This was finally going to be the year I read Ulysses, and for my first time through I decided I was going to just dive in and read it all on my own, without notes or any preparation, and only a vague memory of the larger plot points of the original Homer epic. I did not expect it to take me four months to do it.

I have no fear of big, difficult books — I breezed right through 2666 and Infinite Jest and the complete works of Mark Danielewski — so I thought “just how hard could it be?” The answer is very hard. To understand and experience Ulysses I had to give it my full attention and read it far more closely than I’m used to reading. And both those things are difficult to me to do at the end of the day in bed when I normally read. If I had a glass or wine or two for dinner, forget it, I did not have nearly the focus I needed for this book and I had to put it aside and read other things.

That said I am completely captivated by this book, I don’t regret having spent the time, and I already have plans to re-read it later with better preparation. The writing is loose and impressionistic and there were times when I had feelings and sensations in my head from reading it and I had no idea how they got there. Joyce’s skill with writing is on a level I did not even realize existed, and I have not the faintest clue of how he did it. In that respect, I loved it, just loved it.

Four stars instead of five mostly as a reflection of my own inadequacies in understanding this book. Will re-evaluate on the next reading.