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3.64 AVERAGE
3.64 AVERAGE
There's no way to describe this in 1000 characters. Maybe the best book ever written...but thank god there's not two of them! Brilliant but impenetrable.
I'm not sure I'm ready to write a review of this yet, so many thoughts swirling in my head. Wow, what a last chapter though.
Better than The Odyssey. Though that’s not saying much. However, this book did have some entertaining parts and better characters.
Oh boy. I feel like I may have "understood" about 10% of what was going on in this book. Often, it felt like eating my vegetables. Often, it felt like doing homework. I've wanted to read this book for about 10 years, and I've put it off, thinking that I wasn't "ready" for it (as it has a reputation for being dense, filled with allusion, overly experimental, etc. etc.). I think I was feeling cocky having read some of the other "big" historical novels. I felt like I might be able to handle ULYSSES. Nope.
I took my time with ULYSSES. I read the SparkNotes after every chapter. I often pulled up Gifford's ULYSSES ANNOTATED. Even still, I feel like I only scratched the surface of WHAT HAPPENED, much less what it all means and what is in the text itself.
But I like this book. I like it quite a bit. Would I like it if it didn't have its reputation as the Greatest Novel of the 20th Century? Maybe there's a placebo effect going on here? There has to be. And yet, some of the prose is absolute dynamite. Every chapter, Joyce works in a different literary style, and while some of these "don't work", some absolutely do. It's undeniable that the man is a master after reading some of these chapters -- but not all of them. And maybe that's the point.
What I'm wrestling with here is, how can I say that I really liked a book that I feel like I barely understood? Was it the impression it left on me? The themes that I was able to pick up? Was it the marvel at the literary acrobatics? Maybe it's all of these things.
Sure, this book is frustrating as all hell at times (on purpose, it seems), but it's both over-rated and under-rated as a novel. It is better than its reputation and also not nearly as good. And with that said, I'll definitely be revisiting this in a few years time.
I took my time with ULYSSES. I read the SparkNotes after every chapter. I often pulled up Gifford's ULYSSES ANNOTATED. Even still, I feel like I only scratched the surface of WHAT HAPPENED, much less what it all means and what is in the text itself.
But I like this book. I like it quite a bit. Would I like it if it didn't have its reputation as the Greatest Novel of the 20th Century? Maybe there's a placebo effect going on here? There has to be. And yet, some of the prose is absolute dynamite. Every chapter, Joyce works in a different literary style, and while some of these "don't work", some absolutely do. It's undeniable that the man is a master after reading some of these chapters -- but not all of them. And maybe that's the point.
What I'm wrestling with here is, how can I say that I really liked a book that I feel like I barely understood? Was it the impression it left on me? The themes that I was able to pick up? Was it the marvel at the literary acrobatics? Maybe it's all of these things.
Sure, this book is frustrating as all hell at times (on purpose, it seems), but it's both over-rated and under-rated as a novel. It is better than its reputation and also not nearly as good. And with that said, I'll definitely be revisiting this in a few years time.
reading this was like being thrown down a ravine and, while falling, intermittently bonking one’s head on various stone outcroppings tree branches ledges etc. just a lot of brain soreness and prayer. but definitely some interesting stuff
It’s a classic! It probably deserves five stars but I’m deducting one because I hated Leo Bloom and a second for that play chapter. Don’t try to get me to read Finnegan’s awake.
Ugh... This book is my Unicorn... one day I will finish it. But this was not the year.
