From Anne Enright to Dr Seuss: eight of the best books to read at Christmas
These books will leave both adults and children feeling a little bit more festive
James Joyce
Author of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses and Finnegans Wake
Stranger Than Fiction: Lives of the Twentieth-Century Novel by Edwin Frank – A must-buy for fans of fiction writing
While Joyce, Proust and Thomas Mann dominate, the right of authors to write exactly what they are inspired to write is a central issue for Frank
F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is the great Irish diaspora novel
At a time when Irishness in the US is sometimes used to service ‘white power’ messaging, it is imperative to uncover the recognition of past Irish ‘off-whiteness’ in Irish-American writers
The Eyes Have It - Frank McNally on the feast day of St Lucy
The name Lucy shares its origins with the word lux, Latin for light, so it’s no coincidence her feast day coincides with the darkest time of the year
The Lost & Early Writings of James Connolly, 1889-1898, by Conor McCabe: Newly unearthed writings fill out the picture
The material includes rhetorical flourishes, humour and a Joycean fictional ramble through Dublin
Author Georgi Gospodinov: ‘The past is not a good place to live in. And the dealers of the past roam among us’
The Bulgarian author on the dangers of nostalgia, his 2023 Booker-winning novel Time Shelter, and Irish writers he admires
The Dead review: James Joyce’s tragicomedy wraps around the audience in a hugely engaging, immensely accomplished evening
Theatre: Marty Rea and Maeve Fitzgerald star as Gabriel and Gretta Conroy in Louise Lowe’s promenade staging of the beloved Dubliners story
The Dead brought to life: how James Joyce’s celebrated short story is being re-created as an immersive experience
Featuring Marty Rea, Maeve Fitzgerald and Marie Mullen, Louise Lowe’s re-creation is taking over Newman House, on St Stephen’s Green in Dublin
Dublin is a beautiful city held back by naysayers. That needn’t be the case
Dublin 1 could become one of the most exciting neighbourhoods in Europe... if we want
Julianne Moore: ‘When a friend really needs to unburden themselves, what are they asking you to do?’
The Oscar winner stars in The Room Next Door, a euthanasia drama that is Pedro Almodóvar’s first feature in English. It’s an ideal film for her to appear in
A New York Times book critic spent five days in Dublin. Here’s how he got on
The city is a soulful playground for the kind of people who have spectacles on their nose and autumn in their hearts
Sally Rooney: ‘I think I should have read more at university’
Intermezzo author explains how she treats quotation marks in her writing
In times of war, ‘we have a duty to hope, as without hope all is lost’
Unthinkable: Always treat humanity not as a means but as an end, said the philosopher Immanuel Kant
Big Phil is welcomed back into the Fine Gael fold as old foe Leo Varadkar departs the stage
Plus: Alan Shatter seeks to protect the inheritance; a campaign for a Colm Meaney statue in Killarney; and Clare Daly’s political future
Sally Rooney: ‘There is something Christian about my work, even if I would not describe myself as religious’
Intermezzo author reflects on Joyce, how Christianity has shaped her thinking, and her dislike of the limelight
Local history: Cartoonish cruelty betrays a fundamentalist who would not cotton on
The Reverend Psychopath: Suffer Little Children, Terror, Tears and Tragedy: The Mount Cashells and the Notorious Divorce Case of 1876, and Under the Metal Man: Sligo in Yeats
Apartment scheme intended for Joyce’s The Dead building is substandard, says council
Dublin City Council has requested Brimwood UC submit revised drawings with a reduction in the number of proposed units
Arts Council intervenes in row over contentious plans for James Joyce’s ‘The Dead’ house
Planning report on behalf of developer claims residential use of landmark building would be more suitable than as tourist hostel, as was previously authorised
Does Paschal Donohoe haggle? ‘I get enough of that at budget time so I leave shopkeepers in peace’
Me and My Money: Pascal Donohoe is Minister for Public Expenditure
Plan to return house in Usher’s Island that was setting for Joyce’s The Dead to residential use
Brimwood UC has submitted a planning application seeking to develop 10 apartments at the Dublin 8 property
Joyce scholars fear ‘schism’ in their community over sexual harassment allegations
Divisions grow following efforts to handle complaints of inappropriate behaviour
I wanted to write a book about Irish women’s writing. They told me to include men
If anything will embitter you, it is researching and writing a history of Irish women’s writing
Joyce scholar asked to leave Glasgow academic conference over inappropriate behaviour
Fritz Senn barred from James Joyce Symposium in Scotland following allegations he harassed a young woman
Community of Joyce scholars grapples with accusations of misogyny and harassment claims
Allegations of inappropriate behaviour at James Joyce events have led organisers to introduce safeguard to protect participants
In Pictures: Bloomsday 2024
Performances and fun across Dublin for commemoration of the 120th year since the day on which James Joyce’s Ulysses is set
Bloomsday: Minister and Sinn Féin leader among Dubs lining out for ‘Joycean Olympics’
Among €25 T-shirts for sale at James Joyce Centre, those reading ‘Stately Plump Buck Mulligan’ sold out quickly
‘Come back to me when you have an idea nobody has ever attempted before’
My five-year-old and I are heading home to Hungary after a weekend visiting family in Lucan. Our bag is full of chocolate and paints
In a Word....Rejoice
Imagine the attention were Ireland to have a public holiday celebrating a fictional character
Joe Joyce obituary: Award-winning journalist, writer and biographer
Joyce had an astute understanding of government and the political system, of politicians and how they worked
Brianna Parkins: I’m leaving Ireland. I don’t have the energy for life here
This country teased a lightness out of me. But so many people leaving Ireland for Australia is down to more than sunshine
Plan your Bloomsday weekend: What’s on and will I have to eat pork kidneys?
Joycean events to mark the 120th anniversary of Leopold Bloom’s many steps across Dublin are being held across the capital and beyond
Celebrating James Joyce and those fearful Jesuits
Rite & Reason: Joyce knew far more about Catholic dogma than many of his detractors
Yes to Molly Bloomsday weekend: Four days of women-led spectacle in Derry and Donegal
The Ulysses European Odyssey stretches across 18 European cities that have produced artistic responses to the novel
Translated fiction: coming of age in Trieste, tales from 19th century Brittany, and life in a post-Soviet world
Reviewing works by Diego Marani, François-Marie Luzel, María Bastarós, Sasha Salzmann and Anna Stern
Stream-of-consciousness writing: ‘an act of trust’
Some writers seek to delve into the inner workings of their characters’ hearts and minds using this unbridled technique. We talk to four
A sense of foreboding descends on Liveline. Then Joe Duffy takes an unexpected turn
Radio: Talk of saints and babies has the RTÉ broadcaster in flighty mood. Over on Today FM, Matt Cooper has the better show
Books in brief: A ‘Proper’ Woman?; Finnegans Wake, Ulster and Partition; and Tearing Stripes off Zebras
Books by Pat O’Connor and Donal Manning, and an anthology of writing by 33 women
James Joyce was obsessed with the man Nora Barnacle ‘betrayed’ him with before they met
The ghost of Barnacle’s onetime sweetheart Michael Bodkin haunts Joyce’s literature in secret ways, the word ‘bodkin’ always used ambiguously
Write Cut Rewrite: Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven was almost called The Parrot
Fascinating insights into cuts, revisions, alternative endings and censorship in the work of Austen, Joyce, Bennett, Chandler, Kafka, Imlah, Oswald and more
‘Emigrating is one of those life-changing experiences that represent a change from which you can never return’
Laura Kennedy: Every emigrant has a little of Joyce in them — the longing for home and awareness of why some leave
Celebrating Saint Brigid: the younger generations believe and they don’t believe
We have in Brigid the ancient and the ever-new, a symbol of the malleable moment that opens new possibilities
A truly great book is always about now. By that measure, Joyce’s Dubliners is great
Rite & Reason: James Joyce was our Cole Porter, our Bob Dylan, our Bessie Smith, and every story in Dubliners is a song
Tidings of discomfort and Joyce - Frank McNally on recreating a famous Christmas dinner row
I had the privilege of seeing a group of actors recreate the scene, with spine-tingling effect, in the place where it happened
Irish literary magazine scene: Brilliant writing and blurred boundaries
Stinging Fly, The Pig’s Back and Tolka brim with excellent fiction of inclusivity and ambition
Nobel prize-winning author Jon Fosse on giving up alcohol and converting to Catholicism
The Nobel laureate is a master of the short novel – but none of them rivals Septology, an 800-page, single-sentence masterpiece
The United States vs Ulysses review: A clever courtroom drama entertainingly brought to life
Colin Murphy’s script explores the 1933 legal battle to allow US publication of James Joyce’s Ulysses
Budget enhances tax relief for the rich for the benefit of our heritage
Donors can secure 80% of the value of accepted works as a credit against outstanding and future tax bills
Dance First: Finely acted Samuel Beckett biopic undermined by lit-flick cliches
Film review: Gabriel Byrne and Fionn O’Shea play the writer to great effect but the pedestrian writing bogs proceedings
Penelope Unbound by Mary Morrissy: What if Nora Barnacle hadn’t waited on James Joyce?
The problem with the novel is that it remains bound to Joyce
Time waits for Naumann – Frank McNally on a buried tragedy in Joyce’s Ulysses
Investigating a possible allusion to a man not yet deceased
A first look inside the new space at the renovated UCD James Joyce Library
University College Dublin’s James Joyce Library has undergone a renovation that reveals the power of space to sit and think
Dublin Marathon misattributing a quote to Yeats makes a mockery of him and his Nobel Prize
Presenting runners with a tribute to Yeats featuring a line he almost certainly never said is an embarrassing travesty for a city that prides itself on its literary heritage
‘In Ireland I started missing the sun very soon, but I knew it was the place I wanted to be in’
New to the Parish: Ginna Álvarez came here from Mexico almost a year and a half ago
Fintan O’Toole: Sinéad O’Connor’s honesty was a curse for her but a blessing for us
The singer shattered our perfect circle of denial about abuse and trauma. If you had been abused and traumatised, you were probably half-cracked and since you were half-cracked, who could believe you?
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