Joyce's Voices

I want so much to like Kenner and his fine, early and original work in Joycean scholarship. But I discover myself arguing with him to the point of violent blows. Perhaps this comes from his having something to say. These chapters originally comprised a series of lectures delivered at the University of Kent at Canterbury in England as part of the TS Eliot Memorial Lectures in 1975. Like Eliot, who based the authority of his early commentary of Ulysses (Ulysses: Order and Myth) on the fact at the time no one in England nor the USA were permitted to purchase the work, Kenner makes several outrageous statements completely opposite the facts of the book at hand. For one thing, addressing a mob of BRitish academes, he plays court jester and appeals to their prejudice regarding the Irish, including their absolute ignorance of Irish literature, myth, history, etc., by stating the Irish, including Joyce, shared that ignorance. For the British the Irish have no history, nor literature, nor mythology, whereas, as later studies such as The Irish Ulysses have proven, Joyce based his novel almost exculsively upon its archetypes, the real reason Joyce removed the Homeric Chapter titles at the last moment, in order not to distract us, instead of the assumptions Kenner presents here. This brief volume is interesting as a milestone in JOycean scholarship, but its conclusions and judgments must not be taken at face value, as with anything Joycean. It is essential to read the later criticism which refutes, defuses, confuses, complements and deines the statements offered by Kenner. Nevertheless, as noted in other reviews upon this page, Kenner writes in an engaging and a breezy manner, happily opening doors, even if those doors lead on to bricked up passages and cellars without stairs. Thus, approach this slim collection with caution, and get the more recent commentary, such as Rejoycing, which directly addresses the Uncle Charles Principle which Kenner first presents here. Worth a reading in an idle moment upon your heroic and indeed Homeric adventure with Ulysses, before engaging in the more serious hand to hand battle with more substantial and later work. Buy this book cheaply, and read it at your leisure. Then write your own commentary as to how you perceive it so horribly wrong. Unfortunately Professor Kenner is not close at hand to argue with over a small Jamesons. If anything Joyce achieves at least one goal in providing such excuse for lively scholarly conversation as he forges the conscience of our race within the smithy of his soul. I could not put this down, unlike much of Joyce commentary. I had to read it to the end; it is that engaging. Please see as well his more comprehensive A Colder Eye written nearly ten years later at greater leisure than this brief lecture series, yet with the same engaging brilliance and wit and valuable insights and information. In fact his Colder Eye is as enveloping, enchanting, informing and entertaining as Ulysses him

If you're a modern day graduate student (or worse, a professor), you know that modern scholars aren't allowed to write the way Kenner wrote. More's the pity, too: Joyce's Voices is one of the most illuminating short works of criticism, even by New Critics' standards, which for stylistic agility were remarkably high. As Kenner said, he was almost solely responsible for putting the university at which he worked on the map, and it was that level of nonchalant genius that permeates this work. Viewed first through a comparison between "objective" or "empirical" treatments of experience by other authors, Kenner shows the ways that Joyce sought to illuminate observed experience through a new means: the lens of style for its own sake. Without resorting to the jargon or jingoism that so commonly pervades academia, Kenner reveals Joyce's talent for pursuing his muse through a panopoly of styles and stylistic gestures that leaves one more capable of understanding, and therefore appreciating, Ulysses than ever before.

This brilliant, witty little book is simply the most penetrating essay ever written on the greatest novel of the 20th century, James Joyce's Ulysses. For some odd reason, no critic before Kenner (or since) ever paid much attention to the most salient feature of Ulysses: its stylistic variousness, from the limpid Edwardian tones of its opening chapters through the long internal monologues of Bloom and Molly to the countless genre parodies interlarded throughout. All other critics have been content to dismiss it as a mere humorous quirk by Joyce, unrelated to the main point of the novel. Kenner shows that, in fact, it goes to the very heart of the novel: it is how the modern artist reinvokes the muse.Kenner's explanation of Joyce's choices is absolutely brilliant. And along the way we get an insightful short history of the objective style and its problems, as well as numerous witty, perceptive asides on sundry matters. This is how literary criticism ought to be written.What a shame this great little book is out of print. If you're even slightly interested in modern literature, grab a used copy immediately.

Well-written essays, concise, and enlightening. Some of Kenner's points blew my mind--and I've been reading Joyce for 20 years (already). Definitely worth a shot.