Joyce In His Own Words

Since the works of James Joyce were first published, there have been many different readings and re-imaginings of his work. From a stage version of The Dead to free form group readings of Ulysses, many have tried to bring Joyce's notoriously complex writing to life. With the prevalence of others performing his work, it is interesting to find that Joyce himself had been recorded on gramophone and that the audio was still available. Just as with Eliot, listening to the author read his own work is important both as a historical artifact and also as a window into the intended cadence and intonation of the work. Furthermore like Eliot, no one knew these works better than Joyce as you can hear in the confident way that the words flow in the two passages. Especially in the reading from Finnegans Wake we see Joyce entering into his work, adopting the character of the washerwoman in his tone and accent.

The first recording is a reading from 1924 of the famous Anna Livia Plurabelle section of Finnegans Wake (1939) beginning on page 213 of the book. This chapter describes the life of the Anna Livia Plurabelle, the wife of Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker, through the story of the world's rivers as told by washing women. It is hard to understand Joyce sometimes because of the thick accent he adopts so it may be helpful to follow along in the novel while you listen here


The second recording of his work can be found in this handmade animation of Joyce reading from the Aeolus chapter of Ulysses (1922), from the same session, his only recording from the novel. While the animation may be a tad disconcerting, the audio provides a rare glimpse of the novel being read as the author intended. As the recorder Sylvia Beach describes it:

Joyce had chosen the speech in the Aeolus episode, the only passage that could be lifted out of Ulysses, he said, and the only one that was "declamatory" and therefore suitable for recital. He had made up his mind, he told me, that this would be his only reading from Ulysses.

I have an idea that it was not for declamatory reasons alone that he chose this passage from Aeolus. I believe that it expressed something he wanted said and preserved in his own voice. As it rings out-"he lifted his voice above it boldly"-it is more, one feels, than mere oratory.

Compare the voice that Joyce uses in these two readings. While Joyce clearly has an Irish accent in Ulysses, in the Anna Livia Plurabelle reading Joyce adopts a strong faux-Gaelic lilt making the recording nearly incomprehensible in parts. While this can be considered an over-the-top rendering of a section already heavily written in dialect done for aesthetic effect, it can also be viewed as a critique of Ireland's connection with its language. Gaelic has been in decline in Ireland since the imposition of British rule in the 1800's being replaced with British English. Terry Eagleton jests that

Joyce's Finnegans Wake , the most unreadable novel of all time, is among other things the Irishman's way of being unintelligible to his colonial masters, pulling their language to pieces before their very eyes and running rings around them with it.

Joyce's heavy use of dialect, most commonly associated with the lower class or residents of the country, in Finnegans Wake provides an interesting contrast to the language of Dublin found in Ulysses, The Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist. Like Eliot, this focus on the poor and the use of their language may suggest that the lower classes have a stronger connection to the important aspects of life, in this case the Irish language and culture. While Joyce's words may sound completely foreign to us, that may possibly be the point. To a degree, Joyce rejects the language of Britain using his position as an outsider to both Ireland and England to comment on Ireland's lost heritage.

You can read about the history of these two recordings at UBU Web. The site also features the soundtrack for the out of print Ulysses movie from 1967, which is fascinating to listen to even without the visuals.

On that same site they also have a film version of Finnegans Wake by avante-garde filmmaker Mary Ellen Bute, which won the award for Best Debut at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival. This film, long out of print, is a surreal but fitting adaptation of Joyce's work and is definitely worthwhile to watch as a companion to the novel as well as an example of the long-reaching influence of Joyce's modernist style.