A letter from James Joyce to his American publisher

Exercise 1

Read the letter and say:

• a) Where and when Joyce was when he wrote it.

James Joyce was in Paris on the 2^nd of April 1932, when he wrote it.

• b) Why he wrote it.

He wrote it, because he wanted to tell Mr Cerf, his American publisher, the history of Ulysses' publication in Europe and the complications which followed it in America.

Exercise 2

Summarise the trials and tribulations of the novel Ulysses as described here by Joyce.

When J. Joyce came to Paris in the summer 1920, with the manuscript of Ulysses, his friend Mr Ezra Pound brought him into contact with Miss Sylvia Beach, who had been running a small English bookshop and lending library in Paris; she took the manuscript and she banded it to the printers. Ulysses came out and the first printed copy was sent to him on the 2^nd of February 1922. Shipments of copies of Ulysses were made to America and to Great Britain, with the result that all copies were burnt by the Custom authorities of New York and Folkestone. As a consequence, J. Joyce was unable to acquire the copyright in the United States and people began to print and to sell it clandestinely. This practice provoked a protest and he obtained an injunction in a New York court.