A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

Happy Holidays!

In brief, I liked Joyce’s prose right away. There is something so simple yet good in how he puts words together.

However, the plot, the dialogue, and the character left me a bit wanting. I did like it in the beginning, but not much actually happens in terms of plot. You really have to relate to Stephen to enjoy it. I am not male or religious enough to have done so.

This book reminded me of Catcher in the Rye, but I like this book much better. I prefer Stephen much more than Holden Caulfield. It’s a similar angsty and reflective coming of age story but this one with a much more Catholic bent.

This was my first Joyce, and I do not think it will be my last. However, for a book less than 300 pages, this took me much longer than I would have liked. I hope Ulysses or Finnegan’s Wake is better, but I won’t try those out for awhile.

Read December 9-25, 2015.

4 thoughts on “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

    • athena (Post author)

      Hi JE! Thanks for the comment. I am now dreading Ulysses. Holden was super annoying. Stephen was a bit more interesting, and the book could have been worse. Happy Holidays and thanks again.

      Reply
      • JE Fountain

        I wouldn’t want to warn anyone off from Ulysses. It is THE literary mountain ya know…defying you to climb it. I’m glad I did. I might even reread it someday. I pretty sure I’d appreciate it more now. One recommendation though, if you ever do decide to scale its lofty heights, have a commentary handy, and although I usually hate to read a book this way…I ended up reading commentary on each chapter BEFORE I read the chapter. I doubt I would have comprehended half of it otherwise.

        Reply
        • athena (Post author)

          Hello JE! Yes. I’ll definitely keep that in mind. I am not exactly looking forward to it even though there are SOME aspects of Joyce’s writing I liked. We’ll see. Maybe next year or 2017. Thanks for the comment. Happy New Year. 🙂

          Reply

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