{"id":750,"date":"2016-10-06T14:07:26","date_gmt":"2016-10-06T14:07:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/englishlitvictorianmodern\/?post_type=chapter&p=750"},"modified":"2016-10-11T17:14:23","modified_gmt":"2016-10-11T17:14:23","slug":"biography-21","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-englishlitvictorianmodern\/chapter\/biography-21\/","title":{"raw":"Biography: James Joyce","rendered":"Biography: James Joyce"},"content":{"raw":"\"364px-James_Joyce_by_Alex_Ehrenzweig_1915_restored\"James Joyce was born in Dublin, Ireland, on February 2, 1882, the eldest of 10 surviving children. He was educated by Jesuits at Clongowes Wood College and Belvedere College before going on to University College, then located on St Stephen\u2019s Green in Dublin, where he studied modern languages.\r\n\r\nAfter he graduated from university, Joyce went to Paris, ostensibly to study medicine, and was recalled to Dublin in April 1903 because of the illness and subsequent death of his mother. He stayed in Ireland until 1904, and in June that year he met Nora Barncale, the Galway woman who was to become his partner and later his wife.\r\n\r\nIn August 1904, the first of Joyce\u2019s short stories was published in the Irish Homestead<\/em> magazine, which later published two others. In October of that year, Joyce and Nora left Ireland going first to Pola (now Pula, Croatia) where Joyce got a job teaching English at a Berlitz school. Joyce returned to Ireland only four times in his life, the last visit being in 1912, after which he never returned again.\r\n\r\nSix months after their arrival in Pola, James and Nola moved to Trieste, Italy, where they spent most of the next 10 years. While there, they learned the local Triestino dialect, and Italian remained the family\u2019s home language for many years. Joyce wrote and published articles in Italian in the Piccolo della Sera<\/em> newspaper and gave lectures on English literature. A portrait of Nora was painted by the Italian artist Tullio Silvestri in Trieste just before World War I. The James Joyce Centre in Dublin has on display a reproduction of this portrait.\r\n\r\nThe year 1914 proved a crucial one for Joyce. With Ezra Pound\u2019s assistance, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man<\/em>, Joyce\u2019s first novel, appeared in serial form in Harriet Weaver\u2019s Egoist<\/em> magazine in London. His collection of short stories, Dubliners<\/em>, on which he had been working since 1904, was finally published, and he also wrote his only play, Exiles<\/em>. Having cleared his desk, Joyce could then start in earnest on the novel he had been thinking about since 1907: Ulysses<\/em>.\r\n\r\nWith the start of World War I, Joyce and Nora, along with their two children, Giorgio and Lucia, were forced to leave Trieste. They moved to Zurich, Switzerland, where they lived for the duration of the war. The family had little money, relying on subventions from friends and family, people like Harriet Weaver in London, and Nora\u2019s uncle in Galway. They often ended up living in cramped, squalid accommodation as Joyce persisted in writing Ulysses<\/em>. In fact, Joyce never really had a room or an office of his own in which to do his writing, and far from trying to block out the world around him while he wrote, Joyce included things going on around him as part of the book. Characteristics of his friends, Trieste, Zurich, and Paris are given to characters in the book, and, most notably, Nora\u2019s language and writing style become the voice of Molly Bloom in the novel.\r\n\r\nThough Joyce wanted to settle in Trieste again after the war, the poet Ezra Pound persuaded him to come to Paris for a while, and Joyce stayed for the next 20 years. The publication of Ulysses<\/em> in serial form in the American journal The Little Review<\/em> was brought to a halt in 1921 when a court banned it as obscene. Shortly after, Harriet Weaver ran out of printers willing to set the text in England, and for a while it looked as though Ulysses<\/em> would never be published.\r\n\r\nIn July 1920, Joyce met Sylvia Beach, an American expatriate living in Paris who owned and ran the bookshop Shakespeare & Co. In 1921, Beach offered to publish Ulysses<\/em> and finally, on February 2, 1922, Joyce\u2019s 40th birthday, the first edition of the book was published. Beach continued to publish Ulysses<\/em> through 1930.\r\n\r\nAfter Beach gave up the rights to Ulysses<\/em>, much of Joyce\u2019s business was taken over by Paul L\u00e9on, a Russian Jewish \u00e9migr\u00e9 living in Paris. As a close friend of Joyce and Joyce\u2019s family, L\u00e9on also became Joyce\u2019s business advisor, looking after his correspondence and dealing with his literary and legal affairs. The L\u00e9ons\u2019 apartment became a centre for Joyce studies, and L\u00e9on and others met Joyce there to discuss translations of Ulysses<\/em> and the early serial publications of what became Finnegans Wake<\/em>.\r\n\r\nFor the next 10 years, Joyce and L\u00e9on were in almost daily contact, and L\u00e9on came to assume a role as necessary and important to Joyce and his work as Sylvia Beach had played in the 1920s. Not only did he manage Joyce\u2019s legal, financial, and daily existence, much as Beach had during the years she published Ulysses<\/em>, L\u00e9on played an essential part in the composition and proofreading of Joyce\u2019s last work and perhaps most challenging work, Finnegans Wake, <\/em>which was published on May 4, 1939. It was immediately listed as \u201cthe book of the week\u201d in the United Kingdom and the United States.\r\n\r\nIn 1940, when Joyce fled to the south of France ahead of the Nazi invasion, L\u00e9on returned to the Joyces\u2019 apartment in Paris to salvage their belongings and put them into safekeeping for the duration of the war, and it\u2019s thanks to L\u00e9on\u2019s efforts that much of Joyce\u2019s personal possessions and manuscripts survived.\r\n\r\nJoyce died at the age of 59 on January 13, 1941, at 2 a.m., in Zurich, where he and his family had been given asylum. He is buried in Fluntern cemetery, Zurich.\r\n\r\n[Biography from The James Joyce Centre, Dublin<\/em> http:\/\/jamesjoyce.ie\/joyce\/<\/a>]\r\n\r\nFor a useful introduction to Dubliners<\/em> and a detailed biography of Joyce, see http:\/\/www.mendele.com\/WWD\/WWD.dubintro.html<\/a>","rendered":"

\"364px-James_Joyce_by_Alex_Ehrenzweig_1915_restored\"James Joyce was born in Dublin, Ireland, on February 2, 1882, the eldest of 10 surviving children. He was educated by Jesuits at Clongowes Wood College and Belvedere College before going on to University College, then located on St Stephen\u2019s Green in Dublin, where he studied modern languages.<\/p>\n

After he graduated from university, Joyce went to Paris, ostensibly to study medicine, and was recalled to Dublin in April 1903 because of the illness and subsequent death of his mother. He stayed in Ireland until 1904, and in June that year he met Nora Barncale, the Galway woman who was to become his partner and later his wife.<\/p>\n

In August 1904, the first of Joyce\u2019s short stories was published in the Irish Homestead<\/em> magazine, which later published two others. In October of that year, Joyce and Nora left Ireland going first to Pola (now Pula, Croatia) where Joyce got a job teaching English at a Berlitz school. Joyce returned to Ireland only four times in his life, the last visit being in 1912, after which he never returned again.<\/p>\n

Six months after their arrival in Pola, James and Nola moved to Trieste, Italy, where they spent most of the next 10 years. While there, they learned the local Triestino dialect, and Italian remained the family\u2019s home language for many years. Joyce wrote and published articles in Italian in the Piccolo della Sera<\/em> newspaper and gave lectures on English literature. A portrait of Nora was painted by the Italian artist Tullio Silvestri in Trieste just before World War I. The James Joyce Centre in Dublin has on display a reproduction of this portrait.<\/p>\n

The year 1914 proved a crucial one for Joyce. With Ezra Pound\u2019s assistance, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man<\/em>, Joyce\u2019s first novel, appeared in serial form in Harriet Weaver\u2019s Egoist<\/em> magazine in London. His collection of short stories, Dubliners<\/em>, on which he had been working since 1904, was finally published, and he also wrote his only play, Exiles<\/em>. Having cleared his desk, Joyce could then start in earnest on the novel he had been thinking about since 1907: Ulysses<\/em>.<\/p>\n

With the start of World War I, Joyce and Nora, along with their two children, Giorgio and Lucia, were forced to leave Trieste. They moved to Zurich, Switzerland, where they lived for the duration of the war. The family had little money, relying on subventions from friends and family, people like Harriet Weaver in London, and Nora\u2019s uncle in Galway. They often ended up living in cramped, squalid accommodation as Joyce persisted in writing Ulysses<\/em>. In fact, Joyce never really had a room or an office of his own in which to do his writing, and far from trying to block out the world around him while he wrote, Joyce included things going on around him as part of the book. Characteristics of his friends, Trieste, Zurich, and Paris are given to characters in the book, and, most notably, Nora\u2019s language and writing style become the voice of Molly Bloom in the novel.<\/p>\n

Though Joyce wanted to settle in Trieste again after the war, the poet Ezra Pound persuaded him to come to Paris for a while, and Joyce stayed for the next 20 years. The publication of Ulysses<\/em> in serial form in the American journal The Little Review<\/em> was brought to a halt in 1921 when a court banned it as obscene. Shortly after, Harriet Weaver ran out of printers willing to set the text in England, and for a while it looked as though Ulysses<\/em> would never be published.<\/p>\n

In July 1920, Joyce met Sylvia Beach, an American expatriate living in Paris who owned and ran the bookshop Shakespeare & Co. In 1921, Beach offered to publish Ulysses<\/em> and finally, on February 2, 1922, Joyce\u2019s 40th birthday, the first edition of the book was published. Beach continued to publish Ulysses<\/em> through 1930.<\/p>\n

After Beach gave up the rights to Ulysses<\/em>, much of Joyce\u2019s business was taken over by Paul L\u00e9on, a Russian Jewish \u00e9migr\u00e9 living in Paris. As a close friend of Joyce and Joyce\u2019s family, L\u00e9on also became Joyce\u2019s business advisor, looking after his correspondence and dealing with his literary and legal affairs. The L\u00e9ons\u2019 apartment became a centre for Joyce studies, and L\u00e9on and others met Joyce there to discuss translations of Ulysses<\/em> and the early serial publications of what became Finnegans Wake<\/em>.<\/p>\n

For the next 10 years, Joyce and L\u00e9on were in almost daily contact, and L\u00e9on came to assume a role as necessary and important to Joyce and his work as Sylvia Beach had played in the 1920s. Not only did he manage Joyce\u2019s legal, financial, and daily existence, much as Beach had during the years she published Ulysses<\/em>, L\u00e9on played an essential part in the composition and proofreading of Joyce\u2019s last work and perhaps most challenging work, Finnegans Wake, <\/em>which was published on May 4, 1939. It was immediately listed as \u201cthe book of the week\u201d in the United Kingdom and the United States.<\/p>\n

In 1940, when Joyce fled to the south of France ahead of the Nazi invasion, L\u00e9on returned to the Joyces\u2019 apartment in Paris to salvage their belongings and put them into safekeeping for the duration of the war, and it\u2019s thanks to L\u00e9on\u2019s efforts that much of Joyce\u2019s personal possessions and manuscripts survived.<\/p>\n

Joyce died at the age of 59 on January 13, 1941, at 2 a.m., in Zurich, where he and his family had been given asylum. He is buried in Fluntern cemetery, Zurich.<\/p>\n

[Biography from The James Joyce Centre, Dublin<\/em> http:\/\/jamesjoyce.ie\/joyce\/<\/a>]<\/p>\n

For a useful introduction to Dubliners<\/em> and a detailed biography of Joyce, see http:\/\/www.mendele.com\/WWD\/WWD.dubintro.html<\/a><\/p>\n\n\t\t\t

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Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t
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