pm

Only the original by Homer. I was a tad confused till I released Penelope must be a Greek word for Marge.

Permabear · 16-06-2011 10:52pm

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Plowman · 16-06-2011 11:47pm

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Permabear · 17-06-2011 6:53am

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The Scientician · 17-06-2011 6:59am

Nope, I just carry it around with me this time of year. Joking aside, I've had a gander at some passages in it but never really fully perused it nor read it cover-to-cover. It's in the "I really must" pile.

Denerick · 17-06-2011 10:52pm

I plan to read it as soon as I have my (first) mental breakdown.

KnifeWRENCH · 18-06-2011 1:59am

It's been on my "to do" list for about 3 years........so I should get around to it any day now! :pac:

The Mad Hatter · 18-06-2011 10:53am

I read the first couple of hundred pages a year or two ago, and found it wasn't as hard a slog as I'd been led to believe. The prose was beautiful, but I felt that without having read Homer I was missing out on a lot, so I went back to read The Iliad and The Odyssey. I admit they've defeated me. I tried translations by Alexander Pope and found that the constant iambic rhythm of the verse got genuinely nauseating after a while. I'm gonna try Graham Chapman's translation next (which I hear is more faithful anyway).

Permabear: I don't know if you're into Twitter, but you might like the user @_FinnegansWake_, who's tweeting the book 140 characters at a time. Little daily fragments of profundity and strangeness.

spintendo · 18-06-2011 3:52pm

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

I read the first couple of hundred pages a year or two ago, and found it wasn't as hard a slog as I'd been led to believe. The prose was beautiful, but I felt that without having read Homer I was missing out on a lot, so I went back to read The Iliad and The Odyssey. I admit they've defeated me. I tried translations by Alexander Pope and found that the constant iambic rhythm of the verse got genuinely nauseating after a while. I'm gonna try Graham Chapman's translation next (which I hear is more faithful anyway).

Permabear: I don't know if you're into Twitter, but you might like the user @_FinnegansWake_, who's tweeting the book 140 characters at a time. Little daily fragments of profundity and strangeness.

Why not read the prose translations of Homer?

Lustrum · 18-06-2011 3:59pm

I tried it once and got to page 41 before giving up, I hadn't a clue what was going on even at that stage. The missus got me Dubliners then because she loved it so I read that and didn't like it, maybe I just don't get Joyce!

My english teacher in school used to read Ulysses every year for lent, he was some man

The Mad Hatter · 18-06-2011 5:28pm

spintendo wrote: »

Why not read the prose translations of Homer?

I probably will, if I can't get through the Chapman, but I want to try as I've never read an epic poem.

Permabear · 19-06-2011 4:17pm

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Travel is good · 19-06-2011 4:57pm

No haven't read it yet, but I think I tried to, many years ago.

The film Is on RTE1 tonight at 01.20am, for those of us who haven't read the book!

The Mad Hatter · 19-06-2011 7:43pm

Permabear wrote: »

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Possibly, but I hope not. The estate has started being a little softer on copyright since Joyce's main body of work work will be in the public domain in less than a year. They even let Kate Bush use an extract from Ulysses as song lyrics this year, though they turned down the same request twenty years ago.

I actually quite like getting the Wake in little bitesize chunks like this. I have a feeling that when I do eventually read (experience?) Finnegans Wake, a lot of the passages will be dreamily familiar. Twitter has lots of little gems like that. You might also like John Quincey Adams' account: his diary entries were almost invariably just a line long, so some historical society started tweeting them two hundred years to the day after they were originally written.

Thanks very much for the suggestions, by the way. I've heard great things about the Lattimore translation.

Duffy the Vampire Slayer · 19-06-2011 7:56pm

I've read Dubliners and Portrait... but I haven't got around to Ulysses yet. I might buy a copy as soon as I finish the books I'm reading at the moment.

Permabear · 19-06-2011 9:26pm

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Asphyxia · 19-06-2011 10:43pm

After starting and stopping for a few years I finally started it in January and I'm over half way through it now I do like it but I prefer Dubliners and Portrait Of The Artist... I've got Finnegan's Wake here as well which I might read again.

Harry Angstrom · 19-06-2011 11:21pm

Travel is good wrote: »

The film Is on RTE1 tonight at 01.20am, for those of us who haven't read the book!

I remember seeing that film a few years back. Considering it was made in the straitened times of 1967 and the fact that Ulysses is practically unfilmable, it's actually not a bad piece of work, all things considered. I remember Joe Lynch played Blazes Boylan. I never looked at Dinny Byrne in quite the same way again.

There was another film made relatively recently called Bloom, which was a bit disappointing although I have to say that Angeline Ball did a great job as a very voluptuous and a very sexual Molly Bloom

squeakyduck · 19-06-2011 11:35pm

I've read it through (as much as you can read Ulysses to the full 3/4's?!) twice and my first time reading it was in random episodes which caused me to hate it.

In my third year of college I had the opportunity to take a class with Declan Kiberd, my love of that book flourished. I turned up to every class and I loved to hear him speak in English seminars. The love that that man has for the book is infectious!

He said that if we had trouble understanding an episode skip it and it would be discussed in class....then start afresh with another chapter.

In my MA year I studied the book with him again. His book Ulysses and Us is a fantastic help and is very easy to read.

IvyTheTerrible · 21-06-2011 11:27am

I tried about 5 years ago maybe, I got 150 pages through it and just couldn't carry on, it was too much hard work. I think I was hampered by having little to no classical knowledge.

Enkidu · 21-06-2011 2:53pm

Permabear wrote: »

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Personally I would recommend Lattimore above Fagles, in my opinion Fagles distorts Homer too much (e.g. removing the epithets) and honestly, as subjective as this is, it doesn't "feel" like Homer. Lattimore and Fitzgerald, I think are closer to Homer, Lattimore more accurate, Fitzgerald more readable.

squeakyduck · 21-06-2011 2:56pm

Travel is good wrote: »

No haven't read it yet, but I think I tried to, many years ago.

The film Is on RTE1 tonight at 01.20am, for those of us who haven't read the book!

Downloaded this earlier and I'm watching it now!

So far so good!

Episodes are a bit muddled but the plot is interesting!

Nhead · 21-06-2011 3:03pm

Read it and loved it...I think about it a lot. Changed the way I view Dublin.

Plowman · 21-06-2011 9:30pm

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pipelaser · 05-07-2011 10:26pm

IvyTheTerrible wrote: »

I tried about 5 years ago maybe, I got 150 pages through it and just couldn't carry on, it was too much hard work. I think I was hampered by having little to no classical knowledge.

I was really hampered by having no classical knowledge as well.
Still managed to get through it. I was wondering what the hell was going on for much of the middle of the book, but then the true prize came in the last two chapters, they are excellent. Esp the second last.

Now that I have completed it, (after it taking a few months and having to watch the film
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTEuj4kOCmc
) I must say that it the most rewarding of all the books I've read.

I'm fascinated by Joyce.

The Princess Bride · 05-07-2011 10:35pm

Had every good intention to read it, went to my local library, but alas, some other well intended member had already taken it out.
.......at least I tried.

mosin · 02-01-2012 8:57pm

My news years resolution every year is to read Ulysses but frankly I find it a bit daunting. Is there such thing as a reading group you can join specifically to help you get through Ulysses? Wud love to join one in the Dublin area.

Have you read Ulysses?

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