How to Read Ulysses by James Joyce (10 Tips)

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Hardcore Literature Lecture Series
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0:00 how to read Ulysses by James Joyce
2:00 Ulysses is a reflection of your reading
4:00 on the importance of taking your time
6:00 Homer, Shakespeare & Joyce
7:00 passive reading & single meanings
9:00 allusion hunting assignment
9:40 “Ineluctable modality of the visible”
11:00 Proteus & stream-of-consciousness
12:00 read Ulysses for Joyce’s language
13:37 listening and reading aloud
14:30 the musicality of Ulysses
16:30 the Sirens episode of Ulysses
18:30 reading Ulysses like a poem
19:20 mythic and aesthetic crib notes
20:00 collect your favourite sections
20:40 the Homeric parallels in Ulysses
22:00 my first experience with Ulysses
22:20 the opening episode (Telemachus)
23:44 one of my personal favourite sections
24:26 Stephen’s theory of Hamlet
26:10 experiencing otherness in literature
26:51 the oxen of the sun
27:48 Marilyn Monroe’s reading of ‘Penelope’
29:09 the story and characters of Ulysses
30:00 June 16th 1904, Bloomsday
31:31 Trieste-Zürich-Paris, 1914-1921
32:10 Dubliners, and Joyce's Portrait
33:02 irony in the micro becoming the epic
33:57 the name Stephen Daedalus
34:54 meeting Leopold ‘Poldy’ Bloom
35:50 what Joyce’s characters represent
36:26 approach Ulysses with a sense of joy
37:12 celebrating Irish humour
37:53 using Joyce’s other works as entrance
38:10 James Joyce’s Dubliners
38:40 my favourite stories from Dubliners
40:00 read Joyce to understand Modernism
40:20 what is Modernism in literature?
44:18 T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf & James Joyce
45:00 content vs form, or style vs substance
45:30 the censorship of Joyce’s Ulysses
47:52 Joyce’s love letters to Nora Barnacle
48:18 the controversial Nausicaa episode
50:22 which edition of Ulysses is the best?
50:59 Ulysses serialisation in the Little Review
52:40 the 1922 edition of Ulysses
54:00 Eduardo Arroyo’s illustrated Ulysses
55:25 read Joyce’s Ulysses with a group
57:45 well wishes for your Joyce Journey
58:06 some questions for you

[BlueDusk]

I've managed to read Ulysses in three weeks using these two tips: read it in Dublin, and get drunk 24/7. It worked! The only downside is that I have no recollections of my reading.

[briancoveney]

I just finished it. Minutes ago. Some help with the Audio, but I did read every word. I AM speechless. I can't wait to "re-read" it. It's incredible. I didn't think I was going to make it through the (long running, punctuationless) Molly monologue of the last hunk of pages. But, It WAS worth every minute I used to read it. I does feel like a lifetime. I am already thinking of when and how to go through it again. "Yes I said yes I will Yes."

[You-TubeUser]

Please—please keep posting these kind of videos—please, they are so endearing. Because of you I’ve come to known such great writers like Samuel Richardson and much more.

[construct]

I read most of Ulysses over Christmas break in 9th grade, and I finished it in the next couple of weeks. I'll say I took four weeks, but most of the reading was in the first two. So, I was 14, and I knew the book from it's reputations: (1) that it was very long and very difficult; and (2) that it had been banned as obscene for its first decade. And I was 14. So I was very curious, and I was always up for a challenge. And at 14 I had little "experience of life" and a little broader experience of literature. But I loved to read, and Ulysses was by no means the first "classic" I'd read. It didn't take me long to figure out that Ulysses was much easier to understand when you read it out loud. I found parts almost unintelligible, but I kept going, knowing that the mist would lift before long.

Two things stood out to me. First, the language was so elegant, so effective. Each word had been carefully selected to impress a particular combination of meanings and feeling. It was poetry masquerading as prose. Second, traveling with Stephen and Leopold let me experience some ordinary situations, and a few situations that were extraordinary for a 14-year-old boy, from someone else's point of view. I was seeing the world through their eyes, hearing the world through their ears, not mine. It was so immediate. Being with Stephen and Leopold made me feel grown up. Stephen was a role model like an older brother. Leopold showed me a way of getting along in community despite his status as "other"--a Polish Jew.

I absolutely loved Unlysses, and I quickly picked up and read Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. A Portrait was very relatable. I saw myself in Stephen in every chapter. I was particularly taken with the theory of art that he explained in the last chapter. And of course, his escape at the end was very poignant since I already knew that he wouldn't be able to escape for long. Try as you might, you can't jump out of your own skin.

Finnegans Wake I started when I was in 11th grade, and I went slowly, carefully, with long breaks. I guess it took me about ten years to finish it. I had to read Ulysses quickly to understand what it was doing. I had to read Finnegans Wake slowly to understand what it was doing. There are lots of very funny sections in the Wake. And I became very interested in Giambatista Vico and Bruno of Nola from reading the Wake. The time spent on Finnegans Wake was very rewarding.

And I discovered Samuel Beckett along the way. While Joyce was trying to stuff as much as he could into a book, Beckett was trying to strip as much out of a book as he could. When I'm looking for a familiar voice to keep me company, I turn to Beckett.

[johnmccullagh_]

To read Ulysses is to live Ulysses. I have just finished reading the absolute masterpiece novel that is Joyces Ulysses. My mind is quite frankly blown away. It’s hard to convey into words how utterly life changing and mesmerising this work is. It’s abstract, it’s funny, it’s absurd, it’s ridiculous, it’s life and life it’s self all written into the most stunning beautiful prose I have read. It’s a towering epic novel that only the Brothers Karamazov rivals. Thank you for your wonderful video Benjamin, you are a diamond in the rough.

[michaelasciutto]

Thank you, sir. I've read "Ulysses" once in each of the past four decades and will again soon after turning seventy. Also, I've witnessed great lectures at four different universities on Joyce and his masterpieces given by my favorite professors. It seems you'll be my guide when I begin my final act.

[christophechalaye]

I love your passion and eloquence. About 15 years ago, I tried to read Ulysses on my own without a guide. I failed. I made it roughly 300 pages before putting it down, defeated and discouraged. It was simply beyond me. Since then, I've considered this novel my personal literary Everest, and with every passing year, I feel a little more confident to reattempt my ascent.

[mrich]

I'm 53 this year and have been working up the courage to start this book. My Lit Professor had us listen to and read all of Shakespeare plays and they have stayed with me for the past 30 years. It's a great way to learn.

[richardlong]

This is without question the best video on the internet regarding Ulysses, Joyce, and how to best read and celebrate his art. Thank you so much. I’ve been looking everywhere for this.

[jimicolorado]

As an aspiring intellectual at 16, I got about 10 pages in before giving up and going back to Ray Bradbury. Now, at age 75, with the invaluable assistance of Don Gifford's Annotated Ulysses, I am not plodding but wandering my way through it and enjoying it immensely. I appreciate the flow of the language but I really want to understand every reference and allusion and Gifford's book provides most. I especially like, in Joyce's many references to poems, that Gifford both identifies and then quotes the poems, which are so lyrical as the Irish bards historically are.

[dasaporta]

As a 50-something forced to retire earlier than planned for health reasons, I decided to audit a class at the local university called "Modern Fiction." I thought the course would explore contemporary novels, but this was a class on Modernism. The syllabus includes works by such writers as Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Virginia Woolf and, of course, James Joyce. We were assigned "Ulysses" last week. I must thank both my instructor and you for helping me approach this book with a positive spirit of adventure and curiosity, as opposed to one of dread. We are using the Gabler Edition in class. I have emerged from Hades and am now in Aeolus. I wouldn't say it's a breeze, but reading this book certainly is not the chore I expected!

[ros.an.]

this is so abnormally timely i literally just finished reading ulysses this morning!

[ann-marieodonnell]

I read and fell in love with Ulysses this year. I understand and agree that you are never truly finished with this book. Along with others, I read Ulysses over 80 days to celebrate the centenary. It worked out 6-8 pages per day. Some days, those 6 pages took an hour. Other days, I wanted to keep reading on, which I did.
I have since seen Edna O'Brien's play, Joyce's Women and I intend to revisit this again. Probably sooner rather than later. Some of it went over my head, but that's ok. Reading it in a group setting made a huge difference to that.

[thephilosophicalagnostic]

I first read The Artist and then Ulysses. I did so after listening to Joseph Campbell's lectures on James Joyce's work. It really helped listening to those and reading the Artist first. Yes, I read the entirety of Ulysses. I did this about 20 years ago.

[AngelaRodhas]

Congratulations, It is very gratifying to see a young man who loves good literature. I wish many more people, politicians, businessmen, etc. could follow in your footsteps. The world would be a better place to live, without a doubt.

[r.w.bottorff]

I fell in love with a book, and it was this book. It was my companion during many difficult episodes of my life, and would always cheer me, even at the bottom of the blackest depression. Thank you for this video. It brings back wonderful memories of my initial readings of it.

[FiveFigsDigital]

I experienced this great work in Dublin under the tutelage of Roland McHugh while studying at the School of Irish Studies in Ballsbridge in 1979. We read it aloud, every page, every paragraph in class. Joyce may have invented Meta Data, the hidden information in plain sight that places a reader in one place, at one time. To truly understand it, you must study it, and in doing so, it teaches one how to learn and observe. Only after you have studied and consumed it, can you say you have read it. You emerge changed forever.

[mistraldespair]

My suggestion to other readers who want to experience Ulysses but possess a pea brain like i do -- just do the following:
1. Read The Odyssey and Hamlet, and the other two books Joyce wrote before Ulysses.
2. Keep this site called The Joyce Project open on the side as you start reading the book. They have brief explanations for all the obscure allusions that may confuse you.
3. This one may look like cheating but actually helps: READ A CHAPTER SUMMARY BEFORE READING THE ACTUAL CHAPTER IN THE NOVEL. I know this sounds lame, but sometimes I had no idea what the heck was going on in the book and had to read chapter summaries to figure it out. So I decided to reverse that and went into each chapter with a basic idea of what's about to happen so I could actually appreciate what Joyce was doing. Helped me actually enjoy the book.
4. This one's important: listen to an audiobook in some capacity. It's a book that's meant to be read aloud, and there is an awesome dramatic reading of the book available here on YouTube for free. I finished the book by accompanying my reading of the last few chapters with the audiobook playing and it was very engaging.
5. Listen to Kate Bush's "The Sensual World" to motivate yourself to reach the end. It's a great song!

You're welcome.

[marcomeglioli]

thank you for this video from Italy. You know Joyce was a great lover of the italian arts and we know that him and Italo Svevo were very in touch, making a very interesting bridge between italian and english literature. Sorry fo my bad english but I'm not mother tongue although you are very good and I can understood you ☺. Greetings from Bologna 👋👋

[matthewcossolotto]

Excellent tips. Just want to underscore a key point. Listen while you read. I did this several years ago before I had heard of this tip. It’s a game-changer. If you hear the characters, with their Irish accents, you will feel the joy that Joyce wants to convey. Another thing happens when you read and listen to an audio version of the book — you hear the internal dialogue of the characters much more clearly. I was surprised that I could appreciate the humor much better when I heard the language. I think the book was meant to be heard as well as read.