A revealing new biography--the first in more than fifty years--of one of the twentieth-century's towering literary figures -- James Joyce, author of "Ulysses." Gordon Bowker draws on material recently come to light and reconsiders the two signal works produced about Joyce's life--Herbert Gorman's authorized biography of 1939 and Richard Ellman's tome of 1959. By binding together more intimately than has ever before been attempted the life and work of this singular artist, Gordon Bowker here gives us a masterful, fresh, eminently readable contribution to our understanding, both of Joyce's personality and of the monumental opus he created. --from publisher description.

Past imperfect, 1800-1882 -- The dawn of consciousness, 1882-1888 -- Willingly to school, 1888-1893 -- Belvedere: in the arms of the Jesuits, 1893-1898 -- Cultivating `the enigma of a manner', 1898-1899 -- Making a reputation, 1900-1902 -- An uncertain future, 1902 -- `Sinister genius', 1902-1903 -- A death in the family, 1903-1904 -- Nora, 1904 -- Birds of passage, 1904-1905 -- At a crossroads, 1905-1906 -- The conception of Ulysses, 1906-1907 -- Going freelance in Trieste, 1907-1909 -- The exile's return, 1909-1910 -- Portrait of the artist in retrospect, 1910-1912 -- A portrait completed; a masterpiece begun, 1912-15 -- The exile in exile, 1915-1917 -- The coming forth by day of Leopold Bloom, 1917-1918 -- Earthly trials, 1918 -- Settling scores and moving on, 1918-1920 -- Ulysses: inside the dismal labyrinth, 1920-1921 -- An eventful labour, 1921-1922 -- Ulysses: birth and afterbirth, 1922-1924 -- A conspiracy of concealment, 1924-1926 -- Fending off the pirates and envisioning the invisible, 1927-1928 -- A French connection, 1929 -- `Always something new on the Robiac front', 1930 -- A very English wedding, 1931 -- Death, birth and madness, 1932-1933 -- Ulysses unbound, 1934-1936 -- The ABC of blind love and ruination, 1936-1938 -- A puzzle for a puzzled world, 1939 -- `Going downhill fast', 1940 -- Death in exile, 1940.