James Joyce in the Nineteenth Century

James Joyce was one of the most important writers of the twentieth century, and a hugely influential figure in modernism and Irish literary culture. This book is the first to take stock of Joyce's widespread links to major figures and movements of the nineteenth century and to read Joyce in detail against the context of nineteenth-century Ireland.

This collection shows the depth and range of James Joyce's relationship with key literary, intellectual and cultural issues that arose in the nineteenth century. Thirteen original essays explore several new themes in Joyce studies, connecting Joyce's writing to that of his predecessors, and linking Joyce's formal innovations to his reading of, and immersion in, nineteenth-century life. The volume begins by addressing Joyce's relationships with fictional forms in nineteenth-century and turn-of-the-century Ireland. Further sections explore the rise of new economies of consumption and Joyce's formal adaptations of major intellectual figures and issues. What emerges is a portrait of Joyce as he has not previously been seen, giving scholars and students of fin-de-siecle culture, literary modernism and English and Irish literature fresh insight into one of the most important writers of the past century.