Bloom's Blog 2022 -10 ~ Happy 100th Birthday of the Publication of James Joyce's "Ulysses"!!! The Birth of a Masterpiece
It is Thursday, February 2nd 1922. A 34 year old American woman is waiting at the Gare de Lyons train station in Paris for the Dijon-Paris express to arrive, at 7am. She is waiting anxiously to collect a parcel from the train’s conductor: a parcel entrusted to him the previous evening in Dijon by the printer, Maurice Darantière.
She collects the parcel. It contains two copies of a new novel; the first novel that she had ever published.
The woman takes a taxi to the residence of the author, who is waiting patiently for her arrival. She gives one copy of the novel to him and hurries to her bookshop with the other. She carefully places the novel in the centre of her bookshop window and allows herself a triumphant smile as the admiring public file into the shop to have a look at the book.
The bookshop is Shakespeare & Company; the woman is Sylvia Beach; the author is James Joyce; and the novel is ‘Ulysses’.
A masterpiece is born.
She collects the parcel. It contains two copies of a new novel; the first novel that she had ever published.
The woman takes a taxi to the residence of the author, who is waiting patiently for her arrival. She gives one copy of the novel to him and hurries to her bookshop with the other. She carefully places the novel in the centre of her bookshop window and allows herself a triumphant smile as the admiring public file into the shop to have a look at the book.
The bookshop is Shakespeare & Company; the woman is Sylvia Beach; the author is James Joyce; and the novel is ‘Ulysses’.
A masterpiece is born.