Dubliners

‘Like an artist working an empty sky into a busy cityscape, or an empty chair into a crowded family portrait, Joyce creates spaces where the reader is left to themselves’ Patrick McGuinness, from his Preface to Dubliners.

Set in the late 19th and early 20th-century, Dubliners is made up of fifteen stories, which all sit within the realm of realism, with easily identifiable streets and a cartographic identity of the city. Alike Joyce’s other works, the collection was repeatedly rejected by publishers and he received accusations of obscurity and obscenity before it finally appeared in print on 15 June 1914. This was five years after a contract was signed, six weeks before the outbreak of World War One, and at a time when Ireland was under British Home Rule. We find an intricate account of the lives of the city’s inhabitants in Joyce’s haunted and bleak vision of Dublin.

Discover these stories for the first time here, or read them afresh, and marvel at the unique stories that Joyce was able to capture, and make timeless, for us all.