The Essay: Reading Ulysses

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The Essay: Reading Ulysses: Nuala O'Connor on Penelope

Nuala O'Connor on Penelope

Reading Ulysses

BBC Radio 3 - The Essay, Reading Ulysses, Nuala O'Connor on Penelope

Nuala O'Connor explores a passage from the novel's final episode, Molly Bloom's soliloquy.

Nuala O'Connor chooses the final episode of Ulysses - Penelope - in which Molly Bloom speaks to us. In the passage we hear, Molly reflects on her husband, and men in general.

Five Irish writers each take a passage from James Joyce’s Ulysses and, through a close reading, explore its meaning and significance within the wider work, as well as what it means to them. Reading Ulysses is a famously challenging experience for most readers, so can our Essayists help?

In the final essay of the series, novelist Nuala O'Connor chooses the last episode of the book - Penelope - which is the one Nuala discovered first.  In Penelope, we hear Molly Bloom, the wife of the novel's main protagonist, speak to us. 

In the extract Nuala selects, Molly lies in bed, top to tail with her husband. We hear Molly consider him and his antics - and muse on what husbands, and men in general, mean to her. Nuala examines some of her favourite phrases from the passage; she reveals some of the parallels she can see in Joyce's own biography; and she tells us why the novel's final words might prove the ultimate key to unlocking the book.

First broadcast in February 2022 to mark 100 years since the publication of Ulysses.

Presenter: Nuala O'Connor
Producer: Camellia Sinclair

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Five Irish writers re-read James Joyce's difficult classic novel Ulysses.

Five Irish writers re-read James Joyce's novel Ulysses, providing insights into the meaning of a notoriously difficult classic of world literature.

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