I don't know why I have this urge to apologize, but this is the third attempt I made to read this, and yet again, I failed.

This time, I tried it with a group, hoping that it would become more understandable and less overwhelming. However, to my disappointment, the reaction was pretty much the same as the first time. I simply will not try again. If it were up to me, James Joyce would still remain in obscurity.

I am well aware that it is avant-garde, it is groundbreaking, it is unique, and for those who share his sense of humor, it is humorous. But for me, it didn't possess any of those qualities. Maybe I just don't have an appreciation for the cutting edge. I also despised Confederacy of Dunces, and for very similar reasons.

My respect goes out to everyone who persevered through it, truly to everyone who managed to discover the aspects that are worthy of admiration. And there is a hint of fear for those who actually enjoyed it. :)

I suddenly realized that although I had promised to put up my essay on Ulysses, I never actually did it! How could I have forgotten such an important thing? Well, here it is finally: http://www.publicbooks.org/bloomsday/.

I hope you will take the time to read it and perhaps gain some new insights into this remarkable work of literature.

Ulysses is a complex and challenging novel, but it is also one of the most influential works of the 20th century.

By exploring the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of its characters on a single day, Joyce creates a vivid and detailed portrait of modern life.

So, please click on the link and enjoy!

Some works are not simply written; they are lived experiences. The authors pen not with ink but with their very breaths. Each inhalation draws in a piece of the world, which then seeps into the author's being, allowing it to permeate, assess, prod, absorb, and contemplate. It is then packaged like a precious farewell gift and released with the exhalation. Since this captivating process continues for several years until the end approaches, we are left with a work that resembles refined crystals, the result of a purification process of worldly elements.

Fueled by my love for Stephen, when I instinctively picked up Ulysses to read last year, I knew I was entering a complex maze of diverse and encrypted observations, given its inescapable cult reputation. I was aware that I wouldn't understand half of it, but I was okay with that.



Ulysses, in simple terms, is the account of a single day in the lives of two Irish men, Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom, in Dublin. They leave their respective homes, go to work, meet friends and acquaintances, have both ordinary and passionate conversations over food and drinks, encounter each other at a library, discuss more ideas and opinions, form a bond and then disengage, and finally say goodnight before returning to their respective abodes.



That's the basic story, yes. But it's Ulysses, after all. And so it comes with a plethora of caveats. Within its seven letters, it holds seven worlds, and I was, unintentionally, drawn into its clutches for seven months. This intimidating text often dampens the ambition of a reader, as I had heard, sometimes right from the start, and occasionally, in the middle, of reading it in its entirety. And the trepidation is not without reason.



Do we ever stop to think about the answer we should truthfully give when someone asks, 'What are you doing now?' We are asked this at least a dozen times a day, and mostly, we focus on one activity, at most two, and sometimes, none. But incidentally, the mind registers much more than one thing at a time. I am writing this review, but I also heard the beep of my phone, which is kept next to my keyboard, a second ago. Oh, and I am also noticing the movement of the person loitering by the door through the corner of my eye. The subdued chatter from the adjacent wing is also not going unnoticed, nor is the phone ring singing its soft bellow outside the corridor, in some random cabin. You see, my mind is constantly switching between all these activities, and I am thinking about all of them simultaneously, perhaps with a millisecond's gap: who is messaging me (and what do they want), who is loitering around (and who are they waiting for, and what color is that shirt), what is the group chatting about (and does it concern me in any way), where is that phone ringing (and why isn't anyone answering). Mostly, these questions are inconsequential to me, but not to my observations. The latter feeds on this scattered field of information and greedily devours it to maintain its vitality. These uncertainties in answers are, after all, the gaps within which new meanings are born every minute.



The beauty of this work lies in this very premise: the intricately overlapping thoughts that run through the minds of these two men on a canvas as vast as your imagination. Joyce must have been an avid reader and an even more observant learner, as the references one stumbles upon span geographical boundaries, political systems, societal norms, and religious beliefs. While the literary flavors waft into the nostrils with Blake, Milton, Shakespeare, Swift, Dante, Aristotle, and Poe concocting a rich broth, the linguistic sprinkling of Latin, French, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Greek, and Italian jewels adorn the prudent chaos. Algebra is summoned in a conversation and then dispatched to an opera; the sandwich is crowned as the hero of an Irish mythological meal. Coffee is intensely scrutinized on a discarded tabletop, while adultery walks away like a dignified head of state. Since thoughts cannot be chained, words follow suit, and all the structural nomenclature and conventional meanings are cast aside. So, no good becomes n.g, and the bartender is rechristened aproned curator.



This voluminous work is made lighter by the collective effort of literary devices, as they all dance in a dazzling display beneath the core narrative: conversations, vignettes, reflections, satire, parody, lyricism, hallucinations, catechism, theatrical enactment, humor, allusions, and aphorisms make the most of the moment. The only mainstream narrative style I didn't find was the epistolary form.



Reading this was like engaging in water-skiing. The balance was precarious, and the grip was minimal. But one glimpse of the blue sea, and all fears are swallowed by its hues. And that occasional peak one suddenly reaches, courtesy of a huge leap of cognition, is worth all the struggles through the choppy waters. I felt those incredible highs at Oxen of the Sun (Chapter 14) and Ithaca (Chapter 17). But is there a right way to read it? I'm not entirely sure. But if my experience can be of any help, I'm happy to share it under the spoiler :) When I started, I had two versions of Ulysses with me: a Kindle version and a paperback. I wasn't sure which one I should read. So, I did a little bit of research on supporting texts. There is a wealth of information available offline and online, and I'm only mentioning those that I think would be useful: Ulysses Annotated is a comprehensive book for those seeking annotations to understand the political, commercial, and religious contexts of that time. Also, the use of multiple languages means referring to translating websites/apps, and this book comes in handy here. However, it is expensive (in fact, more expensive than Ulysses!) and may not be available in libraries. In such a case, there is a free alternative that is fairly good, if not as good as the book. Put together by some kind soul from Columbia University, this neat website has annotations for most of the chapters, and these annotations are sourced from Ulysses Annotated. If podcasts or audio is your thing, you could check Frank Delany's blog for some assistance. And now, with all these resources, we are back to the same question - how does one read Ulysses? Well, there is no definitive answer. I ended up reading both my Kindle and paperback versions, one after the other. I didn't refer to the annotations beyond Chapter 3 and went on my own thereafter. There was a certain rhythm that had seeped into my reading, and I began to view the constant references as an obstacle to the overall experience. I do intend to read this again someday with all the annotations in place. That should be an experience of a different kind! Oh, another aspect to consider: does one need to read Odyssey before venturing into Ulysses, as most of us know the former to be the structural foundation of the latter? I have only one answer: if you have read Odyssey, great! And if you haven't, that's also fine! Either way, you are bound to have a life-changing experience :)



Ulysses, on the surface, appears to have been written in a rush. But upon reading it slowly, sipping a mug of coffee every 20 pages, I realized that the urgency was just a guise; all Joyce wanted to do was talk. Talk because he was compelled to; compelled by the remarkable manifestations of life and death around him, compelled by the overwhelming significance of routine and triviality that surrounded him. Even though I struggled to fully grasp the entirety of his revelations on each page of this epic, I reveled in the powerful gusts of illuminating thoughts that protected me from the whirlpools of ignorance.



And yes... Happy Birthday, Sir Joyce.







----




  Also on my blog.

Sometimes reading a Great Work of Literature is like drinking fine French wine, say an aged Burgundy or Mersault. Everyone raves about how amazing it is. On an intellectual level, you can indeed appreciate its brilliance, subtlety, and refinement.

However, it often feels too refined. It seems unapproachable and aloof, not quite in sync with that ketchupy burger you're having for dinner. You just don't find yourself enjoying it.

But then, as you read the label more closely, you realize that although it tastes just like a fine burgundy, your wine was actually made in the Abarca Hills of Chile. It's from Casa Marin and was produced not by a snooty Frenchman with a degree in oenology but by a down-to-earth woman farmer.

Despite its sophistication and complexity, there's a more accessible note, a friendliness. And perhaps more importantly, it has a higher alcohol content than the French wine you thought you had. By the time you're halfway through the bottle, it starts to seem quite likeable after all. You and the wine are getting along splendidly, and you're engaged in an enthusiastic discussion of literature with people who were strangers just an hour ago.

One of them tells a dirty joke that Joyce would have sniggered at, and you laugh so hard that you spill your wine on him. Maybe he's a little annoyed, but your host brings a towel and another bottle, and the party is truly great. And even if you're a wine ignoramus and the fancy bottle was kind of wasted on you, the fact is you enjoyed it. So what if it wasn't a traditional French wine? The enjoyment you derived from it is what matters.

“Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.”

Ulysses ~~~ James Joyce

I have never had such a tumultuous experience with a novel as I did with Ulysses. There were countless starts, false starts, and restarts. But, oh, was it worth it! This amazing book is truly a masterpiece.

My Goodreads friend, zxvasdf, once told me, "You'll always be far from finishing, even when you finish it. I don't think anyone can really appreciate Joyce's work in its entirety if they're not Joyce themselves; there'll always be mysteries abound." He couldn't have been more right. When I closed the cover, my first thought was to go back to the beginning and start over. Then I considered diving into A Portrait of the Artist As a Young Man. But ultimately, I decided to step away from James Joyce and let Ulysses soak in for a few months.

Joyce's Ulysses is被誉为 the most important novel in modern literature, and it当之无愧. Joyce completely revolutionized the traditional form of the novel. It's a radical departure from what came before, yet he brilliantly weaves together modern and classical literature within its pages.

Am I gushing? Absolutely! But Ulysses is a novel that demands it. Friends on Goodreads have asked me to explain it in my review, but I'm sorry, I can't. I don't think anyone truly can. Joyce deliberately set out to baffle and disorient scholars for centuries, and he succeeded.

Before I end this non-review, I have to mention PENELOPE. The final chapter, Molly Bloom's Soliloquy, is the single greatest piece of writing I've ever read. It ties the entire novel together and provides deep insights into the characters of Leopold and Stephen. While reading those 76 punctuation-less pages, I had several aha moments. Not everyone will agree with my interpretations, and perhaps Joyce is having a good laugh at my expense.

Molly's Soliloquy is a piece that I will return to again and again, just as I read Charles Dickens annually. It's an amazing work that will continue to enthrall me for years to come. In the end, it's Molly's voice that is the most powerful in Ulysses. Ending the novel with her soliloquy is truly orgasmic.

In conclusion, Ulysses is about all of humanity. It's about a city and its people, about the joys and sorrows of life, about eating, drinking, and loving. It's a challenging read, but one that is well worth the effort. So, should you read it? Without a doubt! It's a glorious literary adventure that you won't soon forget.

**CRITIQUE**

**A Flotational Theory of “Ulysses”**

I made extensive notes while merrily making my way through “Ulysses”. These notes were invaluable as they helped me stay on top of the task and manage my sense of intimidation. Ultimately, “Ulysses” is not overly difficult to read, and its length should not deter you. However, it is relatively challenging to understand. There is a great deal happening within its pages, a lot to think about, and I could have written much more. When it came time to write a review, I added water to my notes, shook them up, and waited to see what floated to the top and what sank to the bottom. What I have written is what rose to the surface, while the rest is sediment. What I included might be light and superficial, and what I didn't might be deep and meaningful. This review represents my views as of August 25, 2011, and they will change as I continue to engage with this novel. If you don't like my views, that's okay with me, as I have others. I'm glad you do too.

**A Patchwork Quilt Theory of “Ulysses”**

While reading “Ulysses”, I was reminded of a community art project I imagined years ago. I dreamed of creating a website that would publish photos of every family or person in the world in the comfort of their own living space. People could展示 themselves surrounded by their loved ones, prized possessions, and the minutiae of their lives. One photo of each family could show how we actually live. It would be a digital patchwork quilt. “Ulysses” is like an early nineteenth-century patchwork quilt set in Dublin, capturing everyday life, one day's life in the world.
**A Simpsons Theory of “Ulysses”**
As soon as I started thinking about a family on a couch, I realized that to understand “Ulysses”, you only need one archetypal family sitting on a couch in their living room, the Simpsons. Every night at the start of each episode, Homer returns from his travels and travails through the dangerous streets of Springfield to be reunited with his family on the couch. The audience also unites each evening in front of the television, reconciled to watch the life of another family, wondering how similar or different their own families are.
**A Tricky Marxist Theory of “Ulysses” (Of the Groucho, not the Karl Variety)**
I read the Penguin Modern Classics edition of “Ulysses”, which is described as the standard Random House/Bodley Head text that first appeared in 1960. I haven't read the annotated version yet, but I'm sure I will one Bloomsday or before. I am interested in the relationship between the novel itself and the annotations. The text is just part of a broader source of meaning, intent, and context for the novel. In a way, Joyce never intended the novel to be a closed text with all meaning sourced from the text alone. Indeed, only part, possibly a small part, of its meaning and significance is apparent on the page. This reminds me of the “Tutsi Fruitsy Ice Cream” skit with the books in the Marx Brothers film, “A Day at the Races”. To interpret and understand one book, you had to buy another, and then another. As Groucho remarks, “It's pretty tricky when you don't know it.”
**A Three R’s Theory of “Ulysses” (On Writing, Reading and Rhythmatic)**
Just as Joyce revolutionized the writing of fiction, he also revolutionized the reading of fiction. He expanded the scope, content, and boundaries of the novel. My first reading of “Ulysses” focused on the text in front of me, especially the beauty of the language, the alliteration, the invention of new words, the aggregation of words into phrases and rhymes, and the rhythm of both the spoken and written word. However, initially, this reading was insufficient to determine the meaning of the novel. “Ulysses” derives much of its deeper meaning from its literary and historical context. To fully understand it, you have to go beyond the physical boundaries of the book. So, what Joyce created was a work of art that is an amalgam of the book and its context. I would also add “interpretation” and the reading experience. More so than in any other novel I have read, the meaning of “Ulysses” is a creative joint venture between the author and the reader, and possibly other readers. I continue to read, hoping to reach a point of enlightenment, a Eureka moment when all is clear and I finally “get it”. Yet, part of me expects that this might not have occurred yet. Once you have read “Ulysses”, the act of reading and comprehension never stops, and the road goes on forever.
**A Cubist Theory of “Ulysses”**
Reading “Ulysses”, or the ability to read it, might be a skill set that you acquire over time and through repeated readings. Practice makes perfect. What originally intimidated me (and still does to some extent) is the possibility that “Ulysses” could end up being a giant, 900-page Rubik's Cube. I am prepared to spend hundreds of hours playing with it until one day, awake or asleep, I unlock its mysteries. If this happens, I might be able to read it with more facility or ease. I might be able to twist it into shape in under 10 seconds. I might be able to forget all the wrong moves, twists, and turns I made on my journey. That moment hasn't happened yet. I am striving for facility, but part of me is still preoccupied with the detail and the facile. “Ulysses” is still sitting on my shelf, now read, but still Sphinx-like in all its mystery and complexity, discovered but not necessarily understood. This review is the story of my journey of discovery, starting with baby steps.
**A Racist Theory of “Ulysses”**
“Ulysses” is an epic of three races: the Jews, the Irish, and the horse races. The Irish and the Jews are united by one God and divided by one man, Jesus Christ. They share an Old Testament but are separated by a New Testament. They both live in exile, one inside their homeland and the other exiled from their homeland. They both seek freedom, self-determination, and home-rule. In the meantime, life is a gamble, and we never know from one moment to another whether we will be winners or losers.
**A Paternalist Theory of “Ulysses”**
Just as “Ulysses” is concerned with remoteness from home or the Homeland, it is also concerned with Fathers and Sons, the absence of a Father from a Son (and vice versa). The Father is always the most immediate connection with the Past, while the Son is the most immediate connection with the Future. Every Son has a Father, but not every Father has a Son. “Ulysses” is a journey within a day, but it is also symbolic of a longer and greater journey, the Journey or Cycle of Life. Bloom is the Father (an apostate Jew), and Stephen is the Son (an Irishman), just as the Christ of Christianity was born of a Jew. Bloom is the body, the flesh from which the Son derived (at least symbolically), and Stephen is the mind, the imagination, “the young bard”.
**A Stuffist Theory of “Ulysses” (The Stuff of Life)**
In the gaps between the Father and the Son, Bloom and Stephen, in the streets of Dublin, Joyce finds the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Stuff of Life. “Ulysses” is about the Stuff of Life and is stuffed full of Life, from birth to death and all the days in between.
**A Feminist Theory of “Ulysses” (On and Off Women)**
“Ulysses” is written by a man, from a man's point of view. Yet, it is about women and the love that men have for women, whatever the motivation. Men can turn their backs on women, but ultimately they must return to be whole. Just as “Ulysses” is about the world, it is about women, the unknowability and insatiability of women. Bloom is intelligent, scientific, and rational, while Stephen is creative. However, Bloom's wife Molly is physical and sensuous. It is possible that Bloom was originally attracted to Molly in Gibraltar because of her dark, Jewish appearance. However, it's more likely that he was attracted to her because of her ample figure, her breasts, her buttocks, and her voluptuousness. To him, these features must have symbolized fertility. Yet, after having a female child (Milly) and a son dying shortly after birth, the quest for a male heir (at least together) ceases. This marks the point of estrangement in their relationship. Molly, seeking physical satisfaction, is unsatisfied, and Bloom, seeking a son, is also unsatisfied. Both of them anticipate Mick Jagger's “I can't get no…satisfaction!” Molly engages in a long list of liaisons, and Bloom seeks the company of prostitutes and barmaids. Yet, they remain together. They co-exist, co-habit, and share a bed, to the extent that Bloom even sleeps in the wet spot of Molly's infidelity. Despite the superficial appetite for breasts and buttocks, what Bloom seems to want is a son. This provides a different perspective on sex. Molly sees sex as recreation, while Bloom sees it as procreation and a continuation of himself, his journey, his culture, and his legacy into the future. To the extent that his ambitions and goals might not be achieved during his lifetime, his son will be able to continue and achieve them. However, Molly has not borne him a son. In Bloom's eyes, he has no son, therefore he has no future, no legacy, no legend, and no immortality. Therefore, he will not have achieved except ephemerally. Molly, on the other hand, is preoccupied with the moment and is content with the ephemeral. We don't see much of her relationship with Milly, and we don't see how maternal she is. She seems to be interested in her own physical pleasure (and why not). While the physical attraction between Molly and Bloom might not have been great and the intellectual affinity might have been negligible, it is sad that the two have drifted apart. Although the action takes place over 24 hours, the two end up in bed together, despite their differences. Stephen satisfies Bloom's appetite for a son, which allows Molly to satisfy Bloom's sexual appetite, and perhaps vice versa.
**A Floral Arrangement of “Ulysses”**
Joyce constructs “Ulysses” around the imagery of flowers. Leopold Bloom himself is, of course, a flower, Molly's “mountain flower”, perhaps her “mountin' flower”. Molly loves roses and associates their courting with the exchange of roses and, during consummation, the squashing of roses on her chest. A rose bud might describe her genitals, a red rose might symbolize that she is menstruating, and a white rose might represent her availability for sex. Ultimately, over the course of the day, the relationship between Bloom and Molly progresses from bud to blossom. The flower of any relationship is not a constant but an organic cycle of growth, decay, and revival that repeats with time, each time a rebirth or resurrection.
**A Journalistic Approach to “Ulysses”**
I could pause and focus on the language of “Ulysses”, the Episodes and sentences and expressions that I loved. However, ultimately, the tidbits and titbits that appealed to me are in my notes. I would prefer to spend the rest of this review focusing on the extent to which “Ulysses” is Joyce's journal of a journey. Interestingly, the word “journal” derives from the recording of a day's activities, while the word “journey” derives from the work or travel we do in a day. A journalist was originally someone who kept a journal of the day's activities. “Ulysses” is an epic tale of a journey or, more accurately, a number of journeys. It is modeled on Homer's “Odyssey”, the tale of the Greek king Odysseus' return home from Troy to Ithaca. The Trojan War took ten years, and after that, it took Odysseus another ten years to overcome many perils and make his way back home to his wife (Penelope) and son (Telemachus). In the meantime, Penelope had been besieged by marriage suitors, everyone believing that Odysseus was dead. Thus, at the heart of “The Odyssey” is a return to home, matrimony, and parenthood. In Homer's work, Odysseus is the hero, and the Odyssey describes the hero's journey. The word “Ulysses” is the Latin equivalent of the word “Odysseus”. For what it's worth, in contrast to Homer, Joyce's work is named after the hero rather than the journey itself. At the most superficial level, “Ulysses” is a geographical journey home from Troy to Ithaca, from a place of war to a place of love, from Bloom's home, through the streets of Dublin, and back home again. It is also a chronological journey from morning (sunrise) to afternoon to evening, through the night (darkness), and back to morning (a new sunrise, a new day). It is a journey from Stephen's childhood to Bloom's parenthood, from Stephen's quest for a father to Bloom's quest for a son, and the satisfaction of both. In the relationship between Stephen and Bloom, it is a journey from separation to unity, from an unholy threesome to a Holy Trinity (including Dublin's Stuff of Life). Artistically, for both Stephen and Joyce himself, it is a journey from self-doubt and idleness to realization and fruition. Inside Bloom's residence, it is a journey from downstairs to upstairs, from the basement (Hell) through the lounge room and kitchen (Purgatory) to the bedroom (Heaven). In the relationship between Bloom and Molly, it is a journey from estrangement to reconciliation, from celibacy to consummation, from No! to Yes! In the vulgar relationship between cock and cunt (to use the vernacular), it is a journey from the outside to the inside, from dry to wet, from interruptus to coitus, from conjugal wrongs to conjugal rights, from a red erection to a resurrection, from till death do us part to life ever after.
**A Creative Theory of “Ulysses”**
The return home completes and perfects everything, restoring order and the way of all flesh, the way of all things. Just as this beauty is achieved in everyday life, it is achieved in creativity. Artistic creation achieves order and beauty. Just as Bloom returns to Molly, Joyce himself returns to his wife, Nora, bearing a gift. Ultimately, “Ulysses” is Joyce's gift to his wife, Nora, the mother of his son (George) and daughter (Lucia). She is his love, his purpose, his cause, his fulfillment, and his reward. She is the stuff of his life, the stuff of his legend, and the guarantee of his immortality. “Ulysses” is the container, the receptacle (dare I say it, the Holy Grail?), the womb that holds all of this and more.

In late 2012 in Geneva, at the Plainpalais market, there was a riotous display of phallic vegetables, ill-smelling cheese, and trash literature. The Reviewer and his Girlfriend walked through the stalls hand in hand, surrounded by polyglot conversations. The Reviewer quoted various lines, such as "My methods are new and are causing surprise / To make the blind see I throw dust in their eyes" by Stanislaw Lem and "The sense of beauty leads us astray." He also made remarks about projective spaces and Riemann spheres, much to the irritation of his Girlfriend.

They reached a bookstall full of lurid French paperbacks, and the Girlfriend started going through them, asking the Reviewer if he had read certain ones. He gave his opinions, using words like "très douce," "amazingly, appallingly alliterative," and "nausicating." She accused him of being a smartarse and asked if he was talking about cosmology again.

Then, Albert Einstein, Lawrence Krauss, and Richard Dawkins appeared and had a conversation about space being curved or flat. Einstein also made a comment about the Church being founded on mystery and the void. The Girlfriend told Einstein to speak English, and they all disappeared again.

The Reviewer and his Girlfriend continued towards the Route de Carouge. A tram passed with a Christmas-themed wine poster on its side. Stephen Potter appeared and made some remarks about the tramlines and the wine. They also met Charles Darwin, who talked about evolution and the survival of the fittest in relation to a book. The Reviewer and his Girlfriend had a discussion about the fascination and revelation of the book.

Kristen Stewart then entered, wearing a semi-transparent gown. The Reviewer and Robert Pattinson both vied for her attention, with the Reviewer wanting to write a poem to her breasts and Pattinson proposing marriage. The Girlfriend was not impressed.

Finally, they met the Prophet Elijah halfway across the Pont du Mont-Blanc. Elijah pointed to the Jet d'eau and made a speech about it being proteiform, constant but always changing, an annunciatory angel, and an inexhaustible power. He compared it to the book, and the Girlfriend surprisingly understood. They all gazed at the fountain in silence for a moment, until E.L. James turned up and exclaimed "Holy shit!"

Curtain

(This expanded article provides more details and descriptions to bring the scene and the conversations to life, while still maintaining the essence of the original text.)

You shouldn't read this.

Almost no one should read this. People get mad when I say that. (Some people. Almost no one actually.) They think I'm dissing the book and I'm not, or at least not at that moment, although I don't particularly like it and I'm going to dis it soon. I'm not saying it's not a brilliant book though. If nothing else, it's definitely a brilliant book. I'm just saying almost no one should read it.

The reason is that it's the most difficult book in the canon: it's the K2 of literature. And should everyone go climbing K2, just because it's a very good mountain? No, almost no one should because they haven't trained for it and they're going to die. Almost no one should climb K2 and almost no one should read Ulysses. You haven't trained for it and it's going to kill you.

What it's going to do is it's going to annoy you to death. It's not like it's boring - it's not boring, really, except for episodes ten and fourteen - but it's annoying. It's 800 pages of trying to figure out what's happening. It's the most difficult book that we all agree is brilliant. Everyone knows about Ulysses. It's a taunt, a boogeyman, a trophy. Look, I read a lot of books myself, and I barely staggered through this and understood very little of it.

And given that almost no one should read it and almost everyone who has feels about it the same way they feel about the time they ate a fried spider on a dare, it's easy to find yourself reviewing not the book, but the fact that the book exists.

Because we have opinions about the fact of the book, right? Why must Joyce write an 800-page stream-of-consciousness masterpiece in which it's very hard to figure out what's going on and when you do figure it out it's probably farting? Why must people continue to call it a masterpiece? Is everyone just being assholes?

Is it rewarding? Yeah, sure, I guess so. You won't forget it, anyway. Leopold Bloom, in his pathetic everyman interior optimistic life, feels like no one else in literature. And the feel of the words themselves, their collisions into each other and their abrupt abdications, is entirely unique.

Will you like it? No, probably not. Some people do. Most people don't. I didn't, not really. I like having read it more than I liked reading it.

But Ulysses is a rare thing: it's a book that doesn't need to be liked. It's not even really about being "liked". It has something else in mind.

Virginia Woolf famously called Ulysses the work of "a queasy undergraduate scratching his pimples," but she also said of it, "If we want life itself, here surely we have it." It was a clear influence on Mrs. Dalloway, but she "invites the suspicion that she is awkwardly straining to rationalize an aversion that she cannot justify by logical means," and I bring this up in order to point out that a super smart lady feels the same way I do and therefore I'm right or at least not definitely wrong.

Because here's my problem with Ulysses: my problem is James Joyce. I don't like him. I don't like his style, I don't like his sense of humor, I don't like his kinks or his kidneys, and I really don't like his bear-on-a-tricycle tricks. There's a new gimmick for every chapter in here. One contains a parody of every style of literature Joyce knows, which isn't as much fun as it sounds. Another is written as the Rabelaisian answers to a series of 309 questions. I don't like it.

And that's okay, right? Authors are just people. You get to know them, not necessarily through their characters but through their books. Sometimes you don't like them. It's okay if you like James Joyce and I don't; people are like that. Joyce isn't the easiest guy to like compared to, say, Judy Blume, the most likable author I can think of...but you might.

(So Joyce is not Leopold Bloom. I'm not sure if he's Stephen Dedalus; to be honest, I didn't feel I got to know Dedalus very well. But the kinks and the farts...those are all Joyce, my friend, make no mistake.)

When Woolf called this "life itself", what she meant was that thing modernists were trying to create in the early 1900s (or trying to catch up to Tristram Shandy on, anyway): the interior process of living. Your inside voice, the unfiltered id. And Joyce has done it as well as anyone has; that's one of the reasons Bloom is so memorable. You know him on a level you don't know anyone else in literature, or really in life either; it's a level of direct access that you only otherwise get with weird dudes on the subway.

And one of the things about that level of access is that I think it necessarily comes with a certain amount of farting. I mean that I'm earthier inside my head than I generally let on. The weird sex stuff, the awareness of my body's prosaic functioning - this is, actually, how my brain is too. Woolf and I find Joyce's frankness distasteful; in fact, we find it shocking, which is a funny feeling for me. But it's true, so maybe its shock says more about us than Joyce.

Or, maybe turning into a lady and getting fisted is just super weird even for me and Virginia. We're all gross, but Joyce is gross in a specific way that's not mine, and we're back to I don't care for him.

One of the recurring themes of Ulysses is how poorly we know each other. Bloom spends the book trying desperately to explain who he thinks he is to everyone around him. And everyone, from Dedalus on to Gertie, the young lady whose upskirt he whacks off to in the park, disagrees with him about who he is. In fact Bloom isn't who he likes to think he is either; he's some combination of his and others' perceptions of him, and Joyce does a lovely job of showing us how that all works. And in the climactic almost-twist-ending we find out that Molly, whose presence has permeated the book, isn't who Bloom thinks she is either.

So in his creation of a person whom we know, from every angle and from the inside all the way out, Joyce has done something that was entirely revolutionary at the time, which is still shocking today, and which to my knowledge has still not been matched. So. Five stars not for the book but for the fact of the book. Five stars for life itself, because we do want it, even if we don't always like it, and here - surely - we have it.

The singer stood on the stage and asked the crowd, "how many of you have read James Joyce?"

He had just finished singing "Whiskey in the Jar" and was about to sing "Finnegan's Wake", so he was setting the stage for his next song. A few hands went up, including mine. We were in The Merry Ploughman's Pub in South Dublin, and the crowd was having a great time, singing and drinking Guinness from pint glasses.

"Now, how many understood what you read?" The crowd laughed, and half as many hands stayed up. I realized my extended arm was wavering a bit too.

Over the years, I have regarded "Ulysses" as a high and formidable mountain to climb. I have picked it up several times, weighed it, set it beside the phone book and compared the width. I have scanned the pages and noticed with alarm a painful lack of punctuation, not the simplicity of Cormac McCarthy, but run-on sentences and stream of consciousness. I have avoided "The Sound and the Fury" for the same reason and finally gave up on it. Mailer's "Why Are We in Vietnam?" was a mess of nonsense that I slogged through to the end, but it was a relatively short book.

And then there is the length. It's really intimidating. I read through "War and Peace", in awe of its epic stature, and I finished "Atlas Shrugged" out of sheer inertia and also out of a morbid curiosity to see it through. "Ulysses" was long and in stream of consciousness prose.

So the years passed, and I couldn't bring myself to start the climb. I didn't feel up to wading through the swamp of adjectives and relentless narration.

When I finally did start, I was pleasantly surprised.

The stream of consciousness technique was not overwhelming, not the nonsensical mess of Mailer nor the cacophony of thought from Faulkner. Joyce's language is rich and engaging, his storytelling modern and experimental but still approachable. There were moments when I was in love with the book, believing it was the greatest novel I had ever read. I was convinced of Joyce's brilliance and inspired by his genius. It is funny, profane, irreverent, even shocking. The references to classic literature, especially the parallels with Homer, make it worthy of a greater review than I can come up with. Molly Bloom's lengthy soliloquy at the end is a gem of vulgarity and human observation. Other times, I was simply reading to get through, keeping a runner's pace through the long back miles and steep hills of a marathon.

Ultimately, this is a masterpiece, a great work in the English language or of any language, literature of the highest order. But it can be difficult, in its length and its narration, and Joyce asks a lot of his reader. His prose is steeped in his own erudition, and he makes little attempt to simplify it. But for the reader who makes it to the top, it is a great view from the summit.

It's truly impossible to speak in a general way about a book that I hold so dear. Thus, I made the decision to gather some of my half-formed thoughts on each chapter. Here we go:

1. Telemachus

"Stately, plump Buck Mulligan" … "the scrotumtightening sea" … the old milk-woman. The strange, vivid, and meandering language of this chapter is firmly etched in my brain from my numerous earlier failed attempts to read Ulysses when I was younger. I would always tire myself out by trying (and failing) to understand every single detail. Finally, I gave up on that and simply read it. The style of this chapter is what I consider to be the quintessential "Joycean" style. I can understand why people get discouraged early on, as Mulligan as a character is rather irritating.

2. Nestor

Unlike chapter 1, this chapter feels as if we are picking up where A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man left off. There's something warm and comforting about seeing Stephen back in the schoolroom, but this time as the teacher.

3. Proteus

This is perhaps the archetypal "stream of consciousness" chapter, punctuated with those amazing brief flashes of thought like "Paris rawly waking, crude sunlight on her lemon streets" that thrill you with a powerful image and then fade away. We are clearly in the mind of someone extremely erudite and a bit solipsistic. But I think the real genius of Joyce here is that he (quite literally) keeps Stephen's feet on the ground, bringing us back now and then to the plodding of his boots in the sand.

4. Calypso

Leopold Bloom is the absolute cutest character ever! I'm sorry, but he is just adorable. Stephen (as the avatar of the younger Joyce) has to be all cerebral, brooding, and Hamlet-esque, but Bloom is wonderfully curious, open-minded, and full of funny little ideas. It is in Bloom that Joyce展现了 the full depth and breadth of his humanity and empathy. Through bumbling Bloom, this book becomes so much more than what Portrait was – more than a piece of formal innovation or a Novel of Ideas, but a real breathing piece of vulnerable life.

5. Lotus Eaters

More introduction to Bloom, sort of a counterpoint to Proteus. It would be interesting to count the parallels between them (lemon houses, lemon soap, etc.). But of course, there are images and echoes like this that pop up everywhere. The connection to The Odyssey in "Lotus Eaters" seems rather tenuous.

6. Hades

It's James Joyce ruminating on death, so of course it's brilliant. The mysterious man in the mackintosh is such a lovely detail. Notice how Joyce is teasing us by having Stephen and Bloom almost meet but not quite. Ulysses is not exactly a plot-driven page-turner, but there is a kind of narrative tension that comes from our curiosity about when the two main characters will finally meet (this, of course, comes from the Odyssey as well). Bloom and his wandering mind continue to be adorable. It's wonderful how Joyce, a Catholic, describes Bloom, a Jew, observing the Catholic church service.

7. Aeolus

Probably the most dated chapter in the book, based on a layout parodying newspapers of the time. A lot of this went over my head.

8. Lestrygonians

Joyce once again proves his chops (get it?) with a masterful evocation of hunger and eating.

9. Scylla and Charybdis

Stephen seems to be trolling everybody with his weird Shakespeare theory. It reminds me of the later parts of Portrait, and I guess this could be seen as the logical continuation of that novel, which started with baby-talk and became increasingly more linguistically sophisticated. Here we reach dizzying heights of pun and wordplay – but I think even Joyce is acknowledging that, in the end, this kind of bookish repartee is a bit hollow.

10. Wandering Rocks

Joyce flexing with a bunch of mini streams of consciousness. Amazingly detailed. People talk about Ulysses as if it's a novel all about Dublin as a city, but only a few chapters seem that way to me, and this is one of them.

11. Sirens

In this chapter, which is all about music, rhythm and sound eventually overtake sense, and as a result, this is, in my opinion, the most difficult chapter in the whole book. I wonder if it should be read aloud – listened to, rather than read.

12. Cyclops

Bloom's famous encounter with "The Citizen". Joyce seems to be parodying the various irritating men one may find in an Irish pub. He is at his caustic best when lampooning the arrogant nationalists. Unfortunately, like a boorish drunkard in a pub, this chapter drags a bit. I also don't understand why Joyce seems to go back and forth between colloquial/pub language to highfalutin epic-style language. I suppose it's about the way people boast and pontificate in drinking establishments. Still entertaining, and Bloom emerges as the only truly heroic one there.

13. Nausicaa

James Joyce describes an orgasm. Amazing.

14. Oxen of the Sun

This is simply one of the most accomplished, ingenious, and dazzling pieces of writing of all time. Just incredibly clever. Joyce parodying the entire history of English literature is the biggest flex ever, and the way he interweaves it with the gestation and birth, the men going from the hospital to the pub and talking a lot of nonsense, and Stephen and Bloom finally meeting. And it's kind of funny how even when parodying other writers, Joyce still sounds Joycean.

15. Circe

This is where everything goes crazy and departs entirely from reality. Even today, almost exactly 100 years later, this still seems transgressively modern and original. Bloom's subconscious comes spewing out of these pages in a carnivalesque fever dream of characters and surreal images. The nagging guilts and regrets and insecurities that various characters have stifled over the course of the novel finally take center stage, and Bloom (poor Bloom!) becomes the scapegoat for all Ireland's wrongs. The first time I read this, I was not at all ready for the ending of this chapter. After all that ridiculousness, it comes out of nowhere. A real gut-punch. I cried!

16. Eumaeus

I have to admit I just don't get this chapter. It seems to be deliberately very badly written. I wonder if maybe, consistent with its themes of mistaken identity, Joyce was trying to write in a style as different as possible from his own? Worst chapter.

17. Ithaca

Probably my favorite chapter in the novel. There are just so many beautiful passages, like the one about "what Bloom liked about water" or whatever it is (can't find it now). Also, after such a long build-up, this is the real moment of bonding between Stephen and Bloom, which is what this book is all about. People will disagree, but I really believe that's what it's about – human connection, empathy, the ability of one brain (one stream of consciousness) to relate to and identify with another. There's a great quote:

"each one who enters imagines himself to be the first to enter whereas he is always the last term of a preceding series even if the first term of a succeeding one, each imagining himself to be first, last, only and alone whereas he is neither first nor last nor only nor alone in a series originating in and repeated to infinity."

18. Penelope

At the last minute, Joyce (sort of) makes up for the glaring absence of female subjectivity from the rest of the novel, with Molly Bloom's hypnotic, half-asleep monologue. It is a pitch-perfect way to end this novel, giving Molly the last word. And the language is, of course, stunning. There are a few dregs of misogyny here, but I think Joyce's heart was in the right place. Again, human empathy, relating to the thoughts of others, seems to me to be the whole point.

Basically, Ulysses is a novel that puts things into perspective. This is what literature is supposed to do. It is the first and greatest novel that honestly takes as its object "the now, the here, through which all future plunges to the past". It reminds us that there is richness and complexity and beauty and ugliness within us and surrounding us at every moment. And rather than just saying that in a stylish way, as many other writers would have done (and still do 100 years later), Joyce actually set out to demonstrate it, to literally prove it, to change the very form of the novel itself in order to do it, scrupulously observing and recording the minutiae of the fleeting thoughts of one or two minds, on one day, 16 June 1904. And not only that, but he structures it all on Homer's Odyssey!

Life is indeed too short to read Ulysses.

This renowned novel by James Joyce is notoriously complex and difficult to understand.

The convoluted plot, stream-of-consciousness writing style, and numerous literary allusions make it a challenging read even for the most dedicated bookworms.

While some may argue that Ulysses is a masterpiece and a must-read for any serious literature enthusiast, the reality is that not everyone has the time or the inclination to embark on such a demanding literary journey.

In a world where there are countless other great books to explore, it seems reasonable to prioritize those that are more accessible and enjoyable.

After all, reading should be a source of pleasure and inspiration, not a chore or a burden.

So, if you find yourself daunted by the prospect of reading Ulysses, don't feel bad.

There are plenty of other wonderful books out there waiting to be discovered.

Life is too short to waste on a book that doesn't speak to you.

Choose something that you will love and let the joy of reading enrich your life.

Δύσκολο! Πολύ δύσκολο! Πάρα πολύ δύσκολο!

This book is truly difficult. However, it is worth reading for all those who consider themselves lovers of literature.

I think it should be in a well-informed library. It is a book that, although difficult, will reward you with what it has to offer.

Do not hesitate at all. Read it without a second thought!