Born on 2 February 1882 in Dublin, Ireland, James Joyce was one of the most revered writers of the 20th century. His masterpiece, Ulysses, remains an unparalleled literary feat. His exploration of language and his exceptional use of the stream-of-consciousness technique immensely contributed to the modernist avant-garde, inspiring contemporary writers to experiment with fresh perspective. A brilliant student, Joyce briefly attended the Christian Brothers-run O'Connell School before excelling at the Jesuit schools Clongowes and Belvedere. In 1904, in his early twenties, he emigrated permanently to continental Europe with his partner and future wife, Nora Barnacle. Though most of his life was spent in Trieste, Paris and Zurich, his fictional universe was largely set in Dublin, with characters who resembled his family members, acquaintances, friends and enemies. Joyce's other well known works include Dubliners, a short-story collection; his first novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, which caught the attention of the American poet, Ezra Pound, who praised him for his unconventional style and voice, and the masterly Finnegans Wake. Following the Nazi invasion of Paris, he and his family moved to southern France in 1940. On 13 January 1941, following an intestinal operation, the writer passed away in Zurich, where he is buried in the Fluntern cemetery.
The first novel by Irish writer, James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a coming-of-age tale about the religious and intellectual awakening of the protagonist. In this semi-autobiographical novel, Joyce examines what distinguishes the individual from the social, religious and cultural, by mapping the ever-changing landscape of the mind. Written in a modernist style, the novel traces the journey of young Stephen Dedalus, a fictitious alter ego of Joyce, with an allusion to the skilful craftsman and artist of Greek mythology. Stephen rebels against the Catholic and Irish mores that govern his upbringing, culminating in his self-imposed exile from Ireland to Europe. American modernist poet Ezra Pound had the novel serialised in the English literary magazine The Egotist in 1914 and 1915. Published as a book in 1916 by B.W. Huebsch of New York, Joyce's debut novel earned him his place as a frontrunner of literary modernism.
