Ulysses: Penguin Classics Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

James Joyce (Author), Patrick Gibson (Narrator), Penguin Audio (Publisher)

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Brought to you by Penguin.

This Penguin Classic is performed by Patrick Gibson, known for his roles in The OA, The Tudors and The Passing Bells. This definitive recording includes an introduction by Declan Kiberd

Following the events of one single day in Dublin, the 16th June 1904, and what happens to the characters Stephen Dedalus, Leopold Bloom and his wife Molly, Ulysses,is a monument to the human condition. It has survived censorship, controversy and legal action, and even been deemed blasphemous, but remains an undisputed modernist classic: ceaselessly inventive, garrulous, funny, sorrowful, vulgar, lyrical and ultimately redemptive. It confirms Joyce's belief that literature 'is the eternal affirmation of the spirit of man'.

Public Domain (P)2019 Penguin Audio

Listening Length

32 hours and 38 minutes
Author

James Joyce
Narrator

Patrick Gibson
Audible release date

26 September 2019
Language

English
Publisher

Penguin Audio
ASIN

B07XTNR26V
Version

Unabridged
Program Type

Audiobook
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Product details

Listening Length	32 hours and 38 minutes
Author	James Joyce
Narrator	Patrick Gibson
Whispersync for Voice	Ready
Audible.com.au Release Date	26 September 2019
Publisher	Penguin Audio
Program Type	Audiobook
Version	Unabridged
Language	English
ASIN	B07XTNR26V
Best Sellers Rank	3,142 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals) 92 in Classic Literature 172 in Classic Literature & Fiction

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Kindle Customer

The most overrated writer of all time!

Reviewed in Australia on 9 October 2021

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This book was nothing but a bunch of gibberish and it made absolutely no sense at all! There were a bunch of words that did not go together and I learned almost nothing from this book. I don't know why people say that James Joyce is such a great writer, when most people can't even understand most of what he says! I did not like the lack of story and the fact jokes, as well as the bad grammar and the childish and juvenile way in which it was written. I also did not empathize with the characters and felt they were flat and lacked a lot of depth, too.

Stay clear from this book, unless you want to waste precious time in your life doing more valuable things! I wouldn't even suggest reading this in lockdown.

2 people found this helpful

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Little Buddha

Blooming Original - One of a kind.

Reviewed in Australia on 12 January 2015

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Interesting book, the writing is divine, 18 sessions, with not a clear or obvious plot or structure other then a day in the life of Mr Bloom, set in Ireland, with reference to all points of the globe though. One of the sessions is written as a play, my head still can't understand why the author thought that was a good idea, but top marks for originality. Everything I have been taught about composition of a book, doesn't apply with this book, you will either love it, or you will view the book is utter madness or both in my case, but I cant say I have read a book remotely like it, nor will another compare in future. Parts of the book are written with such highbrow elegant detail, you will cherish the velvety language, other parts of the book, scandalous, no sign of grammar or no holding back with vulgarities, but its definately a journey that will test your patience in every sense. I think its important to read books, that challenge your thoughts and in explore each character in detail, so worth a read, but you may need something stronger then coffee to get you through it, chocolate perhaps :)

3 people found this helpful

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Jennifer nov 18

Beyond Me

Reviewed in Australia on 12 February 2020

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I didn't enjoy so sent the book back

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James C Brandon

FANTASTIC - Modern-day Odysseus, precursor to FINNEGANS WAKE, 12 November 2015

Reviewed in Australia on 27 December 2015

Joyce was 40 yrs old when Ulysses was published, it is a day in the life of a husband and father of Joyce's age (at publication). Joyce loved Dublin and Ireland and though the book was written on the European continent - he wanted to memorialize his birth home (Ireland). The framework of Ulysses is Homer's Odyssey - The Roman Ulysses: 1 Telemachus, 2 Nestor, 3 Proteus, 4 Calypso, 5 Lotus Eaters, 6 Hades, 7 Aeolus, 8 Lestrygonians, 9 Scylla And Charybdis, 10 Wandering Rocks, 11 Sirens, 12 Cyclops, 13 Nausicca, 14 Oxen Of The Sun, 15 Circe, 16 Eumaeus, 17 Ithaca, and 18 Penelope.

Ulysses is the tale of a Modern-day Odysseus, Leopold Bloom in his personal existential/sexual quest. The conclusion of this quest is the quintessential affirmation of humanity, the fundamental family unit - the father, mother, son, and daughter. Like Odysseus, absent from Penelope, traveling the world, for many long years, Leopold Bloom is also absent from his Penelope (in Dublin). Like a traveler (Odysseus), Bloom is sexually absent (abstinent) from Molly “10 years, 5 months and 18 days” (736). Unlike Odysseus, the obstacles Bloom faces are psychological (modern) - internal travails instead of Odysseus' external travails. Bloom's only son’s death has become a psychological barrier; as Molly reflects: “we were never the same since” (778). Yet Bloom is optimistic throughout the work - in regard to the possibility of another child, again Molly: ”Ill give him one more chance” (780). Affirmatively (as we grow to know Molly) we find she has given and is willing to continue to give Bloom “one more chance”. Through the course of the (Dublin) day, Bloom experiences “deep frustration, humiliation, fear, punishment and catharsis” (Herring, p.74). Bloom needs to lead himself back, out of self-deception, fantasy, and frustration to Molly’s (and his marriage) bed.

Bloom’s travails come in the Circe chapter and it is imperative (for Joyce) that as readers, we recognize Joyce’s change from Homer's Odyssey - this is Joyce's major rework, deviating from his Greek predecessor. For Odysseus: insight, understanding, enlightenment, and all importantly direction come to Odysseus in his journey to the (ancient Greek) Underworld. For Bloom, the Hades chapter or “the other world” represents an “emptiness of mind”; Joyce was a man grounded (and devoted) to the present world of man's consciousness and unconsciousness. In Ulysses enlightenment comes in the Circe chapter: described though the Joycean technique of hallucination or the discoveries of the "unconscious mind”. Joyce's Circe chapter (a surrealistic one-act Ibsen-like play) is where Bloom finds self-possession - (Joyce makes) Bloom encounter his own psycho-sexual existential questions, rather than finding life's answers in the dead ghosts of his life (the ancient Greek Hades chapter of the dead past).

In the Circe chapter, Bloom confronts and overcomes every major obstacle in his existential/sexual quest: the Molly he serves in Calypso reappears as Bello the whoremistress, Molly’s letter from Boylan and his from Martha are reworked into a series of seductive letters ending in a trial, his sexual infidelities beginning with Lotty Clarke and ending with Gerty McDowell are relived (importantly balanced by Molly’s infidelities) and reconciled, and lastly, Bloom triumphs over whore, Virgin-Goddess, and most importantly himself. Joyce equanimously gives both Molly and Bloom extramarital sexual infidelities - infidelities known by each of the other (as early as the Calypso chapter) Bloom was conscious of what was to come. Of course there will be resolution in marriage, for Molly only needs to feel that Bloom is willing. As we read, Bloom has undergone the travails of his own mind and has emerged Victorious. He has succeeded in his psycho-sexual existential quest. He has arrived at Molly’s bed. Self-possessed. Victorious. Eager.

Molly "I saw he understood or felt what a woman is and I knew I could always get round him...then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down in to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes. (END)".

After publishing Ulysses, Joyce began FINNEGANS WAKE (FW) - Joyce largely stepped out of one work into his next (and last work). The change Joyce made in FW was instead of using Homer's Ulysses as a framework - FW's framework is Giambattista Vico's "La Scienza Nuova's" 4 cyclic stages of history.

Joyce realized that he ended Ulysses wrongly (not in accordance with the Universe) in Molly's bed - Joyce corrects his mistake in FINNEGANS WAKE by incorporating Vico's revelation of restart / recirculation."HCE day" similar to Bloomsday (roughly 24 hrs): Chronologically FW starts with memories "book I:3" of HCE arrested in front of his gated refuge (from MaMaLuJo) unable to enter, unlike Bloom HCE does not enter through the back door, instead HCE is arrested in hours before dawn. Then memories "book I:4" HCE's psychological musings of past travails/guilts (living death, underworld excursion Ulysses ch Hades) while incarcerated in early hours of morning. Followed by memories "book I:2" HCE walks home through Phoenix Park accosted for the time of day (12 noon) which threatens (real/unreal memories, Ulysses ch Nausicaa) his innocent well-being. These 3 chapters in FW are Joyce's major rework to incorporate Vico's revelation of restart/recirculation into FW, Joyce rewrites 3 chapters of Ulysses: When He is denied Her front door, He is in Hell (on earth), when released (from Hell) His odyssey to Her begins again (with His ever-present accompanying internal travails) for She always knows when He is worthy of Her acceptance (their Paradise).

Then "book I:1" Finnegan's afternoon wake at HCE's tavern and retelling memories (books I:2-4). Inside HCE's tavern (his ship) his patrons talk about his family (Norwegian Captain and the Tailor's Daughter), truthful letters (ALP) and fabricated stories (books I:5-8 & II:3); while the children (Shaun, Shem and Iseult) are in and out of the family tavern/home all day taking their lessons (book II:2) and playing about with their friends (Shem's closing dream, book II:1); HCE, as proprietor, defends himself with a self-deprecating apologia before his intoxicated collapse late night (book II:3). HCE dreams on his tavern floor (book II:4); then dreams in his bed (books III:1-3); before intercourse with his wife ALP (book III:4). HCE & ALP's lovemaking dissolution dream (book IV) to awaken to a new day, Joycean Nirvana is attained by ALP's (& HCE's) awaiting Joyce's God "thunderclap" at the beginning of FW's "book I".

FW is aural (oral) history like Homer's Odessey and Celtic folktales - when one pronounces (phonology) FW's words (aloud) there are more languages than just English; also, when one reads (morphology) FW's words almost all the words are "portmanteaus / neologisms" which gives each of FW's "poly-syncretic" words many meanings (universal impermanence, Heisenberg uncertainty/obscurity), each FW syncretic sentence dozens of possible messages, each FW syncretic paragraph hundreds of possible readings, Joyce's rendering of a more expansive English language and multiplicating universal book with coalescing syncretic themes/stories (that responds/opens to each reader's inquiries). Joyce schooled in Christian Jesuit metaphysics (pushed down into the mindfulness of human consciousness) breathes in the spirit of expansive Celtic (Irish) democratic community tavern life where man's stories of life are told. Tavern life teaches the evolution of Joyce's ten "thunderclaps" (one hundred lettered words) pushing man's (technologic) evolution forward from cave man's tales to modern tv media tales: Indra's thunder upheavals: 1) Emergent human technologies (wheel, cloth, etc.), 2) Women's social/stratifying clothing (i.e. civilization's divisions), 3) Effeminate clerical social control (Buddha, Lao-Tze, Christ, Toltec seers, etc.), 4) Feudal degradation (cities/urban plight), 5) Writings disseminated (Gutenberg's press), 6) Renaissance (blooming informed culture), 7) Radio (instantaneous information), 8) Film (disseminated culture), 9) Reciprocating Engine (democratized travel), 10) TV (instantaneous global media culture). Inside the tavern man learns of the purely human (animal) fall, taken down by another human(s) - like animal taken down on the African savanna. A granular reading of FW can render FW as an updated John Milton's Paradise Lost (regurgitated knowledge from the tree, to affirm man's damnation); however, Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species was published in 1859 and Joyce in FW book II clearly walks Shaun, Shem and Iseult through their earthly evolutionary lifetime travails, our mortality is a consequence of Life's evolution. Every page of FW speaks to man's (unconscious biological survival, conscious "racing competitive" social, contemplative aspirational personal) evolution and to Life recirculating (West meets Dzogchen East a "meeting of metaphysical minds") that binds humanity together into the future. Dzogchen (beyond all dualistic polarities) the heart of human consciousness - Joyce's underlying (subcutaneous) arguments refute the "Western curse of metaphysical/mythological damnation", the curse does not exist in the Eastern mind. Like "counting the number of angels on the head of a pin" (Aquinas 1270) Joyce provides a granular/expansive reading of FW as a "defense against all Western adversity" for our conscious and unconscious Western travails. HCE's angst is caused by his community that imposes a Western curse (damnation) upon him that man is not guilty of...to experience Joycean Nirvana, a defense against this man-made guilt is required - for as Zoroaster revealed cosmogonic dualism, evil is mixed with good in man's everyday universal travails (even the Dalai Lama must defend Nirvana rigorously from the most populous authoritarian state in human history).

Joyce's FW celebrates the Joys of Christian/Buddhist diversity of humanity (expansive human consciousness: Gnostic Norwegian Captain, Shem, Archdruid), Brahma (Finnegan, HCE, Shaun), Divine Women (ALP, Iseult, Nuvoletta), his family - and the Sufferings of the inescapable "evil" of Shiva (Buckley), the debilitating harmful sterile intrusive authoritarian institutionalizing damnation (MaMaLuJo, St. Patrick) by Augustine, the manufactured clerical corruptions identified by Luther et al. (since 367 AD) and the burdens of "survival of the fittest" anxiety (modern commerce) met with a Dzogchen Buddhist stance. The (innocent infant) Norwegian Captain (Krishna, HCE), occasionally defensive (Shiva, HCE), though concretized (Brahma, HCE) by community family life (MaMaLuJo) - through spirits (drink) HCE accesses his spirituality (dreams) and through spiritual (cutting through) love-making with ALP (direct approach) they access (their Krishnas), unification with the Unmanifest. Joyce was a Prophet who consumed Man's conscious and spiritual "thoughts and dreams, history and gossip, efforts and failings" - to reveal the joys (Nirvana) and sufferings (Samsara) of Mankind.

Joyce's FW message: Christian/Buddhist omniscient compassion (Christ/Krishna) is eternally joyful and recirculating. Affirmative family (HCE/Brahma, ALP/Divine woman & children) existentiality: life's biological evolution (sex), modern survival (money), constraining community (Dharma, social evolution) are constantly assaulted by inescapable "aggressive insidious vile" corrupt soul(less/sucking) ossified demonic antipathetic attacks. Joycean Nirvana is attained via the Christian/Buddhist affirmative middle way, "beyond polar opposites" the path of Christ/Buddha.

JCB

2 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

MR D A P

Do not buy this Kindle edition!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 6 December 2019

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This Kindle text has become corrupted and is completely useless. Almost every line reads like it has been put through Google Translate into Chinese and then back into English.

It is absolutely disgraceful that Amazon is selling this junk. Ulysses is a great book and I wonder how many people have paid money for this edition and given up on the first page.

As an example from page 1, the text should say:

Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the mirror and then covered the bowl smartly

But instead you get:

Buck Mulligan peeped an instant under the reflect after which protected the bowl smartly.

I hope this review saves someone a lot of frustration.

95 people found this helpful

Sareh

Manipulated edition

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 16 June 2019

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My review is not about the Ulysses of James Joyce, but about this edition. This is not the real book, almost every line has a substitute word which is not written by Joyce, and not grammatically correct either. It is as if a computer dictionary has substituted words with synonyms. Words which often were not common at the time of Joyce and sometimes make no sense in English.

74 people found this helpful

M. Dowden

A Masterpiece

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 8 July 2021

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As we can all see, there have been many editions of this book that have become cross-posted on this site by the owners, so this has become a bit muddled. If you are looking for the best edition, with footnotes and so on, then you cannot really go wrong with the Oxford University Press edition, which also has the full 1922 text. This review is for the e-artnow edition which has no footnotes, but then neither did the book when originally published, and as I have read this a number of times before does not really bother me. Also I should point out that the number one review for this book does not tell you which edition the reviewer was reading, but if you look through their reviews you will see it is for one no longer available on this site.

James Joyce’s masterpiece is always worth reading and is a must read especially for those into modernist literature. In fact, this has become so famous that in Ireland of course you now have Bloomsday – no mean feat in itself (Dublin of course is the place to go). Along with being an important modernist work this is also important for all book lovers as this has so much to offer and is something that you can never become bored with.

Taking Homer and The Odyssey as its inspiration and the structure of this monumental novel, so we have a tale here that takes in a single day. The main protagonist here, Leopold Bloom is a character that first appears in the second part here and being of some Jewish descent this jars with the first part where we read of certain anti-Semitic comments and feelings. We thus follow what happens and meet and hear from various characters over this one day.

Full of incident, considered by some as controversial and obscene at its first publication, so we can all read this nowadays with a more open mind, and reflect upon the genius that Joyce displays here. There is wordplay, puns and motifs, and with so much detail this book comes alive in your hands as you immerse yourself in the pages. We of course have the re-introduction of Stephen Dedalus here who those who have read it will recognise from ‘A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man’, who appears right near the beginning of this book.

With meticulous detail and a lot of thought going into the construction of what is an experimental work, so this takes stream of consciousness to the highest point it can go, which inevitably meant that in some ways Joyce caught himself in a dead end, and that is why Finnegans Wake is so different, but in ways the logical way to go after this monumental work.

If you have never read this before you may find yourself intimidated and unsure of what you are reading, but that is okay, just go with the flow. This only really becomes very difficult if you have to study it, because you will then be expected to recognise every single nuance and piece of wordplay, etc. that goes on.

In all this is a very clever book, that is erudite, full of humour and intelligence and is certainly worth reading. Don’t expect to speed through this though, because there is so much to take in and absorb. If you do not end up liking it, fair enough, but at least you will be one of those who have tried to read it, rather than some who are quite willing to write this off as not very good, despite the fact that they have never even opened it.

21 people found this helpful

Julie Finlayson

Owning it made me feel cleverer for a good 10 minutes.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 7 March 2020

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This is hard to read. Oh my god, so hard to read. I gave up. I tried multiple times. I wanted to read it, I thought that as it was lauded as one of the greatest tomes of all time, that it would do me some good. But no. It instead highlighted the fact that I have the attention span of a spoon, and that high brow literature of this nature is beyond me. If anything, it makes other people stare at you in wonder when they first see it on your book shelf, making you, the owner, feel slightly superior for a fleeting moment in time.

29 people found this helpful

Peter

Keep going...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 9 July 2020

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I gave this 5 stars because it is value for money and it arrived very promptly. I'm now into it, having read the introduction (50+ pages !!), and first 2 chapters (another 50 pages). It is HEAVY going, but I'm determined to finish it, after all, I've plenty of time on my hands :). I found the trick is to read just 10 pages at a time and digest them before proceeding, so far, so good. I hope to be still alive by the end !

9 people found this helpful

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