Ulysses by James Joyce
Ulysses is extremely long. Much of it is obscure if not entirely unintelligible, and I found it paralyzingly boring. I did read the entire book, if only to secure bragging rights, since I have not yet discovered an acquaintance who has read it. It strikes me as a book that professors of literature inflict on their students, whom they can impress with tidbits of information, culled from secondary sources, about Dublin and the day in 1904 on which the events of the novel occur. It is tempting to suppose that much of the notoriety of the book derives from its having been banned when it first appeared, which conferred on it the allure of forbidden fruit.
Joyce is, of course, a skillful writer. Various chapters of Ulysses are written in different styles: the trashy romance style, the pretentious cliche-ridden journalese style, the stream-of-consciousess style, the question and answer style, and others. Joyce's parodies are amusing. But only for a little while. He pushes them, typically, far beyond the point at which they cease to be amusing. There are a few places where he reminds me of Rabelais--the enumeration of the contents of a drawer, for example, which is a bit like some of Rabelais' lengthy lists of unlikely things: Gargantua's search for the perfect ass-wipe, or the list of his games. But Rabelais, who is sometimes prolix, just as Joyce is, writes out of a kind of overflowing good humor. Joyce is imaginative, but writes about uninteresting things in tiresome detail.
If one were to pore over the novel one could, apparently, discover lots of interconnections between different parts, one could piece together more details of the "story" than are apparent on a first reading, and some parts that seem obscure might turn out to be less obscure. All of that would doubtless generate the sort of satisfaction associated with solving a difficult Sudoku. But what would be the point? Learning in more detail what Leopold Bloom does, what streets he walks on, how they correspond with the 1904 map of Dublin, what shops he passes (presumably actual Dublin shops of the time), what people he meets, how he relieves himself in the morning and what he reads while doing it, what he thinks--all this would be interesting only if Bloom himself were interesting. But he isn't. Nor do I find any reason to take much interest in any of the other characters in the novel.
It is possible that if I were to re-read the book and study it I would discover wonders that elude me now. Some people consider it a masterpiece. But I know that I will never pick it up again.
Joyce is, of course, a skillful writer. Various chapters of Ulysses are written in different styles: the trashy romance style, the pretentious cliche-ridden journalese style, the stream-of-consciousess style, the question and answer style, and others. Joyce's parodies are amusing. But only for a little while. He pushes them, typically, far beyond the point at which they cease to be amusing. There are a few places where he reminds me of Rabelais--the enumeration of the contents of a drawer, for example, which is a bit like some of Rabelais' lengthy lists of unlikely things: Gargantua's search for the perfect ass-wipe, or the list of his games. But Rabelais, who is sometimes prolix, just as Joyce is, writes out of a kind of overflowing good humor. Joyce is imaginative, but writes about uninteresting things in tiresome detail.
If one were to pore over the novel one could, apparently, discover lots of interconnections between different parts, one could piece together more details of the "story" than are apparent on a first reading, and some parts that seem obscure might turn out to be less obscure. All of that would doubtless generate the sort of satisfaction associated with solving a difficult Sudoku. But what would be the point? Learning in more detail what Leopold Bloom does, what streets he walks on, how they correspond with the 1904 map of Dublin, what shops he passes (presumably actual Dublin shops of the time), what people he meets, how he relieves himself in the morning and what he reads while doing it, what he thinks--all this would be interesting only if Bloom himself were interesting. But he isn't. Nor do I find any reason to take much interest in any of the other characters in the novel.
It is possible that if I were to re-read the book and study it I would discover wonders that elude me now. Some people consider it a masterpiece. But I know that I will never pick it up again.