James Joyce

James Joyce was born in Dublin in 1882,in a large catholic family. Hes one of
the most famous realistic writers in Ireland, influenced by French authors like
Flaubert or Baudelaire. He once left Ireland, and visited a lot of foreign
countries, and he never came back. All his stories are set in Ireland and they
all express the love for his country. Joyce is remembered for his great
curiosity of how the human mind works, and this is evident in the use of some
special narrative techniques: the epiphany, the interior monologue, the free
direct speech and the stream of consciousness. The word epiphany comes
from the Ancient Greek and it means manifestation. Its an experience of
striking realization.
Through an inconscious process of thoughts you can have an epiphany, that
reveals something that you didnt understand or think before.
The epiphany is a narrative element that is present in all Joyces works.
It designates the moment in a narrative when events, images or ideas
produce for the reader an explosive recognition of meaning, a sudden
spiritual manifestation.
ULYSSES pag.F152
The whole novel, that takes place on a single day, is set in Dublin. The main
character is Leopold Bloom. Joyce makes a parallel with the Odyssey : Ulysses
is somehow Leopold Bloom and his wife is Penelope. The book is divided into
three parts: the first one is called Telemachiad, the second one Odyssey
and the third one Nostos. We can see here the stream of consciousness
(the psychologist William James spoke about it): Joyce writes one thing after
the other, he does not use punctuation, does not follow grammar rules, and
we have a lot of shifts in time.
In the thirteenth chapter we have, as an important character, Gertie, that
represents Nausicaa: Gertie, like Nausicaa, fall in love with Leopold. The last
part is full of sentimental style, that comes from womens magazines (the
sentences she uses were probably read by her). Theres also a lot of baby
language and colloquial one, too.
Mollys monologue is the final part of the novel. Molly is in bed, waiting for
Leopold to come back home, since its night. The book begins and ends with
the word yes. Here is the hugest example of the stream of consciousness
(in fact is very difficult to understand the whole passage).