Reading the Chunksters discussion

Ulysses by James Joyce

Ulysses has been labeled dirty, blasphemous & unreadable. In a 1933 court decision, Judge John M. Woolsey declared it an emetic book--tho he found it sufficiently unobscene to allow its importation into the USA--& Virginia Woolf was moved to decry Joyce's "cloacal obsession." None of these adjectives, however, do the slightest justice to the novel. To this day it remains the modernist masterpiece, in which the author takes both Celtic lyricism & vulgarity to splendid extremes. It's funny, sorrowful, even (in a close-focus sort of way) suspenseful. Despite the exegetical industry that has sprung up in the last 75 years, Ulysses is also a compulsively readable book. Even the verbal vaudeville of the final chapters can be navigated with relative ease, as long as you're willing to be buffeted, tickled, challenged & (occasionally) vexed by Joyce's sheer command of English. Among other things, a novel is simply a long story. The 1st question about any story is: What happens?. In this case, the answer might be Everything. Wm Blake, one of literature's sublime myopics, saw the universe in a grain of sand. Joyce saw it in Dublin, on 6/16/1904, a day distinguished by its utter normality. Two characters, Stephen Dedalus & Leopold Bloom, go about their separate business, crossing paths with a gallery of indelible Dubliners. We watch them teach, eat, stroll the streets, argue & (in Bloom's case) masturbate. Thanks to the stream-of-consciousness technique--which suggests no mere stream but an impossibly deep, swift-running river--we're privy to their thoughts, emotions & memories. The result? Almost every variety of experience is crammed into the accordian folds of a single day, which makes Ulysses not just an experimental work but the very last word in realism. Both characters add their glorious intonations to the music of the prose. Dedalus' accent--that of a freelance esthetician, who dabbles here & there in what we might call Early Yeats Lite--will be familiar to readers of Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man. But Bloom's wistful sensualism (& naive curiosity) is something else entirely. Seen thru his eyes, a rundown corner of a graveyard is a figure for hope & hopelessness, mortality & dogged survival: "Mr Bloom walked unheeded along his grove by saddened angels, crosses, broken pillars, family vaults, stone hopes praying with upcast eyes, old Ireland's hearts & hands. More sensible to spend the money on some charity for the living. Pray for the repose of the soul of. Does anybody really?"--James Marcus

Ulysses by James Joyce

Reading Schedule for Ulysses

Ok my ebook version of Ulysses actually uses parts and episodes to break up the book. Now the paperback version I have is the 1922 text and contains no episodes at all. The book is only broken up by parts. I am going to use my ebook version (nook) to break up the reading schedule. I will include the approximate page numbers to help with the breaks (hopefully). This is just a schedule – it is flexible. Feel free to go at your own pace (faster or slower).

January 25 – January 31: Intro and Part 1 (this is a very short part of the book and it overlaps the last week of The Odyssey).
• Part I: The Telemachiad – approximate pages 1 – 44 (the paperback goes to page 50)
o Episode 1: Telemachus
o Episode 2: Nestor
o Episode 3: Proteus

February 1 – February 22: Part II (the longest part of the book)
• Part II: The Odyssey – approximate pages 45 – 505 (the paperback is from 53 to 565)

February 1 – February 6: around 113 pages
o Episode 4: Calypso
o Episode 5: The Lotus Eaters
o Episode 6: Hades
o Episode 7: Aeolus
o Episode 8: The Lestrygonians

February 7 – February 13: around 173 pages
o Episode 9: Scylla and Carybdis
o Episode 10: The Wandering Rocks
o Episode 11: The Sirens
o Episode 12: The Cyclops

February 14 – February 22: around 174 pages
o Episode 13: Nausicaa
o Episode 14: The Oxen of the Sun
o Episode 15: Circe

February 23 – February 29: Part III
• Part III: The Nostos – approximately 158 pages (the paperback is from 569 to 732)
o Episode 16: Eumaeus
o Episode 17: Ithaca
o Episode 18: Penelope

I have Part One to Part Two ok, but my copy doesn't break the book down into the smaller sections with titles like that. Can you tell me where The Lestrygonians ends and where Scylla dn Carybdis begins? There are all kinds of headings in the middle of the section but I can't tell if they are all subsections (some are only half a page?) or if they're all part of one of these chapters? Confusing format, for sure!

Alana, none of the books have this breakdown, but you can find it here...well, i was going to post the link, but my copy and paste on my phone isn't working. If you Google "ulysses novel episodes" one of the first is a WordPress link that breaks it down by the words that start each section. I just went through on kindle and bookmarked.

Kaycie wrote: "Alana, none of the books have this breakdown, but you can find it here...well, i was going to post the link, but my copy and paste on my phone isn't working. If you Google "ulysses novel episodes" ..."

Thanks! That will be helpful :)

Edit: Here's that link you were talking about:
https://11ysses.wordpress.com/2012/01...

Coincidentally, It's James Joyce's birthday. Feb 2, 1882

I hope everyone gets their "chapters" sorted. Let me know if you have a problem.

I figured them out, thanks to that link! I have to admit, though, after looking through the book, it's a little bit daunting! I hope I like it :S

LOL yeah it is a bit daunting. I am just going to start it tomorrow. This will be my second attempt at the book.

I will get the weekly threads up this weekend. I'm sorry for the delay. A friend has been using my computer every night.

I just got this one started. I'm not very far, but I'm already a bit confused. This is going to be a good one to read with others so I can decipher what's going on!