Ulysses (Modern Library 100 Best Novels)

I bought this to supplement the 1961 Random House edition (balance of textual corrections and respect for the original, matches most annotations), Modern Library edition (most portable, attractive package as all ML editions, typography a tad hard on my 40-something eyes) and '80s "Gabler edition" (hotly contested, worth keeping as a collector's item as it's been largely withdrawn).The original Shakespeare & Co. printings are out of my league, although I've seen several. Until I hit the lottery, this is the closest I'll own. A quick Google will find you first edition, first printing copies selling for up to 100k. I doubt my stimulus check is that big.This is a textual facsimile - a photo reproduction of the original, 1000-copy first edition - copy #784, to be exact. It also reproduces the cover typography and the Shakespeare and Co. title page, with an added, Orchises title page to keep the record clear. It contains the original colophon. It doesn't contain the forward, letter from Joyce to Bennett Cerf or Judge Woolsey opinion you're probably used to seeing in American editions.In a physical sense, it's hard to say how this is a facsimile, other than Orchises has reproduced the full size of the original. Of course, the paper and binding material are different.Most S. & Co. editions came unbound in blue-green wrappers, and could be bound as desired. This is why you see original printings in such disparate bindings. Orchises has reproduced the color of the original wrappers, although their binding looks a little more green than the original wrappers (maybe the color has shifted on those?). In any case, it's a solid cloth binding, comparable to, say, a better-than-average library binding. Bound size given as 9.6 x 7.5 x 1.7 inches, I measure it a hair taller. I daresay it will hold up to extended use.In addition to giving the slight tingle of pleasure that comes from knowing you're reading the text as originally sold at 12, Rue de l'Odeon, this edition is much more comfortable on my eyes than the others. I like the typeface used by original printer Maurice Darantiere for readability, but haven't gotten a definitive answer as to what it is - does anyone know? Somehow, it just feels right.Orchises says the paper is 50-pound, ph-balanced (aka acid-free) paper, and that seems about right. It's really good paper, with a slight, almost visually undetectable textured finish that feels good to the fingers. Excellent paper-to-ink contrast. I can, and will, read this all day.For the average reader, there's no earthly reason to spend this amount on a novel, and the ML edition will be both more convenient and, with its front material, more informative. For someone who rereads Ulysses for pleasure, it's a joy. The 1922 text has been analyzed to death, and is not without errors (2,000? 3,000? 5,000? the number gets larger each time it's mentioned). It was perhaps inevitable in a book with no clear reference manuscript - even the extant manuscripts were to some degree created by Joyce after the fact for sale. Part of one manuscript was burned by the angry husband of a typist, who found its content objectionable. An appreciable percentage of the text was written as corrections on the original proofs.Hence the charming apology from Sylvia Beach reproduced in this facsimile: "The publisher asks the reader's indulgence for typographical errors unavoidable in the exceptional circumstances. S.B."But each effort to correct the errors added more errors, as well as layers of contention. See the well-documented battle over the Gabler edition. Or the disastrous 1998 "Reader's edition" by Danis Rose. The original is as good as any for reading, and if you care enough to buy a facsimile, you will have other editions for comparison anyway.For scholarly use, this isn't the best edition, since most standard annotations match the Random House or Modern Library editions. Unless you're beyond Ulysses 101 and want to compare editions.This is one of three first-edition facsimiles that have been published. I can't speak to the others, but I can recommend this one. Kudos to Orchises, and I hope they keep it in print. Or not, so my copy will become a minor-league collector's item.Ulysses has become an obsession and and a world in and of itself for its partisans, of whom I am one. The Ulysses obsession is much like the Higher Criticism surrounding the Sherlock Holmes canon. Many people find it bizarre, and I can hardly disagree. If, like me, you've got the bug, I don't have to explain it to you. This is an edition for you.If you don't, I paraphrase Louis Armstrong: "If you have to ask, you'll never know."

Last semester I took a seminar class on James Joyce, and of course no class on Joyce would be complete without reading Ulysses. We spent the last half of the semester on Ulysses, and now that I've reviewed both Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist, I think it's finally time for me to talk about my experiences with Joyce's most famous/infamous novel.Ulysses picks up approximately one year after Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ends, and begins with our old friend Stephen Dedalus, who is navigating the world of Dublin, working as a teacher, and still trying to be an artist in a place that continuously leaves him feeling isolated, alone, and without a home. While the first three chapters focus on Stephen, the rest of the book focuses on a new character, the famous Leopold Bloom, a Dublin Jew who, after eating a breakfast of mutton kidney, leaves the house to go about his daily business, all-the-while knowing that his wife, Molly, is planning an affair later that afternoon. That knowledge, the isolation he feels from his fellow Dubliners, the death of his young son ten years ago, and many other things weigh on his mind as we follow him about the affairs of his day. His path crosses and recrosses that of Stephen, and eventually the two outcasts finally meet and have a real conversation. Taking place in slightly less than 24 hours, Ulysses is an epic of the ordinary, a single day that contains every conceivable high and low.Now, if you've ever heard anything about Ulysses, I'm sure you've heard that it's nearly impossible to read. It has gained a nearly mythic status in the bookish world as an impenetrable wall of stylistic experimentation and dense allusion. The only hope for the intrepid reader is to consult many guides and source-books that will lead them through the labyrinth. To be honest with you, this is partially true. There were plenty of times when I didn't know what was happening, and I assure you that I missed most of the allusions and references to historical events. And yes, I did use a guide when I read it, which was a big help. More importantly, I also had a class full of people to discuss each chapter with and to keep me on schedule. (I do recommend reading this book with a friend. It's more fun that way.) But I want to make one thing very clear:The myth is only partially true.Because while I did not catch many of the allusions and references, I mostly understood what was happening in terms of plot and location. While I may not have understood the meaning of every sentence, I did understand the meaning of most paragraphs. And while I didn't always see exactly how each stylistic invention connected thematically to Bloom's journey, I could certainly appreciate the beauty and craft of Joyce's writing. Reading Ulysses is like being at the ocean; you have to let the waves of text wash over you without trying to analyze every single piece of sand. Understanding every single allusion is not necessary to enjoy the novel as a whole. You might miss a few of the jokes, but I promise you will be ok. The guide I used and which I would highly recommend, James Joyce A to Z, had brief summaries of each chapter in terms of plot and any major thematic elements, and that is all I needed in order to thoroughly enjoy myself. I think that oftentimes we as readers get too caught-up in "getting" the book that we forget to really read it. Ulysses is, first and foremost, an experience. If you get too caught up in trying to "understand" it, you'll miss all the fun.Fun? Yes, fun, because Ulysses is a deeply funny, witty, engaging, and beautiful book. First of all, Joyce is a phenomenal writer, and it would be a challenge to find a novel with more beautiful or more varied writing than this one. Some passages are just heart-stopping in their elegance. I literally stopped and reread some passages just so I could hear them again; they were that beautiful. Others were incredibly technically impressive, showing Joyce's amazing command of the English language (and others). Joyce's amazing skills as a writer mean that he is capable of making the wittiest puns and the funniest satires I have ever read. No, really. From the pub to the graveyard, from political arguments to prostitution, from the romantic novel to the epic catalog, there is nothing that Joyce can't laugh at. I never thought I would say this, but Ulysses literally made me laugh out loud. But of course this novel isn't all fun and games. There are tender, honest moments here more touching than nearly anything else put into print. There is heartbreak here, not of the cheesy faux-tragic kind that you find in a Nicholas Sparks novel, but honest emotion felt by ordinary people in situations that are all too real. Though Ulysses very often made me laugh, on a number of occasions it also made me cry. It touched me, because it spoke to that part of me (and, I think, of many of us) that knows what it's like to feel alone, regretful, and lost. That realism, that honesty of emotion and situation, is what sets Ulysses apart. The strange style, the encyclopedic allusions, the weird diversions, all of these serve to represent reality in all of its complexity, beauty, and sadness. Ulysses is funny, crafty, beautiful, and heartbreaking, but it is all of those things because it is real.If you've ever read my reviews before, you'll notice that this one is rather different. This time I haven't talked very much about technique or writing style, though really this would be the perfect novel to do that. And part of me does want to pull out my analytical brain and tell you all about Joyce's tricks and techniques and themes. I would feel accomplished for breaking down such a complex novel, and you would maybe feel like you learned something. But I don't think I'm going to do that this time. This time I think I'm going to focus on other things.Because despite all the intellectual enjoyment I got from untangling and discussing the themes and techniques, and despite the aesthetic enjoyment I found in Joyce's language, what struck me the most about Ulysses was its emotional honesty, especially in the characterization. For the first three chapters I felt nothing but empathy and pity for Stephen. I wanted to be his big sister, to comfort him, to let him know that he wasn't alone and that he could make it. And then I met Leopold Bloom, and slowly, cautiously, not without reservation, I fell for him, completely and utterly. Not in a romantic way, but as a human being, an all-too-real human being who had emotions and quirks that I could see and understand like those of an old friend. I fell in love with the way that he always tries to figure things out, to calculate, explain, and reason, even if his explanations are often incorrect, more pseudoscience than real science. I fell in love with his desire to please everyone, to make everyone happy, to avoid conflict wherever possible. I love that he maintains his optimism despite everything that happens to him. I love the way he always walks on the sunny side of the street, is conscientious about his money, and loves to eat good food. I wanted nothing more in the world than for him to actually meet Stephen, because I needed to see what would happen when these two characters whom I cared so much about finally met. And yes, sometimes Bloom creeped me out a little with his thoughts about sex or bodily functions. Sometimes I got annoyed with him for being so passive, and I yelled at him to stop being such a pushover already. But when he had the chance to finally show some courage, I cheered him on with all of my heart, and when he stood up for Stephen my heart nearly burst I was so proud of him. Leopold Bloom was so lonely, so hopeful, and so real, and in the end it was the force of his character (and, to a lesser extent, Stephen's) that really made Ulysses shine.Ulysses is a novel that takes place in a single day, and yet somehow seems to encompass the whole world. It's strange and difficult and sometimes frustrating, and to be honest I wouldn't recommend it to those who don't like their books to be a puzzle or who get frustrated when they don't understand what is going on. But if you do like a challenge, then I think you'll find that every frustration in Ulysses is paid back a thousand times over in beauty and enjoyment. I promise that you won't catch everything on your first read-through; I know I didn't. But that did not take away from my enjoyment of the novel in the slightest. I know I'll come back to it some day, maybe a chapter at a time here or there, and that no matter when or how often I return it will always have something new to offer me.Rating: 5+Recommendations: Don't get too weighed down with guides. Just read it and enjoy it, and check chapter summaries or historical events if you get lost. Ulysses is an experience, so just dive in.Note: This is a review of the Revised Gabler Edition, which is that one you should read.

This Kindle text has become corrupted and is completely useless. Almost every line reads like it has been put through Google Translate into Chinese and then back into English.It is absolutely disgraceful that Amazon is selling this junk. Ulysses is a great book and I wonder how many people have paid money for this edition and given up on the first page.As an example from page 1, the text should say:Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the mirror and then covered the bowl smartlyBut instead you get:Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the reflect after which protected the bowl smartly.I hope this review saves someone a lot of frustration.

My review is not about the Ulysses of James Joyce, but about this edition. This is not the real book, almost every line has a substitute word which is not written by Joyce, and not grammatically correct either. It is as if a computer dictionary has substituted words with synonyms. Words which often were not common at the time of Joyce and sometimes make no sense in English.

This is hard to read. Oh my god, so hard to read. I gave up. I tried multiple times. I wanted to read it, I thought that as it was lauded as one of the greatest tomes of all time, that it would do me some good. But no. It instead highlighted the fact that I have the attention span of a spoon, and that high brow literature of this nature is beyond me. If anything, it makes other people stare at you in wonder when they first see it on your book shelf, making you, the owner, feel slightly superior for a fleeting moment in time.

I'm nearly finished ulyess 100 pages left to go and enjoying it without over thinking it.I'm Irish so the terns of phrase is pretty fimilure to me sa my fathers generation used most of them.I wouldn't be able to go into any detail about what joyce was trying to say or if it's based on the Greek Ulysses but as an ordanry Joe soap I think owl Jimmy done a great job revealing how we think and how our conversations flow, example he could have someone mainly mr bloom thinking one thought for quite a few pages and all of a sudden you move on to a new line and your onto a completely different thought and during a conversation between afew characters the subject changes with little or no warning just like in real life.I'm probably completely off the mark but that's how I inturpit Ulysses

I gave this 5 stars because it is value for money and it arrived very promptly. I'm now into it, having read the introduction (50+ pages !!), and first 2 chapters (another 50 pages). It is HEAVY going, but I'm determined to finish it, after all, I've plenty of time on my hands :). I found the trick is to read just 10 pages at a time and digest them before proceeding, so far, so good. I hope to be still alive by the end !