Remembering James Joyce

Tuesday marks the birth anniversary of Irish author James Joyce who is known for his controversial writings about Dublin.

Born in 1882, the Irish author contributes strongly in the field of English literature. He enriches the repertoire of Modern English literature with his rebellious additions in form and content.

His key works include Dubliners, Ulysses, and A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man. Joyce discusses boldly numerous numbers of themes therefore he rejects the Irish national and catholic tendencies.

Centralized his work around the Irish capital, Dublin, Joyce names Dublin as the heart of the world, no writer [like Joyce] has ever been more soaked in Dublin, its atmosphere, its history, its topography.

He emphasizes, “For myself, I always write about Dublin, if I can get to the heart of Dublin, I can get to the heart of all cities of the world” in spite of his complex relationship with Ireland as a state.

Joyce calls for freeing literature to reflect the human mind and man’s inner conflicts similarly unrestricted him away from intellectual and religious chains of society and the British Empire through his writings.

Through his "Dubliners," he diagnoses the tragedy of the people of  Dublin. In addition, he traces the progression of the Irish between the occupation and independence.

Consisted of 15 short stories, the book describes the lives of Dubliners coming from lower or middle-class families in the early 20th century.

It can be mainly pided in accordance with three stages of life: childhood, youth, and adulthood.

Published in 1914, the book features some of Joyce's most celebrated stories such as "Araby," "Eveline," "Clay," and "The Sisters."

"Ulysses" is also one of the most legendary works in the history of literature.

Critics select "Ulysses" alongside T.S Eliot's "The Wasteland" as the marks that define Modernism.

Joyce's "Ulysses" proposes the misery of the modern man in the epic form of the ancient Greek "Odyssey."

The events of the novel occur on only one day and they are pided in terms of episodes, each episode confronts some of the modern man's tragedy amid world wars.

Stream of consciousness, interior monologue, and Irish mythology are the most remarkable literary techniques employed in the novel.

Joyce died in 1941 at the age of 58.