James Joyce and Absolute Music

Drawing on draft manuscripts and other archival material <i>James Joyce and Absolute Music</i> explores Joyce's deep engagement with musical structure and his participation in the growing modernist discourse surrounding 19th-century musical forms. Michelle Witen examines Joyce's claim of having structured the Sirens+? episode of his masterpiece <i>Ulysses</i> as a <i>fuga per canonem</i> and his changing musical project from his early works such as <i>Dubliners </i>and <i>A </i><i>Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man</i>. Informed by a deep understanding of music theory and history the book goes on to consider the pure music+? of Joyce's final work <i>Finnegans Wake</i>. Demonstrating the importance of music to Joyce this ground-breaking study reveals new depths to this enduring body of work.