Music and Sound in the Life and Literature of James Joyce

Music and Sound in the Life and Literature of James Joyce: Joyces Noyces offers a fresh perspective on the Irish writer James Joyces much-noted obsession with music. This book provides an overview of a century-old critical tradition focused on Joyce and music, as well as six in-depth case studies which revisit material from the writers career in the light of new and emerging theories. Considering both Irish cultural history and the European art music tradition, the book combines approaches from cultural musicology, critical theory, sound studies and Irish studies. Chapters explore Joyces use of repetition, his response to literary Wagnerism, the role and status of music in the aesthetic and political debates of the fin de sicle, music and cultural nationalism, ubiquitous urban sound and shanty aesthetics. Gerry Smyth revitalizes Joyces work in relation to the noisy world in which the author wrote (and his audience read) his work.