If you haven’t read it, I recommend trying. The language and form is difficult, but just treat it like a scramble down a hill: maintain direction, pay attention to your surroundings, but mostly just go with the flow.
My constant recommendations for those interested in tackling Ulysses:
- RTÉ produced a fully cast, essentially unabridged dramatization[1] which is phenomenal. So much of the "fun" of Joyce is found only when reading it aloud.
- Frank Delaney's ridiculously ambitious paragraph-by-paragraph[2] unpacking of the novel in podcast form was sadly cut short by his death, but remains a charming journey through the first sections of the novel.
[1] https://www.rte.ie/culture/2020/0610/1146705-listen-ulysses-...
Honestly, it's worth it if you love language and literature at all. Joyce did something extraordinary here.
There's a text called the Bloomsday Book that you may find useful if you get lost.
* bragging rights
* personally, I found it like going to a different world. It’s equal parts emmersive, foreign, and familiar. There’s moments it’s a slog to get through and moments it’s a page-turner. In the same way The Beatles Get Back was so great because it actually felt like being in the studio, reading Ulysses isn’t like reading a story, it’s like being in a different world.
Reading it is fun just for the sake of it, like dancing. You don't have to read the whole thing. Every paragraph is a delight. It's less about the story, and more about the language itself.
it’s a lot more manageable if you read his books in order starting with Dubliners. Ulysses is not exactly a sequel but reading through his work chronologically kind of prepares you for his eccentricities. just don’t consult reading guides or appendixes too much because that sort of stuff will just kind of ruin it.