Re Joyce [Paperback]

Anthony Burgess (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1968

Arguing that "the appearance of difficulty is part of Joyce's big joke," Burgess provides a readable, accessible guide to the writings of James Joyce.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Burgess has written a study of the most brilliant and humane of twentieth-century humanists.” (Philip Toynbee - The Observer )

“Recognizing the coming and cosmic in Joyce, [Burgess] proceeds with his self-imposed task of unraveling meaning by scrutinizing the layers of a mind that was encyclopedic in dimension. . . . He has defined the perimeter of Joyce's adventure in both Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake. . . . It took Burgess to place Joyce's satire in its proper orbit.” (Saturday Review )

About the Author

Anthony Burgess is the author of many works, including The Wanting Seed, Nothing Like the Sun, The Doctor Is Sick, The Long Day Wanes, Honey for the Bears, and ReJoyce. He died in 1993.

Product Details

• Paperback: 276 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; Pages Stained edition (1968)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393004457
• ISBN-13: 978-0393004458
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.7 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #258,634 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #2 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( J ) > Joyce, James

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

91 of 92 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is one of the most delightful companions to Joyce November 16, 1997

By [e-mail]

Anthony Burgess is best known as the author of brilliant novels such as A Clockwork Orange and Enderby; but he has also produced a substantial body of non-fiction, including several works about James Joyce. I suppose it is only natural that one of my favorite pieces of Joyce criticism would be penned by one of my favorite novelists, a writer who has never concealed the influence of Joyce upon his own deft games with language.

ReJoyce does not attempt to explicate or annotate the entire Joycean canon, nor is it exactly a biography. Rather, it is a very personal "reading" of Joyce; a delightful "companion" and a brilliant illumination of his narrative technique. According to Burgess, "My book does not pretend to scholarship, only a desire to help the average reader who wants to know Joyce's work but has been scared off by the professors." Reassuring, but a bit disingenuous -- Burgess's work, though clear and easy to read, never panders to the "simple," and he stocks its pages with enough insight and revelation to impress even the most demanding professor. His primary focus is Joyce's use of language, and he takes great delight in exploring the structure, intentions, and psychology that underpin Joyce's revolutionary technique. But what differentiates -- and elevates -- ReJoyce from most other works of similar Joyce criticism is the clarity and liveliness of Burgess's own unique style. Burgess writes with a lucidity and wit which is rare in academic scholarship, and he never once comes across as being dry, obscure, or condescending. Not a book written by a professional critic, this is a book written by one very talented author about another: and the fact that Joyce was not only a fellow writer but something of a personal hero makes it a very enjoyable reading experience! His sense of admiration of Joyce's genius is liberally mixed in with a playful sense of irreverence, and this mix of guileless enthusiasm and intellectual appreciation enlivens every page.

In structure, the book is elegantly simple but highly effective. Burgess follows Joyce as a writer, tracing his development from his days as a nine-year-old Parnellite to his last years working on Finnegans Wake. Joyce's life is seen as a humanist journey; self-cast into the role of Daedalus, he was on a quest to "rival the primal Creator" as he fashioned increasingly more complex worlds, all aiming for the "ennoblement of the common man." Burgess relates Joyce's life through the framework of his writing, placing each work in a historical context which illuminates Joyce's family, his society, and his own changing ideas about his role as a writer. Against this background, Burgess highlights the many factors which played a hand in shaping Joyce's style, and shows how Joyce himself responded to these forces. Burgess sees a synergistic relationship between Joyce's technique and the image of "reality" it was trying to reflect, a tension which engendered a constant, almost dialectical pressure, forcing his prose to continually evolve in order to meet new demands. He points out that each of Joyce's works contains the seeds of the next, and that from every set of resolutions sprang a more difficult set of problems -- issues that could, in turn, be resolved only through another quantum leap of language and style. This is not to say that Burgess sees Joyce as merely automatically reacting to forces beyond his control; but he does envision Joyce's work as moving towards a single destination. (Destinyation?) In discussing Portrait, Burgess remarks: "The roots of Ulysses are here -- to every phase of the soul its own special language; Finnegans Wake must seem, not a wilful aberration from sense, but a logical conclusion to that premise." True to this vision, all of ReJoyce unfolds below the shadow of Finnegans Wake, the "man-made mountain" and inevitable "terminus" for Joyce's remarkable journey. All roads lead to riverrun. . . .

A deeply spiritual humanist at heart, Burgess is not only concerned with Joyce's amazing technique; he's also intent on showing the spirited "jocoseriousness" which animates his work, and he keeps returning to the themes of integrity, joyousness, and resurrection. As Philip Toynbee has very accurately remarked, "Mr. Burgess has written a brilliant and humane study of the most brilliant and humane of twentieth-century novelists." Burgess makes a very good case not just for Joyce's significance, but for his importance as well: Joyce should be shared by everyone, not kept to the scholars and the critics. But that is not to say that Joyce is easy: he offers us a challenge, and part of being fully aware, fully alive, is saying "yes" to that challenge: "when we have read him and absorbed even one iota of his substance, neither literature nor life can ever be quite the same again. We shall be finding an embarrassing joy in the commonplace, seeing the most defiled city as a figure of heaven, and assuming, against all odds, a hardly supportable optimism." Strong words, and spoken straight from the heart. Again, this is one of my favorite books of Joyce criticism, and no other work has both so influenced and reflected my reading of Joyce. I highly recommend it to beginner and enthusiast alike!

--Allen Ruch, The Brazen Head

33 of 34 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars One Great Mind Parses Another August 25, 2000

By Ted Ficklen

If you are looking for a fairly short, easy to digest introductory guide to Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake, this is it. Anthony Burgess, in addition to being a witty novelist and critic, also had the chutzpah to publish an abridged version of Finnegan's Wake, so you know he knows his stuff! This is not a page by page explication of Joyce's complex works, ala Gifford or Gilbert, but more like a defense for the intelligent reader who may be wondering if these novels are worth the time.

It is wonderful that the cover of this June 2000 paperback reissue has features an image of Joyce looking away, his face hidden from the reader. Joyce remains an enigma-- a sparkling inspiration to readers who enjoy thinking about the questions and don't care about definitive answers.

If you've read A Clockwork Orange or Nothing Like the Sun and are curious about Anthony Burgess' critical work, this is one of his best performances.

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars ReJoyce fair readers, for your guide to the labrynth is here December 5, 1997

By "wessels"

Without a doubt, an attempt to read the works of James Joyce, one of the most demanding authors to live (and one of the best as well) comes with no small amount of trepidation. But thankfully, the Joycian disciple Anthony Burgess has written the book for both the neophyte and the seasoned lover of Joyce's work. ReJoyce features pretty much all that is needed to tackle his canon. The fascinating autobiographical sketch and the analysis of the early works are merely a fitting prelude to the bulk of the book, which is devoted to Joyce's dizzying last two novels, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. The critical analysis of the last two is both brilliant and eminetly approachable, and more than any of the other volumes of scholarly work on Joyce's last two novels, Burgess's analysis helps to make them both understandable and enjoyable. Without a doubt, ReJoyce is among the best guides to Joyce out there on the market now, and well worth it for both the longtime reader or the newcomer to Joyce