Ellmann’s Joyce

Zachary Leader, the Emeritus Professor of English Literature at the University of Roehampton, joins us at the Oklahoma Center for the Humanities to talk about his new book, Ellmann’s Joyce: The Biography of the Masterpiece and its Maker. This is your chance to buy the book before it even hits the shelves!

ABOUT THE BOOK
Richard Ellmann’s James Joyce, published in 1959, was hailed by Anthony Burgess as “the greatest literary biography of the twentieth century.” Frank Kermode thought the book would “fix Joyce’s image for a generation,” a prediction that was if anything too cautious. The biography won the National Book Award and durably secured Joyce’s standing as a preeminent modernist.

Ellmann’s Joyce provides the biography of the biography, exploring how Ellmann came to his subject, gained the cooperation of Joyce’s family and estate, shrewdly, doggedly collected vital papers and interviews, placated publishers, thwarted competitors, and carefully balanced narrative with literary analysis. Ellmann’s Joyce also removes the veil from the biographer—richly rewarded in public, admirable in private life, but also possessed of a startling secret life. An eminent biographer himself, Leader constructs a powerful argument not only in support of Ellmann’s intellectual and artistic claims but also on behalf of literary biography generally. In the process, he takes readers on a rare tour through midcentury publishing houses in New York and London, as well as the corridors and classrooms of elite universities, from Yale to Oxford. The influence of Ellmann’s book, recognized instantly, persists to this day, among literary scholars and Joyce fans alike.

Filled with surprising details, tales of intrigue from the heyday of literary publishing, and intimate portraits of the Joyce and Ellmann families, Ellmann’s Joyce is as immersive as a walk around town with Leopold Bloom and as moving as the thickly drifted snow on Michael Furey’s grave.

Join Leader as he discusses the preeminent Joyce biographer. This talk is perfect for fans of James Joyce or those who want to know more about how biographies are written. For more information about OCH exhibits and events, bookmark our homepage at humanities.utulsa.edu or follow us on social media.