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sonofisaac 's review for:
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
by James Joyce
At its best: well-written poetry with a dense, rich culture bursting from the seams.
At its worst: A Dead Poet’s Society (as noted in another review) predecessor in how it depicts a group of students eagerly debating the meaning of life (or, rather, the definition of terms of life) using an encyclopedic knowledge of their classical education.
It’s impressive that Joyce can put all this together into a coherent novel. But I want to steal Stephen’s lunch money and force him to talk to a girl instead of blaming 500-year-old dead guys for his own awkwardness. It was hard to align myself with the contemporary reviews about rooting for Stephen. Maybe that was Joyce’s point: skewering himself. But it’s not surprising that Stephen says he’d be okay living without any friends. Who would be his friend after enduring a three-hour discussion about aestheticism?
At its worst: A Dead Poet’s Society (as noted in another review) predecessor in how it depicts a group of students eagerly debating the meaning of life (or, rather, the definition of terms of life) using an encyclopedic knowledge of their classical education.
It’s impressive that Joyce can put all this together into a coherent novel. But I want to steal Stephen’s lunch money and force him to talk to a girl instead of blaming 500-year-old dead guys for his own awkwardness. It was hard to align myself with the contemporary reviews about rooting for Stephen. Maybe that was Joyce’s point: skewering himself. But it’s not surprising that Stephen says he’d be okay living without any friends. Who would be his friend after enduring a three-hour discussion about aestheticism?