Simply Joyce

The writer who transformed the possibilities of language and fiction.

James Joyce changed the novel by showing how much could happen inside a person's mind and how far language could be pushed. In Simply Joyce, literary scholar Margot Norris offers an accessible introduction to the life and work of one of the twentieth century's most influential writers. From Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man to the sprawling adventures of Ulysses and the experimental world of Finnegans Wake, Norris explains Joyce's major works without losing sight of the people and stories at their center. She explores his fascination with memory, identity, religion, family, sexuality, exile, and the ordinary details of everyday life, while also explaining the literary techniques that made his writing so revolutionary. The result is an inviting guide to a writer whose work can seem intimidating but whose deepest concerns are remarkably human.