James Joyce

Born in Dublin on February 2, 1882, James Joyce became one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. He was educated in Jesuit schools and at University College Dublin, and his early life in Ireland gave him the people, places, and tensions that would power much of his fiction.

After leaving Ireland, he lived for long periods in cities including Trieste, Zürich, and Paris. Even while abroad, he kept returning to Dublin in his imagination, making the city the vivid center of works such as Dubliners and Ulysses. His writing is famous for its sharp detail, deep feeling, and daring experiments with language and consciousness.

Joyce published the story collection Dubliners in 1914, followed by the novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in 1916. Ulysses, published in 1922, became his most celebrated work, and Finnegans Wake in 1939 pushed his linguistic inventiveness even further. He died in Zürich on January 13, 1941, but his work continues to challenge, surprise, and inspire readers around the world.