The Most Difficult Book I've Ever Read

[@5050AD]

Ulysses is one of the best books I've ever read. I like the social takes, but for me it is all about streams of consciousness. There are more perfect books, but Ulysses captures the complexity of a human soul in a moment in time. Although Dedalus is more showy, Bloom’s ordinary heroics win you over. It is an exercise in observation - the closer you look at life the more there is to see. There is method in the madness.

[@minuteslater86]

I think Ulysses is a must read for everyone who is interested in the philosophy of language.

[@jackj.pelletier1666]

I'm reading the book right now, and having heard that Circe is written in a chronological chart of the English language, I'm beyond excited to get there. I bought it in a Barcelona bookstore a week ago and decided it was finally time to read through it having devoured and loved The Sound and The Fury and The Brothers Karamazov in the past few weeks. It is my favorite book so far, and nothing can come close to how he writes with language, not even the copious amount of poetry I have read.

[@czgibson3086]

@@jackj.pelletier1666 "having heard that Circe is written in a chronological chart of the English language" You're thinking of Oxen of the Sun. Circe is written like a playscript.

[@OLBK]

100% and then Finnegan:)

[@colmgeiran3476]

Read Joyce one bit at a time. First of all, dip into one story of Dubliners. Eveline is a very accessible one. Thereafter, go onto the rest of the stories. Ready for Portrait of the Artist? This gets you into a novel-sized text. Ulysses is next. How many years have elapsed swimming in Joycean themes and language. At this stage you'll either be burnt out or ready for the final immersion into Joycean linguistic flamboyance:- FW. If you can read FW, all other books will seem like a Ladybird book. Rejoice in James!

[@iiwi758]

Fun fact: Joyce and Woolf were born in the same year (1882) and also died in the same year (1941).

[@daheikkinen]

I wrote my senior thesis on Joyce’s Ulysses. I’ve read it quite a few times, and it is one of the few books I would call nearly inexhaustible. I teach English and was planning on going to Dublin (I have never been) with some of my Russian students right before Covid happened. Sadly it didn’t happen, but I hope to go someday. Just found your channel and subbed, btw!

[@plxnemo]

In light of Finnegans Wake, Ulysses seems to have offered Joyce a proof of concept that he didn't fully realise until The Wake was published. The best moments in Ulysses are scattered, but in them Joyce just flies. And then in The Wake he actually finally flies "wayawayawayawayawayaway". . .

[@jessecatrainham6957]

Language is a central challenge in the hardest book I have ever read as well; "The Visions of Isobel Gowdie," a 500+ page work of cultural anthropology by Emma Wilby. It contains long passages from Isobel's 17th century witch trial confessions, which are in a Scots brogue-ish English that is sometimes barely readable, sometimes utterly dense and alien. There is no phrasebook or Babbel course for this dialect, the reader must simply parse it word by word from the unaltered transcript! Not unlike with the Elizabethan English of Shakespeare, it can sometimes help to read the passages aloud, and the familiar English words can begin to emerge from the thick, phonetically transcribed dialect. I really want to revisit this "most difficult book" again, and apply some of the better learning techniques I'm picking up from your vids, including a Commonplace Book. Happy reading, and keep up the great content!

[@andrewlurndahl]

I'll have to try again with this novel. I put it down last summer about 500 pages in. At the time I felt as if I was forcing myself through a miserable experience. Picked up Journey to the End of the Night, and didn't look back. Watching this has convinced me to try again, after I finish Underworld.

[@SilvanFries]

I think Ulysses describes life in general. It brings up a new perspective to me: How funny, childish, stupid it seems from the outside and how serious it gets when you are stuck in your own thoughts. For example Hades. From the outside the dialogue of all these strange characters is quite comical. But the depth of life is provided by the breathtaking stream of consciousness of Leopold Bloom. Great video! Informal and differentiated arguments, enjoyed watching.

[@葛原亜由美]

My Ulysses is just looking at me from the shelf and waiting for me to pick him up. After this video I feel like it is finally time to give him some attention, thank you!

[@asemicwriter]

Joyce is one of my favorite writers of the 20th century. Even though I don't understand all of what he is writing, the music infused in his prose makes the experience of reading his work highly memorable and satisfying. For me listening to his work as an audio book, being recited with an Irish accent is the best way to take in his books, in front of a fireplace being the ideal location.

[@romigoletto]

Excellent. I loved what you said about fiction transforming us in subconscious way, opening us to alternative experiences. Great analysis!

[@melodianarrativa_Rodrigo]

Waldun, It's probably really harsh to make your videos like this but... Wow, it's amazing to watch it in full screen. Very beautiful images, very beautiful job! Big fan from Brazil!

[@henrikibsen6258]

It's interesting to note that Virginia Woolf changed her tune on Joyce later in life. Her very criticism couldn't help citing class in the brazen way of the downpunching upper classes. I find this sort of humor harmless and natual. Yet I think she was self-conscious enough to acknowledge in the end that the one giving her a run for her money was a working-man who actually said "c**t" in a book.

[@Scott-tf7fn]

I love the aesthetic of your videos. Top notch ‘dark academia’ vibe 👌🏼

[@japjeetmehton810]

Did you read an annotated version or the original version? I think that would change the reading experience. You said that the reader should try to flow with the book and read it intuitively instead of trying to decipher each and every allusion; enjoy the confusion. Fair enough. However, IMO the abrupt nature of Joyce's writing breaks immersion and makes it harder for me to actually "flow" and read the book intuitively. See, confusion can be fun, but it's not fun when you're lost after every paragraph and just reading syllables on a paper with any sort of understanding. It becomes equivalent to noise in music. It's like trying to read a book in another language except you don't actually know how to read that language. That type of confusion isn't fun and the book can't be read intuitively or at all. There are many other books that are easier to read intuitively, intentionally confusing, and more fun. As an average reader who doesn't care about the evolution of art and references (I'm not a lit student) and reads novels mostly for fun, the James Joyce comes across as elitist and pretentious. People who like him say, "Oh, you don't like the book, that's because you don't have the huge background knowledge to read it." or "Oh you're unable to enjoy because you're not intuitively reading it", "It's suppose to be a joke" (as if... only a select few people can see its beauty and others are blind). It reminds me of some of the crazy books our Uni. profs made us read, which no one liked, except the prof, but then he would turn around and say it's because we can't see the beauty which he can. Not to say your opinion of him is invalid or anything, I am just sharing how I felt reading it.

[@erik-sr9bj]

Valid opinion. I like when people discuss and share their views on topics in a civilized way

[@bughead5615]

@@erik-sr9bj I think there's the difference between mass entertainment and art. Art takes intellectual effort to comprehend, that simulates and develops your brain. Entertainment is for killing time, not to say not important. If you're looking for a time killer, you'd rather stick wth wattpad and dan brown my guy. Try not to call art elitist and pretentious just because you're not interested in it enough to put in the effort to comprehend it. If you don't understand a language, and want to, you try to learn it. Calling a language “pretentious” just because you're not willing to work to understand it does not do.

[@erik-sr9bj]

@@bughead5615 dude i haven't slept in 3 days I have no idea what's going on

[@salaciouspancakes]

​@@erik-sr9bj get off the meth

[@RichardShortland-Neal]

I’ll be reading Ulysses for the first time soon and this video was really useful for me.

[@RCWaldun]

Thanks Richard! Stay tuned because I’m working on a new series: Ulysses: the theoretical minimum because I’ve learned so much more about the book since this video and I’m so exited to put it into an in-depth video series. :)

[@RichardShortland-Neal]

@@RCWaldun I’ve also added David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest and Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow into the mix as I want to push my reading. I’ve also picked up Moby Dick so I have something a bit lighter to read as well.

[@christait2549]

Interesting advice especially about listening to an audio book in the background!

[@cookiedestroyer402]

is it possible to pull off dark academia look with jeans?

[@arch_dornan6066]

🙄

[@taimaxxx6]

I recommend you to read "Snow Country" by Yasunari Kawabata who won the Nobel prize for literature.the book illustrates the japanese traditional policy called "Monono Aware"

[@laurasofiachitivamachado2223]

You just gave me a whole new look at the work of Joyce

[@floramew]

I haven't combed through your archive so idk if you've done it already, but another great comic work that feels like it's often taken too seriously (at least, ime) is Don Quixote. At least dq has numerous adaptations that I've been able to watch, which are easier to digest than the original text, but they also lose a lot of the inherent humor imo. It really is a brick, though, and a dense one at that. So I'd love to see you do a video on it (if you haven't already, ofc) but also... probably not just after reading Ulysses, lol.

[@floramew]

Also it's wild to me to even consider putting on an audiobook while reading a book-- from what you said, not like whisper sync that audible does, that can be helpful sometimes. It sounded like you were suggesting a separate book altogether? And I don't doubt that puts you in an interesting headspace, but with my overstimulation & processing issues, that sounds like a quick ticket to my brain going into minor Language_Processing.exe Is Not Responding, and if I kept trying anyway a metaphorical bsod, ie a migraine. Maybe I could do it, but with my issues, I'm not willing to risk it. This isn't to say "suggestion bad," sorry if any of the above comes off that way, I'm bad at regulating tone. I'm just marveling at the way that your experience of the book will always be fundamentally much different than mine-- even more than is true of any book or experience.

[@AlexandraB123]

Thank you so much for this video! It’s so interesting

[@nyashagrace-clarence]

thank you for this, i will surely now pick it up from my tbr, was nervous.

[@duke927]

The only problem I have with James Joyce is his ex-pat existence. Never coming back to the home of his birth I consider weakness. The second problem is his love hate of English which is the conquerors language. And is now pretty much his language. He mastered English to be such a literati but probably was full of guilt writing in the conqueror’s language.

[@gothaxngel5383]

where is episode 1 of this series? whats its name? cant seem to find it

[@RCWaldun]

It’s the video before this one on Henry David Thoreau.

[@t.j.johnsonthewriter]

He speaks on how there isn’t enough time, and how we can never catch up with literature

[@herrklamm1454]

Who does?

[@Dino_Medici]

Damn bro. Ur the real deal. This was lovely

[@RCWaldun]

I try my best. :)

[@dimitrikorsakov2570]

Where is episode 1? I can't find it, anyone got a link?

[@kalkwiese]

I want to read Ulysses! I just wonder whether or not I should read the Odyssey and the Bible first, to understand what's going on

[@kalkwiese]

@@robertjordan355 thank you! I will take this into consideration :)

[@kalkwiese]

@@robertjordan355 Just read it. Very interesting. I've got to say, that a challenge for reading fiction. I totally get when people don't want to do this, but doing it out of free will is a different thing

[@kalkwiese]

@@robertjordan355 you know, I'm not a literature student, but a chemistry student, so I read stuff like the books by Günter Grass for fun. And I want to tackle Ulysses maybe next year :)

[@babetik_]

Actually re-reading Prague cementery by Umberto Eco and I feel same kind of energy for that. I am in love and also I feel urge to buy Ulysess even more 😅

[@zamiadams4343]

Ulysses and Finegans wake are my two favourite books, they are both Disneylands of words.

[@cesares9091]

What were your favorite episodes and why? Any notable paragraph that you liked? Any pun you struggled with?

[@boom_handled]

To preserve the culture of ancient Ireland (which was disappearing under British imperialism & Roman Catholicism) with “Ulysses” James Joyce (a painter with languages, who was working in the context of modernism, a period when everyone was trying to innovate with newness) created a mosaic of a looking glass for his vulgar contemporaries to see themselves as they were, the good and the bad. The best way to flow with this performance of all the flavors of a day in Dublin 1904 (mixed with impossible to trace Judeo-Greek allusions that you don’t have to understand in order to “get” the feeling and the point of the book) is to listen to the Audio format of the masterpiece, because it simulates that effect of you passing through the streets of Dublin 1904 and eavesdropping on different conversations like a time traveler who will surely come out of this magical fun experience with expanded consciousness and a snobbish eye patch.

[@GreatWaterCircus]

Great insight... thanks

[@denk-wegen-2112]

only complaint- there is definitely merit to a second, “meaning-mining” slow reading, wherein allusions and language elements are untangled and examined, but specifically because of the impact that it has on a third, fast again reading. it’s like “getting” the inside jokes that way, opens up new levels to connect to the characters, especially with stephen. good video, though :)

[@knthant6591]

Thank you for sharing great video. Love all of yours

[@oscarmullen]

Little critique: Seamus is pronounced ‘shay-muss’ not ‘sha-muss’.

[@czgibson3086]

Finished Ulysses? Now you're ready for the Wake!

[@Phd366]

Love this series!!!

[@exisnih]

Interesting take, although there's also a lot of hilarity and joy that can be gotten out of understanding Joyce's allusions. At the very least, I think you'll miss something from the book if you don't understand the major things he's parodying. Not to say you need to in order to appreciate it, but I don't think it's at all wrongheaded (or against Joyce's intention) to go into this book with an understanding of mythology, philosophy, theology, and Shakespeare. The way I read it was to build my knowledge first, then tackle the book in the way you suggested (letting myself stumble and laugh over the parts I didn't understand).

[@zainabjamshaid2101]

I’m an avid reader and Ulysses has been on my tbr for quite a long time so what I’d like to ask you is how did you build your knowledge specifically ? I mean did you read his other works, odyssey, or Shakespeare and which ones ?

[@radioheadfanshoshka]

I am curious to know, is English your first language?

[@ThusSpokeHaven]

I like the new style

[@ThusSpokeHaven]

@@robertjordan355 I have, review comes sunday!

[@TheMakersRage]

Very well put together break down 👏

[@retrobluemusic]

i thought finnigans wake was more difficult

[@CriticalDispatches]

Whenever I'm asked how to understand Ulysses, the answer is simple - Be born and raised in Ireland.

[@michaelhurley3171]

Ulysses is to literature what calculus is to math.

[@poetofthestreets]

Best video yet 👌

[@wburris2007]

I am almost finished Dubliners. Only 1 more story to go. I didn't enjoy most of the stories. My plan is to read A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man before moving on to Ulysses. The only language that I am familiar with is Canadian English.

[@ordinarygirl4461]

I haven't read it yet, but now it's in my tbr. It makes me remember the book we have to read to study to the entrance exam for universities here in Brazil - it's called "Os Sertões" by Euclides da Cunha. It has an English version called "Backlands: The Canudos Campaign". The book is separated in three parts and the author describes in the first one the land where everything happened, in the second part, the people that live there, and in the third the "war" itself. The Enligh version of the title gives away what the book talks about, but in portuguese, if you had never heard anything about the book, the title wouldn't say anything about it, but, anyway... Thank you for another great video!

[@marcelmiguelc]

o terror que foi tentar ler isso pro vestibular... até hoje não tive coragem de tentar novamente

[@joaovictor_of]

Eu nunca li os sertões. Obrigado por me lembrar de colocar na lista, que só aumenta hahaha

[@filipemarcelino3754]

As partes que ele descreve a geografia... Insuportável kkkk

[@joycejohnson8043]

I clicked so quick on the video because the thumbnail has my name

[@macnacailli]

It would have been nice if his language/identity angst had caused Joyce to actually learn and use the Irish language; and maybe acknowledge the fourth sphere/world he failed to name, that of Irish myth. He was more colonized than he knew. :-/

[@erik-sr9bj]

lmao, good point

[@macnacailli]

@@robertjordan355 Oh, he took a lesson or two, that’s real commitment to the culture. 😉 Seeing the revival as a ‘retreat’ rather than a pulling forward and enlivening movement is, in itself, drinking the colonial cool-aid - to be modern is to be British, is bs. We’re also repeating two sides of a discourse that was happening back then too, so,I guess nothing changes.🤷‍♂️ Also, I never said I was smarter than Joyce, just that (a century later) we’re more aware of how insidious colonialism is, Any thoughts on what Irish figures could have stood in for Greek figures of Telemachus or for the Cyclopes?

[@sunkintree]

Joyce was aware. In Portrait of the Artist he states that it is his ancestors that allowed themselves to be subjugated, to lose their language, and he sees no reason to inherit their problems (that of saving the lost language)

[@macnacailli]

@@sunkintree Wow, sounds like he chose to side with his oppressors; I guess I don't need to incude this 'west brit' on my Irish reading list.

[@sunkintree]

@@macnacailli Lol, he writes about people who call him "west britons" in one of his Dubliners stories: The Dead. He states pretty clearly in Portrait that he sees himself as an Artist, not as a nationality, which is a net he needs to be wise to not be trapped under, though his cultural heritage in Ireland is unmistakable. No doubt if every Irish citizen were like him there would never be a sovereign Irish nation, but I think his relationship to his country is very interesting. At least give Dubliners a read

[@Shiru_dool]

이러는 이유가 모야..

[@cookiedestroyer402]

well waldun meme'd me into reading Ulysses bought a copy for $4 off ebay, free shipping

[@vvnzihan]

Bruhhh I was here when R.C. had around (100k followers, I think), before he had moved and I left for a bit. Coming back, JEEZ DUDE your video quality just shot up

[@ojoaoleal]

The next (and almost impossible) step is Finnegans Wake 😅🤣 Great video!!

[@catedoge3206]

now read finnegans wake

[@kevinuribe318]

Wonderful quality as usual !

[@TheJudgeandtheJury]

This book has been on my TBR forever. I have “A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man”. Also haven’t read that either.

[@aaruop4920]

BroYour Age, Because I am literature student who lost in thoughts

[@kessler2797]

just quoting others nonstop. nice

[@lindanorris2455]

ERNEST HEMINGWAY: uCK!

[@alexiswright3954]

You've done it again. First with Norweigian Wood, then The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and now Ulysses. I just might run out of room on my shelf because of you.

[@consul5531]

Alot of word come from your mouth

[@lumieredice485]

What is this comment

[@cokonutraw8800]

@@lumieredice485translation: blablah word salad

[@americatruecrime]

❤

[@t.j.johnsonthewriter]

Love it, do Alan Bennett next! Please?

[@KelliHarrah]

What a great video!!!

[@oliviaferguson6276]

Brass telescope

[@sohaila9068]

I reached about halfway thru it and stopped honestly 😭 one day ill get back to it

[@marcelhidalgo1076]

Excellent

[@Psychotron72]

Go back to the other style of video

[@nilishabharadwaj]

📍