Dubliners (Wordsworth Classics)

James Joyce's first published book, which he wrote when he was still in his twenties, Dubliners is far removed from the bold experimentalism of his later work, but is essential for understanding the author's development as a writer, and endures as a masterly example of the short-story form. Although ranging considerably in tone, mood and milieu, the fifteen short stories included in this collection all centre around the city of Dublin and its inhabitants at the beginning of the twentieth-century. From the unsettling adventure of two truant schoolboys to the crafty schemes of two con-men, from a young woman's refusal to abandon Ireland and elope with a sailor to a man's moment of clarity during an annual dance party, these stories offer a moving portrait of an entire world and era which has all but disappeared. "His writing is not about something; it is that something itself." - Samuel Beckett. "Its deep power abides in the inextricability of Joyce's masterly control of language and the breadth of his vision." - Eimear McBride - From the Publisher. With just one collection of stories, Joyce left his mark on almost every short-story writer who followed him - Guardian. In Joyce's eyes, Dublin is the whole world - J. G. Ballard. Joyce made me want to write. His use of language was dazzling, impressionistic but controlled, rhythmic, diverse, achingly lyrical. He made people live on the page. He was serious, hilarious, sensitively romantic, filthy and absolutely honest - Carol Birch