James Joyce: A Political Life

In this intricate biography, Irish historian Callanan (The Parnell Split), who died in 2021, challenges the notion that novelist James Joyce was apolitical—which Joyce himself sometimes seemed to endorse—and instead credits him with a deep, subtle engagement with Irish nationalism and other political issues. He unpacks Joyce’s political views, from his Dublin boyhood, when he was devoted to Irish nationalist politician Charles Stewart Parnell, to his sharp criticisms of other nationalist writers in his early career, his muted opposition to WWI, and his ambivalence about the Irish War of Independence. Along the way, Callanan demonstrates that Joyce’s nationalism was idiosyncratic and at odds with mainstream nationalist sentiment. For example, he deplored the influence of the Catholic Church on Irish society, was skeptical of Gaelic language revivalism, and generally opposed fanaticism and political violence. Elsewhere, the author traces how Joyce’s politics influenced his writing; his abhorrence of fascism and antisemitism are apparent in works like Finnegans Wake and Ulysses.. Callanan makes a convincing case for Joyce as a huma ne, sophisticated thinker who eschewed soapboxing and wrote with nuanced insight into the ways that politics affect the lives of ordinary people. It’s a richly detailed portrait of a civic-minded writer. (Mar.)