To study James Joyce is largely to study place. Especially in Dubliners, his first book-length publication, Joyce draws his reader into the cultural place of Irish identity. Today, we went on a walking tour around Dublin city to see the locations that Joyce includes in his work. Jonathan led our tour. He’s a young man, maybe mid-thirties, and teaches at Trinity here in Dublin. He carries a cheap, old copy of Dubliners. Pages are marked, and slips of paper are taped to blank pages at the beginnings and ends of chapters. He’s obviously been studying Joyce for years. He tells us stories of Joyce’s childhood, connecting the narrative of Dubliners to the biography of its author through concepts of place.

We stand in a circle, attentive to the words of our guide, trying to imagine how Joyce wold have understood the place of his childhood. We looks towards the end of the street, a place presumably from one of his stories, and consider the biographical implications of that place on Joyce’s text. We end at the Gresham Hotel. Jonathan talks with us about the conclusion of “The Dead.” We contemplate the westward gaze of its characters and the Irish people during Joyce’s day, trying to understand the cultural place that Joyce’s Dubliners would offer the Irish people. Joyce was more interested in the present and future, while so many of his contemporaries (especially those of the Irish literary revival) were concerned with the past. Joyce wanted Ireland to become active players in all facets of the global experience. We walk towards the General Post Office. The rain falls harder. We looks around the busy city street. I consider the connections and disconnections of Joyce’s 1914 Dubliners and Dublin’s 1916 Easter Rising.